Despite recent efforts to bolster California’s behavioral health workforce, the state is operating with only about two-thirds of the psychiatrists and therapists it needs. The problem is so severe it’s making it hard to backfill retiring practitioners, particularly in the state’s rural areas.

“It feels helpless, because there is more than you can fix. There’s more people than you can help that need it,” said Nick Zepponi, a social worker at the Hill Country Community Clinic CARE Center in Redding in Northern California. The county’s suicide rate is more than double the state average and during the covid-19 pandemic overdose deaths increased more than threefold.

For years, experts have warned of California’s severe shortages of psychologists, psychiatrists, and other professionals in the

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