Latest news with #TARP
Yahoo
12-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
History Says This Is What Comes Next After a Market Crash and When Stocks Might Recover
With the stock market crashing, investors may be wondering where the market is heading from here and when stocks may recover. There have been several market crashes over the past 100 years, so let's look what history has to say. The most recent market crash happened in March 2020, when the dropped 13.8% in two days on March 11 and 12. The cause of the crash was uncertainty over the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdowns. The market would bottom on March 23, with the S&P 500 declining by another 9.8%. The S&P's total decline from peak to trough would be about 34%. This was a quick yet steep decline, with the market putting in a bottom in just over a month. A fast recovery also followed it, as the Federal Reserve acted quickly slashing interest rates to near zero and launching a quantitative easing program where it bought government bonds and other assets. The S&P returned to its pre-crash highs by mid-August of 2020, as the Fed showed how it can help stocks during a market crash. Amid the subprime mortgage crisis and the collapse of investment bank Lehman Brothers, the S&P 500 declined by 8.8% on Sept. 29, 2008. It later declined by about 20% the week of Oct. 6. The market would bottom a little over five months later in early March 2009. After the initial Sept. 29 plunge, the S&P 500 would plummet another 44%. In total, the S&P would lose more than half its value during the bear market. It would take over five years for the market to return to new highs. Once again, the Fed played a huge role in the market's recovery, as it slashed interest rates to near zero percent and initiated a quantitative easing program that included purchases of mortgage-backed securities. The government also reacted with a fiscal stimulus package and injected capital into the banking system and other financial institutions through the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). By the time the market bottomed, stock valuations had fallen quite a bit and were quite attractively priced. In the largest single-day decline in the U.S. stock market, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), which was the benchmark index at the time, plunged 22.6% on Oct. 19, 1987. The large crash was attributed to stocks being overvalued as well as rampant speculation and the introduction of computer-based trading that would try to hedge portfolio losses by automatically selling futures when stock prices dropped. There was also a lot a leverage and margin debt at the time, and investors started to panic. The Dow would bounce around before finding a "second bottom" in early December. It would take nearly nearly two years for the Dow to reach new highs. The Fed once again acted quickly by injecting liquidity into the banking system to help stop further damage. However, while these actions helped the market from spiraling, valuations before the crash were high and investor confidence was shaken. As such, the crash essentially acted as a valuation reset for the market after a long bull market, and it took time for stock fundamentals to catch up to its past valuation. for the Dow to reach new highs. In late October, the Dow Jones nosedived about 23% over a two-day period. The crash was largely the result of speculation, high valuations, and investors buying stock on margin. In addition, the crash would kick-start the Great Depression, as banks collapsed and panic set in. Specifically, the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act would only prolong this difficult period. The stock market crash, however, was just the beginning of a tough several years for investors. The Dow Jones Industrial Average would decline another 82% before hitting a bottom in July 1932. From peak to trough, the Dow's overall decline was 89%. It would take about 25 years for the market to fully recover. Throwing out the extreme of the Great Depression, history suggests that after a market crash, stocks should bottom out in just a few months. Following the three modern-day market crashes, the markets all hit their bottoms in under six months, and for two of them, it was less than two months. A recovery to new highs is a bit more difficult to pin down. Following the COVID-19 crash, the market rallied quickly. Given that it was the government's actions with tariffs and subsequent retaliatory tariffs that caused this most recent stock market crash, it seems like the bear market could be similarly short-lived if there is a change in course with the tariffs. President Donald Trump has proven to be unpredictable and whether the tariffs last a week or his whole term and beyond is a question mark. He has already paused the tariffs for 90 days for countries other than China. However, it is this unpredictability and quick decision reversals that make it difficult for companies to take actions. Many companies had previously started shifting their sourcing and manufacturing to other Asian countries such as Vietnam, only to see Trump initially look to hit those countries with huge tariffs as well. Meanwhile, reshoring would take years to accomplish and the U.S. likely doesn't have the workforce to take on these jobs. This likely leaves most companies paralyzed in their actions just waiting to see what may happen next. The Fed, meanwhile, has played a big role in past market recoveries, but with this crash self inflected by government tariffs, and given the on-and-off nature of them, the central bank has also stayed on the sidelines. The whole lack of clarity and flip-flopping makes this one of the toughest market crashes for anyone to react to and make decisions. With history suggesting the market could drift lower over the next couple of months, one of the best strategies investors can deploy is waiting for further small dips and then buying into them. While pinpointing the market's exact low is challenging, gradually allocating funds during market downturns over the next few months should optimize your returns when the market recovers. Another option is to dollar-cost average into an exchange-traded fund (ETF) such as the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEMKT: VOO), which tracks the S&P 500. This could just entail investing a set amount every two weeks into the ETF. Bull markets typically see their best performance when they rally from the bottom. As such, you'd want to avoid picking a bottom, or you could miss out on the biggest part of the rally. Before you buy stock in Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Vanguard S&P 500 ETF wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $495,226!