U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto is demanding answers after Elon Musk’s DOGE cut federal funding for mental health services and immunization, causing nearly 50 people to lose their jobs and further straining the state’s already-stressed mental health and immunization infrastructure. About 474,000 Nevadans experience mental health conditions, and the state ranks among the nation’s worst for access to care.
Following the Trump Administration’s decision to cut these funds, the Renown Health Crisis Care Center, Reno’s only dedicated mental health crisis center, has had to shut down. Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve said she was “irate” at the closure and planned to reach out to Lombardo’s office to ask why federal funds for mental health programs weren’t secured before the cuts were announced. Schieve said, “we all knew there was a possibility of ARPA funds being sent back” and questioned, “why the money wasn’t out the door knowing that this initiative to suspend everything was there?”
In his State of the State Address, Joe Lombardo said his “first priority” for spending the remaining American Rescue Plan (ARPA) funds would be towards mental health programs. Now, according to a report from the Nevada Independent, terminated grants in Nevada include community mental health block grants funded through the same American Rescue Plan dollars Lombardo failed to spend. Lombardo refuses to stand up for Donald Trump even when it guts health care services and puts on display his and his administration’s incompetence as they fail to achieve his “first priority.”
Read more below:
Nevada Independent: Nevada senator demands answers after DOGE-led cuts to state health care grants
Key points:
- Following the early termination of federal grants supporting immunization and mental health in Nevada, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) has sent a letter to federal officials demanding to know the rationale behind the cuts.
- In the Thursday letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Cortez Masto wrote that the grant terminations could have a devastating effect on the state’s already-stressed mental health and immunization infrastructure. The Nevada Independent reported in March that the canceled grants caused nearly 50 people to lose their jobs and stemmed from a decision made by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
- Cortez Masto requested Kennedy explain why the cuts were made, share any analyses done to determine the effect of the grant terminations and what the department planned to do to ensure that Nevada continues to receive necessary services.
- “This abrupt decision to cut critical, already-allocated funding is alarming and poses a direct threat to the mental health and well-being of Nevadans,” Cortez Masto wrote.
- The terminated grants in Nevada include community mental health block grants funded through the American Rescue Plan Act. These grants, which were set to expire in September, are specifically designed to provide mental health care to adults with serious mental illness and children with “severe emotional disturbances,” according to the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
- State officials indicated the grant terminations stemmed from a directive from DOGE that informed the state the grants were “no longer necessary” because they were pandemic-era relief programs. Cortez Masto disagreed with the assertion, writing that the funding went “far beyond pandemic recovery” and that they helped boost Nevada’s community behavioral health workforce, support community-based initiatives and ensure continuity of care.
- “This funding, approved by Congress, has been instrumental in strengthening Nevada’s mental health infrastructure across our urban cities, rural communities, and tribal lands,” she wrote.
- Her words echo the sentiments of public health leaders in Nevada who have said the pandemic relief funds were vital in supporting the state’s public health infrastructure, which often lags near the bottom of nationwide rankings for mental health, vaccination rates and health care access. Nevada received $2.7 billion in flexible pandemic aid and allocated about $114 million for mental health programs.
Reno Gazette Journal: Federal cuts close Reno mental health crisis center — Mayor Hillary Schieve wants answers
Key points:
- Services at Reno’s only dedicated mental health crisis center have been suspended in the wake of federal cuts. “After thoughtful consideration and a careful review of current circumstances, services have been suspended at the Renown Crisis Care Center,” Renown Health announced the evening of April 10.
- The crisis center was a place where law enforcement officers, paramedics and other first responders could bring someone experiencing serious mental health issues. It opened in February on Galletti Way in Sparks on the Northern Nevada Adult Mental Health campus. During the center’s ramp-up phase, it assessed and treated 80 adults for mental health or substance abuse issues or both, Renown said. It’d been projected to serve more than 7,000 adults annually, or 134 patients a week.
- “I am irate,” Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve told the Reno Gazette Journal. “I worked seven years on this project. This was something that we needed so desperately in the community. This was not an easy lift.”
- Schieve told the RGJ that first responders will feel the closure’s effects because they will have to return to a revolving-door system of repeatedly taking people to emergency rooms and the Washoe County jail instead of getting them the targeted services they need. “We spend a lot of money on that revolving door,” she said. “And guess where they get treated instead? Jail. We are treating some of our country’s sickest patients in our jails, and it’s an enormous amount of resources to the community and taxpayers when all we’re doing is trying to arrest our way out of this mental healthcare crisis.”
- Schieve said she planned to reach out to Lombardo’s office to ask why federal funds for mental health programs weren’t secured before the cuts were announced. “We all knew there was a possibility of ARPA funds being sent back,” she said, referring to the American Rescue Plan Act signed by President Joe Biden in 2021. Its funds were used for the Renown Crisis Care Center and other Nevada mental health programs. “I would like to know why the money wasn’t out the door knowing that this initiative to suspend everything was there?”
- Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto sent a letter on April 11 to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services secretary, expressing concern over “the sudden termination of the block grants for Community Mental Health Services.” […] “Federal mental health dollars serve as a lifeline, helping state and local agencies deliver essential services, particularly in rural and underserved areas.”
- About 474,000 Nevadans experience mental health conditions, and the state ranks among the nation’s worst for access to care. Sen. Cortez Masto asked Kennedy why the mental health funding was terminated before its scheduled expiration in September and how people who relied on programs dependent on federal funds will avoid gaps in their care.
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