MENDOCINO CO., 8/27/26 — After construction delays caused the completion of a new mental health inpatient facility to be nearly a year behind schedule, Mendocino County officials said Wednesday it could be several more months before the facility opens due to a state licensing process.
At the Caspar Community Center on Wednesday afternoon, the Mental Health Treatment Act Citizens Oversight Committee, which oversees the use of funds raised through a county sales tax meant for investments in mental health treatment, got an update on the psychiatric health facility that broke ground two years ago just south of Ukiah.
A psychiatric health facility is an inpatient facility that provides intensive care for people placed on a psychiatric hold, in which a person can be held involuntarily for 72 hours if they are deemed a danger to themselves or others, or are gravely disabled. Mendocino County hasn’t had a psychiatric health facility since 2000.
“It brings the first time in 25-plus years that we have this level of care within Mendocino County,” Dr. Jenine Miller, Mendocino County health services director, told The Mendocino Voice earlier this year.
The construction of the facility was partially funded by revenue generated from Mendocino County’s Measure B, a sales tax increase approved by voters in 2017 to fund mental health services that also created an oversight committee to ensure proper use of the funds. The mental health tax started at a half-cent for the first five years after the measure was approved, then went down to an eighth of a cent.
Measure B funds are overseen by the Mental Health Treatment Act Citizens Oversight Committee.
Doug Anderson, the county’s capital projects manager in charge of the development of the facility, gave an update to the committee Wednesday on the delays that have affected the timeline of the project.
“We’ve experienced quite a few delays, and I believe that most of those issues have been resolved. The cumulative impact of some of these issues means that our completion isn’t as we had indicated.”
The project was originally expected to be completed in the fall of 2025. At the last meeting in May for the oversight committee, Tom Allman, committee member and Willits mayor, said the projected completion date for construction at that time was sometime in August.
“We were talking about August last time,” Anderson said at the Wednesday meeting. “At this point, it appears as though the construction activities should be wrapping up in the next week or two by around the first of September.”
Anderson said after construction is done, next are inspections by architects, engineers, fire marshals and building officials to get a certificate of occupancy. Anderson said he expects the operator of the facility, Restpadd Inc., to be able to occupy the facility by the end of October.
After construction and inspections are completed, the facility is not expected to be fully operating or taking its first patients for at least another three months. This is due to a state licensing process required for the operator of the facility to be able to receive reimbursement from Medi-Cal for operations.
Miller said at the meeting Wednesday that before submitting for state licensure, the facility must be “completely constructed, ready for operation.”
She gave an example saying that if the application were submitted on a Tuesday, the state could come out that Friday, and if Restpadd “didn’t have everything moved in and they weren’t 100% meeting certification, they would get declined.”
Miller said the licensure application process takes three to six months, but she is hopeful the reality will be the minimum.
“The state says it generally takes three to six months,” Miller said. “We’re hoping 90 days.”
What do they have to look at that takes more than an hour. Weeks? This is what is wrong with California and its regulations! What BS
So you can’t submit now because they could, apparently likely enough to be dangerous, come out and inspect within 3 days. But it usually takes 3-6 months… but you’re hoping for 90 days, which is 3 months.
And how many month days til the new jail mental health building opens? We’re on the hook for over $20 million for that right?
Just think about it a little and it all makes perfect financial sense…. To someone.
New Jail Mental Health Wing:
$25 Million Project
$1.1 M in County Matching funds
$17 M grant (from the state) plus another $7 M from measure B funds due to increased costs in labor and materials. The county is on the hook to backfill the measure B funds that was never intended to build the new jail.
If this is for 5150 patients what are the security requirements? Some patients refuse to be patient for a 72 hour period.
It is a locked facility for people being held on a 5150.
The $7 million in Measure B funds for the jail project was initially discussed, but the county later said those funds were not needed, so that money did not actually come out of Measure B.