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $679,900!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 796% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 155% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of April 5, 2025 Geoffrey Seiler has positions in Vanguard S&P 500 ETF. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Vanguard S&P 500 ETF. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. History Says This Is What Comes Next After a Market Crash and When Stocks Might Recover was originally published by The Motley Fool Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
11-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
‘MAGA leftist' blames Obama for 2008 bank bailout that was signed by George W. Bush
Self-described 'MAGA leftist' Batya Ungar-Sargon confidently declared on Thursday night that President Barack Obama's 'first act in office' was passing the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program that bailed out financial institutions during the height of the 2008 financial crisis. Ungar-Sargon would double down on that claim the following morning, tweeting that 'in 2008, President Obama bailed out Wall Street and screwed over Main Street' while defending Donald Trump's tariffs, insisting that 'in 2024' the current president 'screwed over Wall Street to bail out Main Street.' There is just one small problem with The Free Press columnist's analysis: TARP was signed into law by then-President George W. Bush on October 3, 2008 — a full month before Obama was elected president and four months before he entered the White House. During an appearance on CNN Newsnight with Abby Philip, Ungar-Sargon — who has been making the media rounds to passionately defend Trump's chaotic tariffs that have sparked a global market meltdown — attempted to contrast the factors that led to the Great Recession to the current economic environment. 'I've been thinking a lot about the 10 million Americans who lost their homes in the 2008 financial crisis, and how President Obama's first act in office was to give $700 billion to the banks that caused it, including $30 billion in bonuses to the crooks who organized it,' she exclaimed. 'And I'm thinking about how those very Americans saw a president pick Wall Street over Main Street,' Ungar-Sargon added. 'And what they saw this whole week was a president willing to go out there and fight for the forgotten men and women of this heartland and take on the entire international global order for them.' A one-time Marxist academic who has since morphed into a Steve Bannon-style MAGA populist-nationalist, Ungar-Sargon has pounded the drum in recent days that Trump is 'waging war' for 'the forgotten people in the heartland of America' with his trade war, going so far as to argue that it could fix the 'crisis in masculinity.' Still, regardless of the merits of her arguments on behalf of Trump's tariffs, one thing is indisputable — TARP was not Obama's 'first act' after he was sworn in as president in 2009. In reality, the massive bailout came about during the fall of 2008 when the global economy was in freefall due to financial institutions and banks — many of which were deemed 'too big to fail' — going bankrupt due to the subprime mortgage crisis. With the housing bubble bursting and defaults skyrocketing, the mortgage-backed securities that lenders and investment firms bought up in high volumes became worthless, resulting in these institutions losing all their money — and customers' deposits. TARP was eventually implemented to buy up these 'toxic' assets and keep the banks afloat amid concerns of a full-blown economic collapse. The bill was initially met with bipartisan resistance and even failed on its initial vote in the House, but Congress eventually passed it after some tweaks, and it was quickly signed into law by Bush. After Obama came into office, other changes were made to the program, including prohibiting firms receiving TARP funds from giving bonuses to their 25 highest-paid employees. The Treasury Department reported in 2023 that the total amount disbursed from TARP was $443.5 billion, with the government collecting $425.5 billion through repayments, sales and dividends. 'After considering the interest expense of $13.1 billion, the net cost of TARP programs was $31.1 billion,' the report stated. Sharing a clip of her CNN comments, Ungar-Sargon reiterated that Obama was responsible for TARP while simultaneously claiming Trump was president last year. 'In 2008, President Obama bailed out Wall Street and screwed over Main Street,' she posted on X (formerly Twitter). 'In 2024, President Trump screwed over Wall Street to bail out Main Street. That's what a lot of Americans are going to remember about last week.' It didn't take long for a number of political commentators and journalists to take Ungar-Sargon to task for her revisionist history. 'Bush was President in 2008. Trump's tariffs are cratering the economy in 2025. I would recommend that @CNN and @abbydphillip stop inviting on pundits who don't seem to have a handle on the most basic facts about politics or economics,' Pod Save America host Tommy Vietor reacted. 'How many mistakes can you make in one tweet?' Charles W. Cooke, a senior writer for the conservative outlet National Review, wondered while Inside Elections deputy editor Jacob Rubashkin was even more succinct with his observation of Ungar-Sargon's remarks. ''Who was president in 2008?' and 'Who was president in 2020?' are two questions you should be required to answer before you opine about politics on TV,' he noted. 'It's one thing to go on TV and claim that Obama was president in 2008. TV is hectic and ppl make mistakes,' The Atlantic's Derek Thompson added. 'But it's another thing to log on in the morning and go: To be clear, Obama, who became POTUS in 2009, hates the common man so much he traveled back thru time to sign TARP.'
