Los Angeles County’s version of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s signature mental health court program is showing new signs of life, with officials reporting a sharp rise in petitions after a sluggish first couple of years.
CARE Court, formally known as the Community Assistance, Recovery and Empowerment Act, lets family members, first responders and others petition a judge to connect someone suffering from a serious untreated mental illness — conditions like schizophrenia — with a voluntary community-based treatment plan. If that voluntary arrangement doesn’t hold, a judge has the authority to order the person into treatment.
L.A. County launched its program in December 2023, but for much of its existence it has fallen well short of the caseload state officials originally predicted. Between December 2023 and June of this year, only 1,111 petitions were filed countywide — a fraction of the roughly 3,800 cases per year that state projections had anticipated.
That trend appears to be shifting. County officials say petitions climbed by about 85% between November and March, with 68 filed in March alone.
Martin Jones, a program manager with the county’s Department of Mental Health, credits the uptick to closer coordination with hospitals, first responders and other agencies that can identify and refer people who might benefit from the program.
“We’re doing quite a bit of work to put tools in their hands to also help them identify and refer folks to us who might benefit from the support,” Jones told LAist. “I think we’re approaching the project from several fronts, and we’re seeing the results of that.”
Jones also pointed to a change that took effect in January, which expanded the program’s diagnostic criteria to include people with bipolar I disorder accompanied by psychotic features. That broader eligibility, he said, has contributed to the recent surge in filings.
Supporters of CARE Court, a priority initiative for Newsom, argue it offers a more structured but less restrictive path toward stabilizing people with severe mental illness, and they view the rise in petitions as evidence the program is finally catching on.
Not everyone is convinced the growth is meaningful. Some mental health advocates and civil liberties groups say the numbers obscure a lack of real progress.
“The number of petitions says nothing about outcomes, which is the real point of the program,” said Eve Garrow, a policy analyst with the ACLU of Southern California. “Positive outcomes are really minuscule compared to the population in need.”
Statewide data show roughly half of all CARE Court petitions are ultimately dismissed. County officials counter that more than 4,000 people across California have instead been connected to alternative county mental health services when a formal CARE agreement wasn’t the right fit.
Critics, including Garrow, have also raised concerns about cost. A review by the Assembly Committee on the Judiciary found that in fiscal year 2024, the roughly 100 people enrolled in CARE Court statewide cost an average of about $713,000 per participant.
Garrow argues the program sidesteps the deeper issue — a chronically underfunded mental and behavioral health system.
“Basically what it does is it slaps a court order onto a broken system instead of fixing the system,” she said.
As for outcomes in L.A. County specifically, the Department of Mental Health reports that through June, 21 participants had completed the program’s 12-month track, with four more expected to graduate within the coming year. The department also noted that 63% of participants in the county have chosen to keep receiving CARE Court services rather than complete the program and exit.
Original source: CalMatters
