Just a week after the state awarded $25 million for a new behavioral health facility in San Mateo, some county supervisors are yanking their support after a barrage of resident complaints over potential increases in crime, worsening congestion and a degradation of the neighborhood and downtown areas.
The county has been without a sobering station since May, when one of the county’s top behavioral health providers StarVista shut down, which also led to the closure of other services as a result, including counseling services, its early childhood department, DUI program and a shelter for teens and young adults. Caminar, one of the other top mental health providers, has also closed several of its programs over the past two years, including the county’s only long-term residential crisis center.
The award was part of the third and final round of funding from Proposition 1, a 2024 ballot measure that goes toward building and upgrading critical behavioral health infrastructure and facilities throughout the state. For nonprofits like Horizon Services, and the county’s Behavioral Health and Recovery Services Division, the measure offered a unique opportunity to build an integrated facility that would otherwise have further entrenched treatment gaps or fallen on the county to fund.
“It’s once-in-a-generation funding,” said Jaime Campos, CEO of Horizon Services, the nonprofit that applied for the state grant to fund a 69-bed treatment facility in San Mateo.
The proposed project would be located at 101 N. El Camino Real, along the county’s major corridor, which sits at the edge of the Baywood neighborhood, and the commercial downtown district. It would comprise 16 sobering center beds — a jail alternative for nonviolent DUI offenders — 17 detox beds and 36 beds for residential treatment services with medical support.
The facility would prohibit loitering, alcohol and illicit substances. Vehicles are not allowed on site.
But residents have swiftly, and in no uncertain terms, said they don’t want the facility near their homes nor schools — showing up in large numbers to council meetings, Behavioral Health Commission sessions and community meetings in recent weeks — citing traffic congestion and illicit behavior as some of the top concerns.
San Mateo resident Taso Zografos said he’s uncomfortable with the lack of information about the project and believes that residents, including children and senior citizens, could be at risk if clients with substance abuse disorder are living nearby.
“Are they roaming the city? Are they able to walk into an elementary schoolyard nearby? They could walk outside and continue to do drugs,” Zografos said. “They might have drugs delivered to the facility based on a phone call.”
Zografos said at this stage, he can’t imagine getting behind the project unless they “move all the school kids away from this facility.”
The closest school is about two blocks away from the proposed site.
Meeting participants have floated the possibility that the area could eventually resemble San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood and asserted the city’s vibrant downtown and the adjacent Baywood area — one of the city’s most affluent neighborhoods — would change for the worse.
“Choosing this facility is a one-way door to change our residential area as well as … our downtown area forever,” resident Christina Johnson said during the public comment period at a recent City Council meeting. “We have lemonade stands. It’s a very [unfortunate] impact on how we feel about our beautiful neighborhood.”
And while the Board of Supervisors approved matching funds back in October as part of a routine meeting agenda item, supervisors have received so much backlash that some of them, including supervisors Jackie Speier, David Canepa and Ray Mueller, are now reassessing the initiative and in some cases, fully opposing it. Noelia Corzo, who represents the district on the Board of Supervisors and is its president, has expressed strong support and is leading a town hall March 24. Supervisor Lisa Gauthier did not return calls for comment.
Speier made her opposition clear.
“I don’t support the project full stop,” Speier said. “I don’t think this facility should be nestled in a residential community with schools.”
Origin of opposition, misconceptions
Residents are often quick to point out that they’re supportive of treatment — just not near their neighborhoods, schools, churches or senior facilities.
“Unless it’s a warehouse district, there will always be a bit of opposition, especially the more expensive the houses,” Pete Nielsen, president and CEO of the California Consortium of Addiction Programs and Professionals, said. “I hate to say that, but it does matter. The higher the value of the homes, there is more potential pushback from the neighborhood.”
The clients at these types of facilities are also those who are pursuing recovery and tend to cause less issues than those actively engaging in substance use, he added.
“There are a lot of misconceptions about the people who will be there. People think about criminals and homelessness. Those are the only two images that come into people’s minds,” Nielsen said. “Are there some people who decide to leave? Yes, but that’s the same thing at any clinic or hospital … and if they leave, they go back to the community where they feel comfortable, not stick around.”
Neither Campos nor Nielsen say they’ve seen any data showing that such facilities increase criminal behavior in surrounding areas.
Police calls
Between May 1, 2024, to May 1, 2025, there was one arrest made on Mahler Road — where the former sobering station was — and the neighboring Hinckley Road combined.
The San Mateo Police Department responded to roughly 33 calls for service at the Palm Avenue detox facility in 2025, also run by Horizon, though zero arrests were made on the entire block where the facility is located throughout the year, according to public records data.
The detox facility is also just a few buildings down from a small school, which Campos said hasn’t resulted in any safety issues to children.
