Existing law requires the State Department of Health Care Services to collect and publish annually quantitative information concerning the operation of various provisions relating to community mental health services, including the number of persons admitted for evaluation and treatment for certain periods, transferred to mental health facilities, or for whom certain conservatorships are established, as specified. Existing law requires each local mental health director, and each facility providing services to persons under those provisions, to provide the department, upon its request, with any information, records, and reports that the department deems necessary for purposes of the data collection and publication.

This bill would additionally require the department to collect data quarterly and publish, on or before May 1 of each year, a report including quantitative, deidentified information relating to, among other things, the number of persons in designated and approved facilities admitted or detained for 72-hour evaluation and treatment, clinical outcomes and services for certain individuals, waiting periods prior to receiving an evaluation or treatment services in a designated and approved facility, demographic data of those receiving care, the number of all county-contracted beds, and an assessment of the disproportionate use of detentions and conservatorships on various groups. The bill would specify that the information be from each county for some of those data.

The bill would require the Judicial Council to provide the department, by October 1 of each year, with data from each superior court to complete the report, including, among other things, the number and outcomes of certification review hearings, petitions for writs of habeas corpus, and judicial review hearings. The bill would, beginning with the report due May 1, 2025, require the report to also include the progress that has been made on implementing recommendations from prior reports. The bill would require the department to make the report publicly available on the department’s internet website. The bill would require each county behavioral health director or other entity involved in implementing the provisions relating to detention, assessment, evaluation, or treatment for up to 72 hours to provide data as prescribed by the department. The bill would authorize the department to impose a plan of correction against a facility or county that fails to submit data timely or as required.

The bill would authorize the department to implement these provisions through information notices or other similar written instructions. The bill would exempt contracts entered into by the department for purposes of these provisions from certain contract-related requirements.

To the extent that the bill would increase the duties of county behavioral health directors, facilities of local entities, or any other local entities with regard to providing the department with new types of data, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.

This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.