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What happens when Medi-Cal can pay to help an enrollee find an apartment, install a wheelchair ramp, or provide healthy meals? For hundreds of thousands of Californians with low incomes, the answer is a healthier, more stable life.
Now, in the CalAIM initiative’s fifth year, KFF Health News looks at what it has accomplished and the challenges ahead, as the federal administration pushes states toward health care over social services and budget shortfalls threaten the program.
Since 2022, California’s CalAIM initiative has invested nearly $12 billion to help the state’s highest-need enrollees cover the basics that affect their health. The program has reached more than 528,000 enrollees. The results are showing up where it counts, even as new pressures put some of that progress at risk.
The services are practical. People experiencing homelessness can get help finding housing, with Medi-Cal covering deposits and up to six months of rent for people with serious behavioral health needs. People with diabetes can receive home-delivered meals. People leaving jail or prison can be connected immediately to primary care and behavioral health treatment.
Tangible Impact
For enrollees, the impact is tangible. In Orange County, CalOptima Health credited housing services with a drop of nearly 27% in unsheltered homelessness.
Now budget cuts are tightening eligibility, and the stakes are real. To avoid a battle with the Trump administration, the state has proposed to eliminate the room and board portion of recuperative care, which helps unhoused people recover safely after hospitalization instead of returning directly to the streets.
Other states such as Michigan and Minnesota have continued the service and used state funds to cover the room and board portion.
Read the KFF Health News story for a breakdown of what’s changing and who could be affected.
