Alex Briscoe

Alex Briscoe didn’t know much about how local governments pay for mental health care when he joined Alameda County’s Health Care Services Agency in 2004. But he knew there was a problem.

In a paper released today, the California Children’s Trust and the First 5 Center for Children’s Policy propose a paradigm shift in how California conceptualizes, delivers and funds a system of care for MediCal eligible infants, toddlers and their families.

There are about 6 million children enrolled in California’s Medicaid program. And although every single one of them is eligible for mental health screening and services, only four of every 100 received even one mental health visit last year.

Last Friday, a handful of California lawmakers, experts in children’s mental health and advocates assembled at West Oakland’s Lincoln Child Center for a forum on children’s mental health policy. The gathering, which packed Lincoln’s auditorium, was more a chance to publicly address children’s mental health issues than commence on substantive changes.

California has compensated several counties retroactively for expenditures on Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment (EPSDT), and is assuring counties that obligations under the federally mandated program have not been dropped in their laps.

Lead child welfare advocates in California fear that the state’s social services “Realignment,” the conversion of former state programs into a block grant for counties, will stunt the already-sluggish attempt to expand and improve mental health screening and treatment of foster youth and other poor children.