Montana secures federal grants to expand behavioral health clinics

The real test of Montana’s new federal behavioral health money is whether it turns into appointments, crisis care and addiction treatment that Helena and Lewis and Clark County residents can actually reach without a long wait or a long drive.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said May 28 that Montana was one of 10 states added to the Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic Medicaid Demonstration Program, a federal effort built to support clinics through a Medicaid prospective payment system. Along with Montana, the new states were Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Dakota, Washington and West Virginia.

For local families, the promise of the program is not just more funding on paper. CCBHCs are designed to provide coordinated behavioral health care to anyone who needs mental health or substance use services, regardless of ability to pay, place of residence, age or diagnosis. That matters in a county where people often run into the same barriers again and again: not enough providers, too few crisis options and too much delay before the first visit.

Gov. Greg Gianforte said the funding supports the work of overhauling and rebuilding Montana’s behavioral health system, and state materials tie the effort to a broader $300 million push to reform behavioral-health and developmental-disabilities services. The state’s goal is not a one-time burst of grant spending, but a payment structure that can help clinics hire staff, keep doors open and plan beyond the next budget cycle.

Montana had already been laying the groundwork. The Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services secured a SAMHSA planning grant for calendar year 2025, and a state report said the department planned to submit its demonstration application by April 1, 2026. Legislative materials said four providers received CCBHC planning grants and were working with DPHHS to meet full requirements, showing the state had moved beyond the first stages of the process before the federal selection was announced.

The national scale of the model has expanded quickly. HHS said the CCBHC program grew from 66 clinics in eight states when it launched in 2017 to more than 500 clinics in 46 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. SAMHSA has said its CCBHC expansion grants began in 2018 and were extended in 2022 to four-year awards of up to $1 million per year.

For Helena and the rest of Lewis and Clark County, the question now is whether that federal structure translates into more counseling slots, better crisis response and a steadier place for people to get care close to home. The grant win is a start; the measure that matters is whether residents can use it when they need help.