The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) manages two major block grant programs, the Community Mental Health Services Block Grant (MHBG) and the Substance Use Prevention, Treatment, and Recovery Services Block Grant (SUBG). Both grants provide states with essential dollars to fund key mental and behavioral health programs and interventions. Federal statute requires that at least 20% of SUBG funding is set aside for primary prevention strategies including education, information dissemination, alternatives to substances, problem identification and referral, community-based processes, and community agreements. In contrast, the MHBG does not have a similar requirement to fund prevention and early intervention. In fact, as currently authorized, the MHBG can be used only for adults with serious mental illness (SMI) or children with serious emotional disturbance (SED), which limits its use to individuals with very high needs and effectively prohibits funds from being used for early intervention and prevention.

Learn more by reading the full fact sheet here.