Mental Health

CalMatters and CatchLight are partnering on a three-year initiative to tell powerful stories about mental health in California. We’ll spotlight solutions, personal stories, investigate systems, and bring greater awareness to this historically stigmatized topic. This initiative is supported by:

Enlight Foundation
California Health Care Foundation
Flourish Impact Fund
Lisa Stone Pritzker Family Foundation
Resonance Philanthropies
Sarlo Family Foundation
Sand Hill Foundation
Stuart Foundation

A person sits indoors, seen through a window with soft reflections of trees and foliage overlaying the glass, looking slightly downward with a quiet, contemplative expression as warm autumn colors fill the background.

Mental Health

‘False hope’: Why families who celebrated Newsom’s new mental health court feel let down by it

Californians with loved ones in the throes of severe mental illness embraced Gov. Newsom's CARE Court and helped him sign it into law. Two years later, some of them say little has changed.

Jocelyn Wiener

• December 17, 2025

A government official speaks at a podium with a sign reading “Treatment Not Tents,” flanked by two other officials, with U.S. and California flags visible behind them.

Mental Health

How Gavin Newsom’s CARE Court lost its teeth in the California Legislature

Gov. Newsom called for accountability on mental health and homelessness when he proposed his CARE Court program. What became law, however, pleased almost no one.

Yue Stella Yu

and

Erica Yee

• December 17, 2025

A view of two silhouettes of students walking through a dark hallway of a school with light shining through a doorway at the end of the hallway. One silhouette holds a lunch box and a water bottle in one hand.

Commentary

California’s schools can’t afford to cut counselors. They keep kids alive in dangerous times

With suicide and violence stalking students, counselors are often the first to notice kids in trouble. They're also among the first to lose their jobs to budget cuts.

By Ayo Banjo • December 9, 2025

A person jogs down a residential street lined with blooming jacaranda trees. Purple flowers cover the branches and the ground. The runner wears a dark tank top and patterned leggings, moving forward with a focused expression. Parked cars line both sides of the street under the bright, filtered sunlight.

Commentary

In a ‘sober active’ community, I can outrun my addiction

Addiction recovery starts when California creates spaces to replace isolation with belonging, where people can gain the confidence to change their lives..

By Raelynn Franklin • December 5, 2025

Two people sit across from each other at an outdoor table on a college campus, talking quietly. Leaves are scattered on the ground, and a brick archway and greenery appear in the background. Another person sits further behind them, partially visible.

Commentary

California’s rural youth struggle alone with mental health. Their peers could learn to help them

Suicide is 50% higher among rural young people than among others in urban or suburban environments. Many also live too far to get counseling.

By Alonzia Quinn • November 19, 2025

A narrow prison cell with yellow-painted walls contains a stainless steel sink and toilet unit, a small white bucket on the floor, and a black metal bed frame without a mattress. Above the sink, a wall-mounted shelf holds a few items, including toilet paper and a towel. Harsh wall-mounted lights cast strong illumination, highlighting the chipped paint and worn surfaces throughout the confined space.

Justice

California prisoners sleep with ‘one eye open’. Should they have their own cells?

Potentially volatile cellmates are a fact of life in California prisons. That may change as the state's incarcerated population declines, freeing up space for single-person quarters.

Joe Garcia

• November 3, 2025

The light from a laptop illuminates the face of a person wearing a lavender sweater and sitting on a couch during an evening.

Economy

Half a million young Californians aren’t in school or work. Most are men

Thousands of men in California are neither working nor in school. Gov. Gavin Newsom has called it a “crisis,” both for the labor market and for men’s mental health.

Adam Echelman

• October 29, 2025

Preschool students sit on a green and blue rug as adults surrounded while they read a book.

Education

How the tiniest domestic violence survivors heal with the help of a San Diego preschool

A preschool in San Diego focuses on children who've experienced trauma, the "little guys". Mi Escuelita now has a long record of helping kids and families move forward.

Adriana Heldiz

• October 16, 2025

Young students, wearing blue graduation cap and gowns, cheer and jump as they perform a song during a graduation ceremony on the lawn of a field.

Education

This preschool serves kids with traumatic backgrounds. Here’s what researchers learned from them

Children with traumatic experiences who attend Mi Escuelita preschool in San Diego graduate ready for kindergarten and continue to do well in school for years.

Adriana Heldiz

and

Adam Ashton

• October 16, 2025

A teacher — wearing a leopard-print dress and a black puffy vest — leans down to comfort a student while they cry during a school activity.

Education

How to get help if you know a California child who experienced serious trauma

Know a young child who experienced serious trauma? Californians can find resources through their doctors, preschools and First 5. Here's how to get started.

Adriana Heldiz

and

Adam Ashton

• October 16, 2025