At the Mission Street Recovery sobering station in San Jose, about 1.5% of cases escalate to a second call with a police officer, according to Horizon data.
Stigmas
The push to build treatment centers around as few people as possible may also reinforce certain stigmas for those suffering from substance abuse disorder — that even when seeking recovery, they should be kept away from the public.
Maurice Friera works as an intake coordinator at Our Common Ground, which among other facilities, runs a withdrawal management and residential treatment facility in East Palo Alto.
Friera started working with OCG after struggling with addiction himself.
“When they’re put back into community settings, it helps them feel part of something again, and it helps the healing process,” Friera said. “The end goal is to have them return to the community and be productive, and we can’t do that if we’re alienating them. Many organizations are already operating in communities where they are surrounded by residences or where there is some type of school or business around.”
Such facilities can be beneficial for those in recovery but also for nearby community members. At OCG and other treatment programs, clients regularly engage in community-centered activities, like sidewalk clean-ups, as part of the recovery process.
“You want these facilities close to people. You want people to feel like they’re integrating into society,” Nielsen said. “People that are actively drinking or using drugs are not the same people that are changing their life, who are reforming.”
Similar to hospitals, the facilities are highly regulated, have 24/7 supervision and have even stricter intake and discharge protocols in most cases, Friera said.
“You don’t hear people getting mad that sick people are going to be in your community when a hospital or clinic gets built,” he said. “You’re happy that they’re going to get help.”
Impact
While law enforcement officers and some emergency services would frequent the site, clients are not allowed to bring their cars and, even at weekday peaks, there will likely be less than 20 employees present at any given time.
“Should that be a concern in the future design and we can only scope in so many parking spots, there are other approaches we can take to incentivize use of public transit,” Campos said. “We’re committed to engaging with the community and hearing their concerns and feedback.”
By contrast, the four most recently proposed residential developments along El Camino Real in San Mateo will each include anywhere between 38 to more than 600 parking spaces.
Still, Speier is talking to state legislators, hoping to get the Department of Health Care Services to accommodate a location change on the application, from the San Mateo site to the former sobering center location on Mahler Road in Burlingame.
The former site is far away from the Baywood neighborhood and the San Mateo’s downtown district, however, Peninsula High School, a continuation school, is a few blocks away.
In addition to the strict approval conditions making it unlikely the state would honor such a request, Campos said that according to survey responses from 10 law enforcement agencies in the county — including Hillsborough and San Mateo — police officers said they preferred a location that’s even more centrally located than the former Burlingame site and also supported a new facility that could provide other services, like detox and long-term treatment, under one roof.
Community input
The process by which the project has advanced, in a relatively quick manner, has also come under intense criticism. The state announced last spring that it would award the last of the Proposition 1 funds, with an application deadline of October, leaving providers and counties with limited time to secure spots and complete a competitive and thorough application.
Campos reached out to the San Mateo City Council starting at the end of September to solicit feedback, right after Horizon secured the property, but for many residents, city and county officials, that still doesn’t excuse limited engagement directly with neighbors.
“This has brought to my attention that we need to look at location a lot closer when looking at these projects and frankly, see if there has been any community outreach,” Mueller said. “If your process includes doing the town halls in advance and engaging the community, then you don’t get stuck working against a deadline … and playing catch-up to community concerns.”
And until the city has a formal application, it cannot address residents’ specific concerns about the property or facility operations, City Manager Alex Khojikian said during a recent council meeting.
“As city manager, I found out about this in October, and I’ve been demanding of the county that they need to engage with this neighborhood as soon as possible,” he said. “We don’t have those [project] details. We have to wait on a formal application.”
The division gets to a broader concern about how much of a say nearby residents should have in whether to approve critical services for the area’s most vulnerable populations. Some argue that neighbors should have the power to decide whether large developments are constructed near them. But if such proposals are repeatedly rejected, the city and even surrounding jurisdictions could face cripplingly few services for those in most need, which could have long-term impacts to the entire county.
This isn’t the first time in the last couple years that the county must deal with backlash from state-funded projects for vulnerable populations. It was recently part of a contentious battle involving Millbrae residents’ heated opposition to converting La Quinta Inn into affordable housing for formerly homeless individuals. The dispute led to tense City Council meetings and a voting rights lawsuit alleging the project violated the state Constitution. Two former councilmembers were even recalled after they refused to openly condemn the project.
In some ways, the discourse also parallels housing discussions in recent years. Due to neighborhoods repeatedly rejecting new development, the state started passing a bevy of laws which, in most cases, prevent cities from rejecting housing proposals largely based on nearby residents’ pushback.
“It’s the not-in-my-backyard [mentality],” Nielsen said. “It’s great somewhere else but not somewhere near me.”
The county and Horizon Services will host an in-person community meeting at the Jockey Club at the San Mateo County Event Center, 2701 S. Delaware St., 6 p.m. March 24.