Local tax dollars repurposed for mental health

Gallatin County is taking money from legal marijuana sales and using it to pay for mental-health services, with all county revenue from its local marijuana tax flowing into a mental-health fund. The county says it brings in about $500,000 to $800,000 a year from that tax. (kxlf.com) That local tax is 3% on medical marijuana and 3% on non-medical marijuana, and Gallatin County voters approved both questions in November 2022. The county put the tax on the ballot after Montana law let counties add a local-option marijuana tax of up to 3%. (gallatinmt.gov) One chunk of that money, $100,000, paid for renovations at the Help Center’s new campus in Gallatin County. The Help Center used the money to build part of its new crisis call center and add more call stations. (kxlf.com) The Help Center is not a small hotline in one town. It started in the 1970s and now serves 13 counties in southwest Montana through three crisis call lines, sexual-assault advocacy, and trauma-informed counseling. (kxlf.com) In 2025 alone, the Help Center served more than 4,800 people and delivered more than 8,000 hours of counseling. Before moving in January 2025, staff were split between a house on Peach Street and another building off Babcock, with the hotline operating out of what one staffer described as two tiny bedrooms. (kxlf.com) The county is spreading the same tax stream across other pieces of the local safety net. In fiscal year 2025, commissioners allocated $200,000 to Human Resource Development Council for Homeward Point and another $200,000 toward buying a youth mental-health crisis campus north of Belgrade. (kxlf.com) Homeward Point is the new year-round shelter at 208 East Griffin Drive in Bozeman, and it was built with onsite services including medical care and mental-health support. When it opened in September 2025, it housed 107 people on its second night. (thehrdc.org) (gallatinmedia.org) The youth campus is meant to keep teenagers closer to home during a crisis instead of sending families on long drives for care. Gallatin County says the planned campus would let children and adolescents stabilize, get assessed, and connect to services while staying near their families. (gallatinmt.gov) This is happening in a state where need is not abstract. The National Alliance on Mental Illness says 1 in 5 adults experience mental illness each year, and its Montana fact sheet says 234,000 adults in the state have a mental health condition. (nami.org) Gallatin County is also layering this marijuana-tax money on top of a much bigger local buildout. The Gallatin Behavioral Health Coalition said in March 2026 that partners secured $10,946,812 in collaborative funding in 2024 and 2025, opened a 14-bed adult psychiatric inpatient unit at Bozeman Health, and launched new addiction-treatment services through Rimrock in Bozeman. (kbzk.com) The result is that a tax most people associate with retail sales is being used more like plumbing inside the local care system. In Gallatin County, a purchase at a marijuana dispensary can now help pay for a crisis call station, a shelter bed, or the first steps of a youth crisis campus. (kxlf.com) (kbzk.com)