New York’s enacted budget left out the roughly $200 million in youth behavioral health funding sought after the C.K. v. McDonald settlement, frustrating advocates and lawmakers who say children can’t wait. (Will Waldron/Times Union)
Will Waldron/Times Union
Albany — New York’s new state budget left out the youth mental health funding that lawmakers and advocates spent months fighting for, even after the state agreed in a federal court settlement to overhaul how it cares for children on Medicaid.
Advocates wanted roughly $200 million to raise Medicaid reimbursement rates and rebuild a depleted children’s behavioral health workforce. Gov. Kathy Hochul did not include it in her executive budget, and the Legislature did not add it. The advocates contend the gap could leave children stuck on long waitlists while the state spends the next year and a half planning a new system.
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Kayleigh Zaloga, president and chief executive of the NYS Coalition for Children’s Behavioral Health, said the enacted budget falls short of the state’s moral and legal obligation to improve children’s care. She called the omission “willful inaction on a binding commitment to children and families,” and “a slap in the face to the families who have fought so hard for that acknowledgement.”
The fight follows C.K. v. McDonald, a class-action lawsuit filed in 2022 in federal court in Brooklyn. Plaintiffs in that case said New York failed to provide the intensive home and community-based services that federal law guarantees Medicaid-eligible children, leaving some hospitalized or institutionalized far from home. A judge granted final approval early this year. The deal requires the state to expand care coordination, in-home services and mobile crisis teams, and to draft an implementation plan over 18 months.
Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon, a Brooklyn Democrat who has championed the issue, said the missing money reflects both tight finances and the state’s budget rules. “Nothing’s happened,”she said. She pointed to federal cuts under the Trump administration that forced the state to plug other holes.
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Simon said the Legislature was unable to force the measure into the budget. Under a state Court of Appeals ruling, lawmakers can accept, reject or negotiate the governor’s budget, but cannot add spending on their own.
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“If the governor is not on board, we can’t add anything without her agreement,” she said. “It’s not like the Legislature didn’t want to.”
With only a few days left in the legislative session, Simon said a standalone funding bill is unlikely, also because the governor would probably veto spending that belongs in the budget.
“I wouldn’t want to give your readers hope,” she said.
Nicolette Simmonds, a spokeswoman for Hochul, said the governor has allocated nearly $2 billion in the state’s mental health system since taking office, including hundreds of millions of dollars aimed specifically at services for young people. The settlement, said said, “provides us with a framework” for community-based Medicaid care that responds to children and families.
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The budget did include a 2.7% inflationary increase for providers, which Zaloga said offers “modest relief” by helping organizations stay afloat amid rising costs. Even so, she and other advocates say it prevents rate cuts rather than expanding care.
Rather than seeking the full allocation, advocates are now focused on lawmakers passing a narrower bill that would improve coordination and data collection for children with complex needs. It has advanced in the Assembly.
“We are really hopeful to get that to the floor,” Zaloga said.
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A court-appointed independent monitor, Suzanne Fields, is overseeing the state’s compliance with the court settlement. Advocates said she has not publicly weighed in on whether New York is on track.
For families, the planning timeline offers little comfort. The system, as Simon described it, remains “at square one” for many children. Advocates say the real test will come in next year’s budget, when they hope lawmakers and the governor will finally fund the care the state has already promised.