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The Independent
11-04-2025
- Business
- The Independent
‘MAGA leftist' blames Obama for 2008 bank bailout that was signed by George W. Bush
Self-described 'MAGA leftist' Batya Ungar-Sargon confidently declared on Thursday night that President Barack Obama's 'first act in office' was passing the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program that bailed out financial institutions during the height of the 2008 financial crisis. Ungar-Sargon would double down on that claim the following morning, tweeting that 'in 2008, President Obama bailed out Wall Street and screwed over Main Street' while defending Donald Trump's tariffs, insisting that 'in 2024' the current president 'screwed over Wall Street to bail out Main Street.' There is just one small problem with The Free Press columnist's analysis: TARP was signed into law by then-President George W. Bush on October 3, 2008 — a full month before Obama was elected president and four months before he entered the White House. During an appearance on CNN Newsnight with Abby Philip, Ungar-Sargon — who has been making the media rounds to passionately defend Trump's chaotic tariffs that have sparked a global market meltdown — attempted to contrast the factors that led to the Great Recession to the current economic environment. 'I've been thinking a lot about the 10 million Americans who lost their homes in the 2008 financial crisis, and how President Obama's first act in office was to give $700 billion to the banks that caused it, including $30 billion in bonuses to the crooks who organized it,' she exclaimed. 'And I'm thinking about how those very Americans saw a president pick Wall Street over Main Street,' Ungar-Sargon added. 'And what they saw this whole week was a president willing to go out there and fight for the forgotten men and women of this heartland and take on the entire international global order for them.' A one-time Marxist academic who has since morphed into a Steve Bannon-style MAGA populist-nationalist, Ungar-Sargon has pounded the drum in recent days that Trump is 'waging war' for 'the forgotten people in the heartland of America' with his trade war, going so far as to argue that it could fix the 'crisis in masculinity.' Still, regardless of the merits of her arguments on behalf of Trump's tariffs, one thing is indisputable — TARP was not Obama's 'first act' after he was sworn in as president in 2009. In reality, the massive bailout came about during the fall of 2008 when the global economy was in freefall due to financial institutions and banks — many of which were deemed 'too big to fail' — going bankrupt due to the subprime mortgage crisis. With the housing bubble bursting and defaults skyrocketing, the mortgage-backed securities that lenders and investment firms bought up in high volumes became worthless, resulting in these institutions losing all their money — and customers' deposits. TARP was eventually implemented to buy up these 'toxic' assets and keep the banks afloat amid concerns of a full-blown economic collapse. The bill was initially met with bipartisan resistance and even failed on its initial vote in the House, but Congress eventually passed it after some tweaks, and it was quickly signed into law by Bush. After Obama came into office, other changes were made to the program, including prohibiting firms receiving TARP funds from giving bonuses to their 25 highest-paid employees. The Treasury Department reported in 2023 that the total amount disbursed from TARP was $443.5 billion, with the government collecting $425.5 billion through repayments, sales and dividends. 'After considering the interest expense of $13.1 billion, the net cost of TARP programs was $31.1 billion,' the report stated. Sharing a clip of her CNN comments, Ungar-Sargon reiterated that Obama was responsible for TARP while simultaneously claiming Trump was president last year. 'In 2008, President Obama bailed out Wall Street and screwed over Main Street,' she posted on X (formerly Twitter). 