This dataset is based on public record requests by reporters Marisa Kendall and Jocelyn Wiener to California county courts and behavioral health departments about CARE Court usage. The state established the CARE Court program in 2023 to allow judges to order treatment plans for people in severe psychosis who can’t take care of themselves. All counties were suppoesd to implement the program by Dec 2024.
While some initial statewide numbers are available, CalMatters compiled what appears to be the first detailed look at the program by county.
CARE Court petitions are filed to each county court, which may dismiss them or send them to the county's behavioral health department. County behavioral health does the outreach and reports outcomes back to the court. CalMatters requested the following data from every county court, receiving data from 53 of 58 by initial publication, and most county behavioral health departments. If both replied, some numbers for the same county may not match up depending on communication between the agencies and the date of each response. In some cases, only one agency had a responsive record for a certain field. In the story, CalMatters deferred to court numbers if the numbers didn’t match, since behavioral health may not see the full scope of petitions.
If a field is blank, the agency did not specify. If a field is 0, the agency specified 0. Some counties suppressed some or all numbers if they were below 11. Suppressed fields are denoted with *.
Last updated: October 29, 2025
Data reported by the Judicial Council of California and individual county superior courts.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| county | Name of county; except “Judicial Council of California” which receives reports from all county courts |
| petitions_filed | Number of CARE Court petitions filed to the county court. Sometimes multiple petitions may be filed for the same person; this dataset includes total petitions filed. |
| petitions_percapita | Number of petitions filed per 100k adult county residents, using 2024 population estimates from the CA Dept. of Finance (CARE Court is for 18+). Calculated by CalMatters. |
| petitions_dismissed | Number of CARE Court petitions dismissed by the court. Petitions are generally dismissed before a CARE agreement or plan is developed, but some counties may have included agreements that ended in dismissals. |
| care_agreements | Number of petitions that turned into voluntary CARE treatment agreements |
| care_plans | Number of petitions that turned into court-ordered CARE plans |
| graduations | Number of graduations from CARE agreements or plans. After one year, the client can either complete the program and graduate, or can extend for up to one more year. Most counties have not implemented CARE Court for at least a year (see `date-started-by-county.csv`), so it is too soon for graduations. |
| data_as_of | YYYY-MM-DD date the data is through, usually when the county court replied. The data request was for data since the beginning of the county’s CARE Court implementation. |
| notes | Any clarifications the court sent with the data |
Last updated: October 29, 2025
Data reported by county behavioral health departments.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| county | Name of county |
| petitions | Number of CARE Court petitions that behavioral health knew about. Since courts can dismiss petitions before they reach behavioral health, this number may be less than total petitions filed. Sometimes multiple petitions may be filed for the same person; this dataset includes total petitions filed. |
| petitions_dismissed | Number of CARE Court petitions dismissed that county behavioral health knew about. Since courts can dismiss petitions before they reach behavioral health, this number may be less than total petitions dismissed. Petitions are generally dismissed before a CARE agreement or plan is developed, but some counties may have included agreements that ended in dismissals. |
| care_agreements | Number of petitions that turned into voluntary CARE treatment agreements |
| care_plans | Number of petitions that turned into court-ordered CARE plans |
| graduations | Number of graduations from CARE agreements or plans. After one year, the client can either complete the program and graduate, or can extend for up to one more year. Most counties have not implemented CARE Court for at least a year (see `date-started-by-county.csv`), so it is too soon for graduations. |
| data_as_of | YYYY-MM-DD date the data is through, usually when the county replied. The data request was for data since the beginning of the county’s CARE Court implementation. |
| notes | Any clarifications the county sent with the data |
Last updated: December 17, 2025
Data reported by county behavioral health departments on housing status of people petitioned to CARE Court.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| county | Name of county |
| petitions | Number of CARE Court petitions that behavioral health knew about. Since courts can dismiss petitions before they reach behavioral health, this number may be less than total petitions filed. Sometimes multiple petitions may be filed for the same person; this dataset includes total petitions filed. |
| petitions_homeless | Number of CARE Court petitions for people who were homeless, as defined and confirmed by the county. |
| data_as_of | YYYY-MM-DD date the data is through, usually when the county replied. The data request was for data since the beginning of the county’s CARE Court implementation. |
| notes | Any clarifications the county sent with the data on how they define homelessness and whether multiple petitions were for the same person |
Last updated: October 29, 2025
For each county, the date it launched its CARE Court, according to the state. All counties were required to begin by Dec 2024.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| county | Name of county |
| date_started | YYYY-MM-DD date the county launched its CARE Court |
Four counties do not appear in the data files because they did not provide data by publication. CalMatters did not request data from behavioral health for some counties with small populations. All dates are 2025.
| County | Court | Behavioral health |
|---|---|---|
| Calaveras | Requested Jul 29 and Aug 13 | Did not request |
| Del Norte | Requested Jul 29 and Aug 13 | Did not request |
This dataset may be updated as more data is received.
This repo contains data used in the following stories:
- New mental health courts haven’t helped as many people as Newsom promised. Here’s why (September 2, 2025)
- CARE Court was created to help California’s toughest homeless cases. Why that’s been so hard (December 18, 2025)
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