After a year-long delay from the originally expected fall 2025 opening, is construction and licensing really the full reason the PHF could still be several more months away from accepting patients?
https://mendovoice.com/2026/06/mendocino-county-supervisors-approve-proposed-2026-27-budget-tuesday/
Is this article wrong then?
It still says they used measure b funds…
I worked for the County when we had a PHF unit back in the 90s. We never should have ;et it close. It could have been saved to save the County a lot of money.
Building all these fancy facilities that were never be filled. Not for how that shift will pan out.
First major issue is going to be staffing. There is not enough staff to maintain these facilities. They pay really poorly to the lower level staff so people come and go it’s a revolving door. Who’s going to be the doctor that oversees these facilities Jenine can’t take care of all of that, nor does she honestly have the wherewithal to do so. Many of the people that will be possibly entering this facility have comorbidities it’s not just mental health issues it’s also addiction issues it’s also other health issues so the cohort of who will be in those facilities will be gravely ill people with a plethora of health problems. It will be very expensive to maintain them. The amount of money that is poured into out of area facilities to support our community is mind-blowing. The doctors often transfer people to out of area facilities for even standard medical care because they are not qualified or don’t have the facilities to care for people. This is going to open a massive problem for the community mark my words no joke here. The amount of money poured into all of this his astronomical. I would love to see some crisis data for the facility on orchard how many people come in and out how many people have they served since they put that money in there. Did it level out did it pay for itself or is it just a drain? The mental health facility across from live oak behind the Social security building makes it really convenient for people to go in and apply for Social security is that up in functioning yet still see construction happening there. That is a facility ran by out of agency out of area entities that will surely impact the flow of people to the county’s facility. There’s a whole lot of things that are going on behind the scenes that nobody even thinks about. Good luck with it all you’re going to need it.
Cherry – It sounds like this is getting funding from measure B (voted in 2017). In theory, the sales tax bump is dedicated to this service specifically. The county is on the hook to backfill the $7 mill they used to build the jail wing.
Mendocino County, California, Mental Health Sales Tax, Measure B (November 2017) – Ballotpedia https://share.google/4iDMb62iZdG9WFHWP
Certainly that will fund some of the initial steps. Some of the initial staffing. But over the Long haul measure be expires it goes away. They are fantastically focused on high administrative costs so a great portion of any money spent goes to admin. Plans permits, fees, processes etc was greatly reduces the bottom dollar allowed for physical things. Again with the crisis that is happening across the county with staffing. No staff short staffed, overtime budgets, unfilled positions board of supervisors are eliminating from the staff list. Those things are all very concerning and it will be interesting to see how they do the dance to fill the slots. In all actuality it will probably wind up a chronic never-ending situation. We must remember that the original puff unity even though we wanted it and it was needed was closed because of poor staffing and lots of crazy situations that the county couldn’t get under control. Hmmmm. Hope the new plans and process have far better, sustainable results. Lord knows our area is struggling.
The times now are exceptionally difficult for most of this country. After midterms there is some opportunity for new funding especially from what has been the mostly unhelpful federal govt.
The long haul is less clear for anyone to predict. Stay on course.
The sad facts are that this is only going to be a sixteen bed facility and part of it will be contracted out to another county. By having only sixteen beds it eliminates having to run a 24 hour medical staff, that said this facility is still not going to be big enough to meet the needs of our county. In a real world what needs to happen is the reopening of State Hospitals but we all know that is not going to happen, but if they did reopen them and placed a AOD unit there with 24/7 care it sure would make better sense and clean up several issues around mental health and addiction not to mention taking many of the homeless off of the streets. All around it would save more money in the long run as well as creating jobs.
Why is it being put anywhere near neighborhoods or schools? On a main road?
So happy to know we are now and will be paying for Illegal foreign invader psychos to stay on Main Street. I can guarantee 15/16 beds will be occupied by foreigners. Or “Ukiah Man” as they are known to be called.