'In 2024, President Trump screwed over Wall Street to bail out Main Street. That's what a lot of Americans are going to remember about last week.' It didn't take long for a number of political commentators and journalists to take Ungar-Sargon to task for her revisionist history. 'Bush was President in 2008. Trump's tariffs are cratering the economy in 2025. I would recommend that @CNN and @abbydphillip stop inviting on pundits who don't seem to have a handle on the most basic facts about politics or economics,' Pod Save America host Tommy Vietor reacted. 'How many mistakes can you make in one tweet?' Charles W. Cooke, a senior writer for the conservative outlet National Review, wondered while Inside Elections deputy editor Jacob Rubashkin was even more succinct with his observation of Ungar-Sargon's remarks. ''Who was president in 2008?' and 'Who was president in 2020?' are two questions you should be required to answer before you opine about politics on TV,' he noted. 'It's one thing to go on TV and claim that Obama was president in 2008. TV is hectic and ppl make mistakes,' The Atlantic's Derek Thompson added. 'But it's another thing to log on in the morning and go: To be clear, Obama, who became POTUS in 2009, hates the common man so much he traveled back thru time to sign TARP.'
CBS News
02-04-2025
- Climate
- CBS News
As heavy rain soaks Chicago area, officials issue "Overflow Action Day" to urge people to use less water
Even before steady and often heavy rainfall began falling across the Chicago area on Wednesday, the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District was urging people to cut down on their water use, to help limit flooding . The MWRD handles stormwater management and wastewater treatment in the Chicago area, and issued an overflow action alert on Tuesday in an effort to prevent flooding by limiting how much water goes into the sewer system. On days like Wednesday, when it's constantly raining, the MWRD water waste control room stays on high alert. Officials said there have been more weather alerts in recent years. While it might not be the first thing on your mind when you wake up on a rainy day, running your dishwasher and washing clothes are chores the MWRD wants Chicagoans to avoid on Wednesday. "Also, take shorter showers; anything you can do to make sure we have more space available in those local sewer lines so that water can get to the MWRD," said MWRD president Kari Steele. The number of overflow action alerts issued by MWRD has been rising. "It's not that often, but it is picking up more now, because of climate change. We're starting to see more extreme rain events in the Cook County area," Steele said. The MWRD's Tunnel and Reservoir Plan, also known as TARP or "The Deep Tunnel," is designed to reduce flooding and pollution caused by combined sewer overflows. The Deep Tunnel system is designed to capture stormwater and sewage that otherwise would flow into local lakes and rivers – or into basements – when heavy rain overwhelms sewers. TARP has three reservoirs that receive and store the flow from the tunnels during heavy storms. "Our Thornton Reservoir is just at about 2% capacity full, and the McCook Reservoir is at about 20% capacity," Steele said. As of Wednesday morning, the Majewsi Reservoir near Elk Grove Village was empty, but with the rain event being unpredictable, that's why the MWRD sends out overflow action day alerts before storms arrive. "It's very important that we have space available in the local sewer lines so that it can travel to the MWRD and stay out of those unwanted places, like our basements," Steele said. The overflow action day alert will stay in effect until after the storm ends. Officials typically keep such alerts in place for several hours, or even day or two after a big storm ends since stormwater will continue flowing into sewers long after rainfall is over. The Tunnel and Reservoir Plan has been around since 1985. It has 109 miles of tunnels, some as large as 33 feet in diameter.
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Prop 1 to cut $13 million to SLO County behavioral health programs. What's on chopping block?
