• U.S. Sens. Alex Padilla (D-California), Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut), and Peter Welch (D-Vermont) led senators in calling on the Biden administration to finalize the proposed mental health parity rule released in 2023, according to a June 6 statement from Padilla’s office. The senators emphasized that these rules will hold insurers accountable and ensure they follow the law to cover mental health and substance use disorders the same way that they cover physical health. They highlighted the severe mental health crisis in the United States, especially among children. More than two-thirds of the 1 in 5 Americans who experience a mental health condition in any year do not receive treatment. In the last 12 months, nearly 110,000 Americans died of drug overdoses and nearly 50,000 Americans died by suicide. “Insurance companies are still preventing patients from getting access to mental health and substance use disorder care,” the senators wrote in a letter to the Biden administration. “These deliberate practices include low reimbursement rates that keep providers from joining insurance networks and discourage new providers from entering the field, failure to contract with available providers, and managed care practices that delay critical care to patients or deny it altogether.”
• With parts of the Klamath River beginning to flow freely for the first time in 100 years due to the largest river restoration effort in American history, Gov. Gavin Newsom visited the dam removal project that will revitalize nearly 400 miles of historical habitat for salmon and steelhead when completed, according to a June 7 statement from Newsom’s office. Last September, the first of four dams was brought down, and the rest are slated for removal later this year as a result of ongoing collaboration between California, Oregon, the Yurok and Karuk Tribes, PacifiCorp, and fishing and environmental groups. The Klamath was once the third-largest salmon producing river on the West Coast before the construction of concrete dams beginning in 1918 blocked migratory salmon and steelhead from accessing nearly 400 miles of river habitat. “The importance of this work underway to restore the Klamath River after more than a century of being dammed cannot be overstated,” Newsom said in the statement. “We’re closer than ever to revitalizing this waterway at the center of crucial ecosystems, tribal community and sustenance, and the local economy. Together with our many partners, California will continue working to ensure the Klamath River flows freely once again.”
• U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara) highlighted new federal attention to airport noise and investments in noise mitigation projects coming through the aviation policy he helped write and get signed into law, according to a June 5 statement from Carbajal’s office. “The Central Coast’s airports are hubs for our local economy, commerce, tourism, and our gateways to the wider world. But they cannot serve those critical functions at the expense of the well-being of its neighbors: our region’s hard-working families,” Carbajal said in the statement. “As a member of the House Aviation Subcommittee, I worked diligently this year to secure these provisions to renew the FAA’s attention and investment in mitigating airport noise to ensure Central Coast residents can exist in harmony with these hubs. I will continue to work with the FAA, our regional airport administrators, and the community advocates to ensure these provisions yield real results across our region.” According to the congressman’s office, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reauthorization signed into law by President Joe Biden contained provisions that required the FAA to take action to reduce undesirable aircraft noise, assess how the FAA and local airports may reduce noise exposure to nearby neighborhoods, and encourage cooperation between airports and impacted neighborhoods to establish routes and procedures that reduce disruption.
