Dr. Violette Cloud, Behavioral Health Services Division Director Nick Boukas, Health Care Authority Secretary Kari Armijo and Administrative Office of the Courts Director Karl Reifsteck question state officials during a Behavioral Health Reform and Investment Act Executive Committee meeting in Santa Fe on Aug. 5, 2025. (Photo by Austin Fisher)
The panel in charge of New Mexico’s mental health reforms on Tuesday approved the initial steps toward creating a locally driven system for treating mental health diagnoses.
New Mexico this year enacted Senate Bill 3, which is meant to rebuild the state’s systems for treating mental health diagnoses by allowing local communities to identify the resources they need. The new law created the Behavioral Health Reform and Investment Act Executive Committee, and made it responsible for implementing it.
The five-member committee in June adopted 13 “behavioral health regions,” in which counties, municipalities, Native American nations and community health organizations are expected to work together.
On Tuesday, the committee unanimously voted to endorse a project timeline for the regions created by Behavioral Health Integration and Reform Administrator Esperanza Lucero. She told them the overarching goals include strengthening capacity for mental health treatment and finding solutions that will be sustainable in the long-run.
“We want this to be the last reform that New Mexico goes through,” Lucero said.
Next week, the AOC expects to open up applications for county managers in each region to designate one entity — either a government or a nongovernmental organization — responsible for identifying gaps between which mental health services exist and what their communities need, Lucero told the committee.
Each region will then hold a workshop at which they will vote on up to five local priorities, which will inform an application to the committee for grant funding, Lucero said. Some regions may have similar priorities, she said, but the way they address them will be unique.
Those solutions may include, for example, medication assisted treatment for substance use disorder; newly built community mental health centers; or psychosocial rehabilitation services. Those are some of the most needed mental health services in New Mexico, according to initial findings from a third-party study conducted by Public Consulting Group presented to the committee by HCA Director of Behavioral Health Transformation and Innovation Kristie Brooks.
Lucero said she hopes some regions will hold workshops and ask for grants by the end of this year, and the rest will apply in 2026. The grants will come out of a specific pot of money totaling approximately $209 million approved by lawmakers in the state government’s annual budget in the most recent session, according to a breakdown presented to the committee by Legislative Finance Committee Principal Analyst Ruby Ann Esquibel.
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