HEALTH ALLIES
LEGISLATING THE MIND: HOW TEXAS
HAS TAKEN STEPS TO ADDRESS THE
GROWING MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS
By Josh Meyers, Attorney, Hall, Render, Killian, Heath & Lyman, P.C.
May 2022 • DALLAS MEDICAL JOURNAL | 17
Each year, the Texas legislature
publicly acknowledges the month
of May as Mental Health Awareness
Month in Texas. Just as the legislature
passed a resolution last year
recognizing this important month of awareness,
so too will it convene this year and do the
same. While these Texas House resolutions are
entirely symbolic without any real substantive
change, they do reaffi rm a crucial concept:
mental health should be acknowledged and
identifi ed as a societal issue aff ecting millions
of Texans. Recently, a study found that Texas
has the ninth most-stressed population in the
United States, while ranking second highest
in work-related stress and fourth highest in
family-related stress. These metrics hit very
close to home as each of us during the COVID
19 pandemic has continuously experienced
the immense mental pressures of everyday
life. In recent years, Texas offi cials have made
notable eff orts to recognize the importance of
improving one’s mental health and identifying
when others are experiencing their own mental
health troubles. Some of these eff orts, like
Mental Health Awareness Month, are gestural.
However, other initiatives have focused more
on practical solutions to the ever-growing
mental health crisis sweeping Texas.
Recently, the Texas Health and Human
Services Commission (THHSC) developed an
awareness campaign that seeks to provide
resources and courses designed to educate
Texas residents of the importance of mental
health. One of these sources is MentalHealth-
TX.org, a website that off ers a large array of
services to those experiencing mental health
issues, including access to psychiatric care
providers and social services. Through this
campaign, THHSC also off ers access to mental
health fi rst-aid courses that educate individuals
in the risk factors and warning signs of
mental health and addiction issues in themselves
and others.
Ahead of the 2021 legislative session, the
Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives,
Dennis Bonnen, charged Texas House committees
with studying various health-related
issues to help inform legislative objectives
during the upcoming session. Notably, the
Speaker stated that members of the Texas
House should:
“Review the state’s behavioral health capacity,
focusing on suicide prevention eff orts
and the provision of behavioral health services
to people with intellectual and developmental
disabilities; review and evaluate the eff ectiveness
of suicide prevention programs across
state agencies.”
The Speaker’s instructions explicitly require
that the Texas legislature engage with mental
health awareness and treatment as a major
public health issue aff ecting Texans. Acknowledging
these greater issues in the Texas legislature
creates more awareness and pressure
for legislators to eff ect actual change through
lawmaking. Further, the Speaker’s charge hints
at the possibility that the Texas legislature will
continue to take a larger role in addressing
the behavioral and mental health issues that
aff ect Texas residents.
To this point, House Bill 1050, originally fi led
in the Texas House on January 11, 2021, proposed
that research should be conducted to
determine the benefi ts of “employing mental
health professionals or mental health response
teams to assist when responding to a behavioral
health-related emergency call.” Specifi -
cally, this bill would have charged the THHSC
with “conducting a study to evaluate the
availability, outcomes, and effi cacy of using
mental health response teams and mental
health professionals to assist in reducing the
number of incarcerations of individuals with: (1)
mental illnesses; (2) substance use disorders;
or (3) intellectual or developmental disabilities.”
This study would have looked at the benefi ts
of placing mental health professionals in
emergency call situations, analyzing outcomes
such as de-escalation and community benefi t.
While the bill appeared to have great potential,
it unfortunately died in committee before
it could be put up for vote. Whether bills like
this will be sponsored in the future is unclear;
however, House Bill 1050 does provide some
evidence that the Texas House is beginning to
expand its research and knowledge on how
mental health experts can be used in a variety
of situations, including those situations in
which potential incarceration or violence is a
possibility.
In the past few years, Texas Governor Greg
Abbott has signed several bills into law that
assist Texas residents experiencing behavioral
and mental health issues by providing greater
access to care overall and also re-evaluating
the manner in which Texas can best provide
this type of care.
On June 14, 2019, Governor Abbott signed
into law House Bill 906, which helped establish
a Collaborative Task Force on Public School
Mental Health Services to study the eff ectiveness
of mental health services being provided
in Texas schools. This task force operates
year-round to evaluate (i) the eff ectiveness of