Alaska Mental Health Trust schedules June listening sessions on behavioral health gaps

The Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority — the state body that funds behavioral health, disability, and substance use services across Alaska — will hold two public listening sessions in June, asking beneficiaries, caregivers, and the public to describe gaps in the system the Trust helps pay for.

The sessions come at a particularly active moment in Alaska's behavioral health landscape. The Trust recently distributed $7.2 million in grants to 22 organizations, including a $2.96 million start-up grant to Southcentral Foundation's Yeshjesh T'uh Project to address what the Trust described as urgent service gaps. The state separately secured roughly $272 million in federal Rural Health Transformation Program funds for FY2026, a portion of it directed at behavioral and specialty care in rural communities. Workforce shortages remain documented across every discipline of Alaska health care, particularly in rural and frontier regions.

What the Trust is asking, in effect, is where the current system is reaching people and where it isn't. Beneficiary feedback shapes the Trust's focus areas and priority initiatives, and the input from these sessions feeds into the next planning cycle.

The sessions are scheduled for June 2 from noon to 1 p.m. and June 30 from 4 to 5 p.m. at the Trust headquarters at 3745 Community Park Loop, Suite 120, Anchorage. Zoom is available with call-in at 669-444-9171 or 253-215-8782. Comments are capped at five minutes per person. Written comments are accepted through June 30 at [email protected] with "Listening session" in the subject line. An anonymized summary will be posted to the Trust's website.

More details: alaskamentalhealthtrust.org/news/events/beneficiary-listening-session-2026/