Hochul details $1 billion investment in mental health, calls it a ‘moral imperative’

She said she recognized the upcoming one-year anniversary of the May 14 Tops Markets mass shooting, fueled by racial hatred, that traumatized residents of Western New York. The need for accessible mental health services was never more apparent, she said.

“And even those who don’t have a direct tie to Buffalo and what happened here, we all need help at different times of our lives,” Hochul said Monday at the Delavan-Grider Community Center.

She laid out the toll taken by the Covid-19 pandemic, particularly on young people. She mentioned the many calls she has received from Erie County Medical Center CEO Thomas Quatroche about the high-demand for and low funding for psychiatric hospital beds. And she mentioned studies showing that 41% of American adults and 60% of those between the ages of 18 and 29 have experienced “psychological distress.”

“This is more than a call to action,” Hochul said. “This is a moral imperative to do something to help our people.”

With that, Hochul laid out a mental health strategy that she called the greatest state commitment to mental health services since the move to release patients from state psychiatric hospitals in the early 1970s.