Around 30 people who have dedicated their lives to working in mental health services in San Luis Obispo County — half in person and half on a Zoom screen — gathered in the basement of a county building on Jan. 29. The meeting was tense and solemn. It was the last meeting they would have as Mental Health Services Act committee members — and the last before at least $13 million cuts would be made to the mental health programs they support. The cuts stem from changes in state law after Prop 1 passed, a bill that according to the California Department of Health Care Services reforms mental health care funding 'to prioritize services for people with the most significant mental health needs while adding the treatment of substance use disorders, expanding housing interventions and increasing the behavioral health workforce.' But in practice, providers said, the bill is doing the opposite. John Crippen works as a behavioral health navigator for a Transitions-Mental Health Association program that helps people at high-risk and in need of intensive support navigate the behavioral health system. He was among the first cuts following Prop. 1's approval, he said. 'With TARP, that applies to… people that are higher risk. What's going to happen to them after they lose their entire treatment team?' Crippen said in the January meeting. 'We are an excellent return on investment, and I can't understand why some of these essentials are on the chopping block.' In 2024, voters passed Prop 1 on a slim margin, with 50.2% of voters supporting the proposition statewide. In San Luis Obispo County, a larger margin of voters rejected it, with 54% of voters opposing the changes to mental health and housing. Prop 1 redefined the Mental Health Services Act, which passed in 2004. The Mental Health Services act was revolutionary for its time, Transitions executive director Jill Bolster-White told The Tribune. It significantly revamped the state's mental health system by imposing a 1% income tax on people making more than $1 million per year. Those funds allowed local governments the flexibility to fund programs to support people living with severe mental illness, including prevention programs and programs not billable by Medi-Cal. It also introduced the idea of prevention services for mental health — something that had long been reserved for substance use disorder. Through the Act, services also did not require reimbursement or processing clients' billing though Medi-Cal, according to Frank Warren, deputy director of the San Luis Obispo Behavioral Health Department. That all changed with Prop 1. Prop 1 renamed the legislation as the Behavioral Health Services Act and carved out a new bucket of funding to focus on housing — but the money for housing projects is taken from money for services. Warren said like many other programs that rely on Mental Health Services Act funding across the state, the county's behavioral health team largely opposed Prop 1 when they first heard about it in March 2023. Services funded by the Mental Health Services Act placed more of an emphasis on the prevention side of mental illness, operating under the idea that it's more cost effective to treat an issue before it becomes more significant, Warren said. 'The Mental Health Services Act, in original, didn't really care whether you had insurance or not,' Warren said. 'It was be served where you are.' Now, Warren said, the messaging from the state is that prevention programs can be done through public health agencies. The Behavioral Health Services Act instead focuses on individuals who need the most severe help and those who are Medi-Cal eligible. 'There was a great focus on cultural competence, underserved populations, prevention, innovative ideas,' Warren said. 'The bill really stripped those out.' Under Prop 1, 30% of funds must go to housing — an allotment that takes millions of the county's current allotment from prevention services like Crippen's outreach work and from treatment beds, Warren said. Another 35% will go to programs for people with severe mental illness who need intensive programs, known as full-service partnerships and the remaining 35% to behavioral health support and services. Programs also must be billable through Medi-Cal and only those insured by Medi-Cal can be served. County Behavioral Health Services Act coordinator Christina Rajlal said the County is looking at possibilities of billing private insurance, but whether someone uninsured can receive help depends on their crisis level. An uninsured patient will receive care if they are entering a crisis service, Warren said, but if it's not a crisis, the county will provide a screening assessment then connect the patient to the Department of Social Services to be enrolled in Medi-Cal. Rajlal said this change in funding priorities will hobble the behavioral health department's ability to provide necessary wraparound services to people placed into housing. 'One of the things that is written into the housing bucket is none of the funding is allowed to be used for treatment services, and we know that one of the challenging parts about serving those that are unhoused is the retention of housing,' Rajlal said. 'I can put somebody in four walls — how do I retain them safely in those four walls, and get them stabilized, and get them in treatment, and get them all of the necessities to be safe and stable and on the road to recovery?' In a sense, the proposition is 'robbing Peter to pay Paul' by diverting prevention dollars to more beds, Rajlal said. A decrease in prevention services will likely have the downstream effect of more severely mentally ill people seeking treatment beds down the line. 