Maine’s Children’s’ Behavioral Health Services Vision
Children’s Behavioral Health Services (CBHS) facilitates the provision of services for the benefit of Maine children, youth, and families. While CBHS is not a direct-service provider, our mission is to oversee and provide access to a broad range of services for children up to their 21st birthday, and their families, including:
- Mental Health
- Intellectual Disability
- Pervasive Developmental Disorders
- Developmental Disability
The Children’s Behavioral Health Settlement Agreement
In December 2024, State of Maine entered into a Settlement Agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice. The Agreement is designed to prevent children and youth with behavioral health disabilities under the age of 21 from unnecessarily entering into or remaining in out-of-home placements, and to support their successful return to their home whenever possible.
Through this Agreement, the State is expanding and strengthening the array of community-based services available to children and families. The goal is to ensure that children receive the right service at the right time, close to home, with the support they need to stay safely in their communities.
The Agreement strengthens Maine’s focus on early identification, use of a standard clinical assessment process, coordinated service planning, and monitoring of outcomes. These elements are intended to help ensure that children receive the right services at the right time, in the appropriate setting, with the supports they need to stay safely in their communities.
In 2025, DHHS built the foundation for these improvements. Early implementation began in 2026 and will continue throughout the Agreement period. DHHS is also developing a public education website to share updates about the Agreement, planned improvements, implementation progress, and resources for families about children’s behavioral health services. As new information and resources become available, they will be added to the site.
To read the full Agreement, visit the DOJ Settlement Agreement section of the DHHS website. You can also find the initial implementation plan, which describes how the State is carrying out the requirements of the Agreement during the first two years.
Updates on Children’s Behavioral Health Services System Improvement Efforts
In 2018, the Office of Child and Family Services (OCFS) partnered with Public Consulting Group (PCG) to evaluate and pursue recommendations for improvements to the CBHS system. OCFS and PCG collaborated with leadership from the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), OCFS staff, families, providers, and stakeholders to develop two reports on the CBHS system and formulate a group of prioritized strategies meant to improve the CBHS system of care. Over the last two years CBHS staff have collaborated with stakeholders to implement these system improvement efforts.