Support for a statewide proposition to build new supportive housing units and expand substance abuse and mental health treatment and re-allocate funds for mental and behavioral health services was leading by a slim margin in early returns following Tuesday’s primary election.
Proponents of the initiative, Proposition 1 on Tuesday’s ballot, say its $6.38 billion bond measure will help the state’s bulging population of unhoused residents. It is projected to provide 6,800 new treatment beds and 4,350 new units of housing, according to state estimates. The state would pay down the bonds with 30 annual $310 million payments, according to the state Legislative Analyst’s Office.
Opponents say the measure would limit counties’ ability to spend mental health funds as they see fit, and trample on the rights of people struggling with behavioral health problems by making it easier to force them into treatment.
As of Wednesday afternoon, “yes” votes were ahead by just two tenths of a point with 86% of all votes counted, according to early results reported by the Associated Press. That lead is a decrease from the roughly six-point lead the “yeses” held Tuesday evening when fewer votes had been counted.
Results released so far this week do not include all of the ballots that were cast, and the measure’s ultimate success or failure might not be known for several days. The election results should be certified by April 12, according to the Secretary of the State’s website.
The measure is backed by Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom. His fundraising committee and others have raised more than $21 million to get the measure passed, according to state campaign finance records.
The measure is opposed by disability rights groups as well as the ACLU and the League of Women Voters. But opponents have raised only $1,000, contributed by one person, state records show.
If enacted, Proposition 1 would also shrink a pool of money counties are already using for mental health services and institute new requirements on how they use it. That funding comes from the Mental Health Services Act (MHSA), a tax enacted in 2004 on households with more than $1 million in annual income.
The proposition would shift 5%, or roughly $140 million, of funding from the tax out of county coffers and into statewide programs. Counties would be required to devote 30% of the money they do receive to housing interventions.
That would nearly triple the amount of MHSA funds Alameda County currently devotes to housing from about $15 million to just over $43 million. The county’s allotment of MHSA funds for the next fiscal year is roughly $129 million, not counting unspent funds from previous years, according to county estimates.
Berkeley’s public health agency stands alone and receives some of the funding in question directly — around $9 million annually, according to the city’s Department of Health, Housing and Community Services. Berkeley, too, would be subject to the new requirements if the proposition passes.
Supporters of the initiative, including many associations of first responders and medical workers, hope the new facilities Proposition 1 would fund will help alleviate the state’s struggle to house people. While California is home to roughly 12% of the country’s population, it is also home to roughly 30% of Americans without housing and half of all unsheltered Americans, according to a UCSF study from 2023.
“Proposition 1 is an initiative that will divert homeless individuals away from tents that line many streets in our state toward the supportive housing and services they need,” according to California Professional Firefighters’ endorsement. “Prop 1 puts the people who need it the most into treatment, not leave them in tents to suffer.”
Opponents of the proposition have warned that, if successful, the new funding system will allow the state to lock more people up against their wills when there are other means of treatment.
“The disturbing consequences will be more people subjected to involuntary detention and treatment without any evidence to support this approach,” the group Disability Rights California said in a statement.
Disability Rights California also opposes the proposition’s new rules regarding how counties spend funding from the mental health tax, saying they will likely mean a reduction in some existing services that patients need.
In approving the measure for the ballot, the legislature “ignored arguments from diverse community-based organizations and health care and civil rights advocates,” the League of Women Voters of California wrote in opposition to the proposition. “These groups contend that community-based care is more effective than institutionalization.”
