November 14, 2024

CARE Act Early Implementation Report

Pursuant to Assembly Bill 102 (Ting, Budget Act of 2023), the Department of Health Care Services (DHCS), in consultation with the Judicial Council of California (JC), is required to produce a report on key data for each court to determine appropriate funding needs, which is due to the Legislature by December 1, 2024. This is an early implementation report and does not include key outcome metrics necessary to measure the impact of the CARE Act. Additional outcome metrics will be included in the Annual CARE Act Report to be published by July 2025. Courts that have implemented the CARE Act are required to report monthly aggregate data to JC, which is then compiled and submitted to DHCS quarterly. This report covers the first nine months, October 1, 2023, through June 30, 2024 (noting that this includes seven months of Los Angeles County who elected to open their CARE Court on December 1, 2023, one year ahead of the required implementation). The CARE Act Early Implementation Report provides the following court data:

• Petitions submitted
• Petitions dismissed
• CARE Act participants
• CARE Court hearings held

Upcoming Training and Technical Assistance (TTA) and New Resources  

Additional TA Office Hours

The CARE TTA team will be facilitating a series of informal office hours for county behavioral health (BH) agencies with subject matter experts (SMEs) from county teams and representatives from HMA’s legal and data teams, Judicial Council of California (JC), and other key partners. Upcoming office hours will focus on implementation support topics. These sessions will be valuable opportunities to engage with SMEs and other county BH and court staff, ask questions, and share best practices. For more information related to these office hours, please email info@care-act.org.

Quarter 4 Rural Affinity Group TA Call – Wednesday, November 20 at 11 a.m.

County BH staff are invited to the next Rural Affinity Group TA Call scheduled for Wednesday, November 20 from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. PT. Confirmed panelists include representatives from Kings, Glenn, Amador, Mendocino, and Nevada counties. Register here for the TA call.

New Training Materials: Role of Public Guardians & Conservators in Petitioning Training

The Role of Public Guardians & Conservators Training provides an overview of the CARE process and the role of public guardians and conservators. The training features learnings from Brock Kolby (Deputy Director at Tuolumne County Behavioral Health Department) and Melody Culhane (Behavioral Health Program Manager for CARE at San Diego Behavioral Health Services).

New Brief: Billing Health Plans for CARE Act Activities

This brief is designed to help providers understand and implement effective strategies and processes for health plan/managed care plan (MCP) billing activities related to services and supports provided when a beneficiary is participating in the CARE process.

Housing and Community Supports Technical Assistance Activities

The HMA Housing team collaborates with counties to enhance housing resources and streamline processes through TA. This TA includes conducting housing landscape assessments, analyzing local needs, interagency facilitation to improve collaboration, documenting and reviewing housing inventories, creating tailored communication products, and developing workflows to quickly establish a housing plan. This TA is intended to help counties improve community engagement, establish workflows for CARE plans, and strengthen tools and partnerships for CARE Act housing needs. The housing TA options are available here.

2025 CARE Act Working Group Schedule

The 2025 CARE Act Working Group meeting dates have been scheduled as follows:

• Meeting 1 – February 12, 2025 – 10:00 am – 3:00 pm
• Meeting 2 – May 21, 2025 – 10:00 am – 3:00 pm
• Meeting 3 – August 27, 2025 – 10:00 am – 3:00 pm
• Meeting 4 – November 19, 2025 – 10:00 am – 3:00 pm

Meeting notices and agendas for each meeting will be available on the CARE Act Working Group website. In addition, the 2024 Quarter 3 Update is now available on the CARE Act website. The quarterly update summarizes progress made on CARE Act implementation through September 2024, including recently developed resources and upcoming activities.