'We as a department are facing a really big time of change and loss in areas that we as a county have been outstanding in in the state,' Rajlal said. Rajlal said once specific guidelines for housing funds are released, the county will first look into what existing programs qualify before taking on new projects. That could help alleviate the millions of dollars of cuts that remain. The county hopes to have decisions made on what programs and positions are cut off from funding by November, when it begins building its new budget for the following year. That way there is time for service providers to adjust to the change before the new funding guidelines are implemented in July 2026, Rajlal said. Across San Luis Obispo County, nonprofit mental health providers are already looking at ways to roll back their programming to comply with the new rules. At Transitions-Mental Health Association, many of those cuts will come on the prevention side of mental health care — a strategy organizational leaders fear will lead to worse outcomes and a higher caseload down the line. 'We're reeling, as you can imagine, and trying to scramble to figure out what our options are,' executive director Jill Bolster-White said. Bolster-White said with cuts coming on the prevention side, programs such as workforce entry and re-entry assistance, early mental illness screening and prevention for high school and college students, wellness centers and supportive programs that help people obtain and keep housing all face an uncertain future. Among those is the group's Transition Assistance and Relapse Prevention — the program Crippen leads. The program helps those who have been designated as high-risk and in-need of intensive support navigate the behavioral health system and makes routine check-ins on clients' mental and physical health. The program is no longer being funded under Prop 1, so if Transitions wants to keep it, it will have to find a new funding source. If the program is cut, Crippen worries his clients will decompensate or relapse. 'They're going to end up in hospitals. They're going to harm themselves,' Crippen told The Tribune. 'They're going to cost the system more.' Crippen said if his clients lose the support the program provides, they'll likely end up in the hospital, harming themselves, relapsing in substance use, losing housing or getting in trouble with law enforcement. The program he leads helps people maintain a continuum of care, and care interruptions could have devastating and lasting impacts on his client's well-being, he said. Others echoed those worries. 'What I worry is that it will increase the number of people who maybe don't know where to go — where to start — and so their symptoms and their issues become more acute,' Bolster-White said. 'The data is super clear that the earlier somebody gets response and treatment and access to support for their mental illness, the better their long term outcomes are, the better that they are to recover and sort of lead just a more traditional kind of lifestyle. 'The further downstream that those services come into play, the worse off people are generally.' Kaplan said the shift from mental health and prevention to a behavioral health focus brings Transitions-Mental Health closer to a medical agency than a supportive nonprofit, with non-medical expenses likely to suffer. 'What's happening to us is that a lot of our survival is going to come down to, 'Well, can we bill Medi-Cal for this?'' Kaplan said. 'We have to figure out if we can do that without losing our soul, because really, we have been so progressive and so person-oriented for so long that to suddenly turn into a bean-counting, medical-billing agency — that ain't going to cut it.' By the time of the Jan. 29 meeting, the County had already figured out how to cut $5 million in programs and jobs to comply with Prop 1 funding changes. One of the ways service providers can keep programs is by ensuring the programs are Medi-Cal billable. If they are not, the program is more likely to be on the chopping block given the County has $8 million in programs it still has to cut. The Veterans Outreach Program, which the county started in 2011, is one of the programs that was cut, Warren said. The program, which was modeled after the Wounded Warrior program through the Marines, engaged with veterans by having a therapist present at planned activities, like kayaking or hiking. Veterans could go to the activity and just have a conversation with the therapist — not a session — and it eventually made more veterans open to asking for help, he said. 'But that program doesn't live in the new (Behavioral Health Services Act). It's prevention. It's not billable,' Warren said. 'It's not specifically for Medi-Cal clients, so we had to say goodbye to that program and that sucks.' The County created three tiers in which it will decide what programs can stay and what should be cut. Top-priority programs to keep, despite not being Medi-Cal billable, are the Community Action Teams — a partnership between law enforcement and mental health providers to respond to people in mental health crises — and Homeless Outreach Teams. The County is also looking to cut costs by not replacing employees who step down from their positions to pursue other opportunities. 'We are stopping and really looking at that position, and if that position can be absorbed in our avenues and us back filling,' Rajlal said in the Jan. 29 meeting. 'That is a cost reduction that I would rather do as opposed to letting people go.' Rajlal said service providers can run programs reimbursable by Medi-Cal to make it self-sustaining or find other funding sources like grants if they want to keep programs that will no longer be covered because of Prop 1. 'People have to get creative,' Rajlal said. 'Everybody is trying to figure out where there are areas where we can identify that gaps are going to open up and where we can close them together as a community and work together.'
