April 4th, 2025
The Honorable Caroline Menjivar
Senate Health Committee
1021 O Street, Room 3310
Sacramento , CA 95814
RE: OPPOSE Senate Bill 367 (Allen)
Dear Chair Menjivar,
Mental Health America of California (MHAC) respectfully opposes Senate Bill 367 (Allen), which would expand Lanterman Petris Short (LPS) Act involuntary commitment and conservatorship statutes by: 1) Requiring information about the historical course of a person’s medical, psychological, educational, social, financial, and legal conditions to be included in the assessment for an involuntary hold; 2) Authorizing conservatorships for people who have accepted voluntary care; and 3) Expanding the list of individuals or entities that can recommend conservatorship. These expansions of current law will risk infringing on peoples’ civil rights by inappropriately increasing conservatorships.
MHAC is a peer-run organization leading the state in behavioral health public policy and advocacy since 1957. The mission of MHAC is to assist and encourage communities, families and individuals to experience hope, wellness and recovery from mental health and substance use disorder issues through voluntary services that are delivered in their local community with compassion and respect for everyone’s dignity and autonomy. In accordance with our mission, MHAC supports increasing the availability of voluntary, accessible, culturally responsive, community-based services.
MHAC is opposed to SB 367 for the following reasons:
Requiring information about the historical course of a person’s medical, psychological, educational, social, financial, and legal conditions to be included in the assessment for an involuntary hold is an egregious and inappropriate expansion of involuntary commitment statute. Current law requires information on the historical course of a person’s mental disorder be considered only if it is determined that the information has a “reasonable bearing” on whether the individual meets criteria for involuntary treatment. Furthermore, current statute specifies limited sources of the historical information.[1] In contrast, SB 367 requires information on the historical course of a broad range of factors that are not relevant to an immediate mental health crisis, including educational, social, financial, and legal. We struggle to understand how the historical course of an individual’s education, for example, bears on their potential status as currently gravely disabled. Requiring this information in assessments risks wrongful involuntary commitments based on bias and prejudice rather than immediate mental health needs, and threatens the privacy of the individual. Furthermore, by not limiting or specifying the sources of this information, the bill would create excessive burdens on evaluation staff who are now required to collect this historical information.
Allowing conservatorships for individuals who have “demonstrated an inability to follow through with stated plans of self-care” is untenably broad and will likely result in wrongful conservatorships. Self-care is a term that can encompass a wide range of activities, including simple things like getting outside, getting enough sleep, meditating, etc.. Moreover, “stated plans” is a vague term that implies an unwritten expression of self-care goals.
Conservatorships remove individuals’ rights, autonomy and self-determination and should only be used when absolutely necessary and only after significant evaluation of the individual’s mental health. SB 326 expands authority to recommend conservatorships to a judicial officer, a treating physician or an emergency physician. These individuals are not likely to have sufficient knowledge of an individual’s mental health history to make an accurate conservatorship recommendation, which runs the risk of inappropriately increasing unnecessary conservatorships.
It is for these reasons MHAC is opposed to SB 326 (Allen). If you have any questions, or if MHAC can provide any assistance on this bill or any behavioral health legislation, please do not hesitate to contact me at hstrunk@mhac.org or our Director of Public Policy, Karen Vicari, at kvicari@mhaofca.org.
In Community,
Heidi L. Strunk
President & CEO