San Diego County supervisors are considering a $2.76 billion spending plan for the San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported May 21.
The plan would be used to add new mental health services, fund homeless shelters and develop affordable housing.
The investment into the HHS would be the largest part of the area's $7.15 billion budget for the fiscal year beginning July 1.
Funding will be used to add staff to mental healthcare departments, medical services, child welfare services, and public assistance and homelessness programs, officials told the Union-Tribune.
"In this year’s budget, we are doing more to tackle homelessness than ever before, including $10 million to help our 18 incorporated cities open new shelters," Nathan Fletcher, Board of Supervisors chair, said in a video about the draft budget. "In the next year, the county will open eight affordable housing developments, a record for any year in county history, which means more than 1,000 individuals will have access to an affordable home."
The $2.76 billion HHS budget would increase the Behavioral Health Services budget from $818 million to $889 million and add 94 staff members.
Funding would also be dedicated to making health services more accessible to youth, homeless people and people in the criminal justice system who lack access to care, create programs for LBGTQ youth and provide middle school students mental health screenings.
Part would be put to increasing mobile crisis response teams, which send mental health professionals to nonviolent emergencies, Behavioral Health Director Luke Bergmann, PhD, told the Union-Tribune.