Alliance Alert: We commend New York City Mayor’s Office, the NYC Health Department, and the New York State Office of Mental Health for launching NYC Mental Health Connect, a new online resource designed to make it easier for New Yorkers to find and access mental health services and supports.
For too many people, finding appropriate mental health services can be confusing, frustrating, and overwhelming. We are encouraged by the City’s efforts to remove these barriers by creating a central resource where individuals and families can explore available services, including information about eligibility, costs, languages, and appointment options. People seeking help should not have to navigate a complicated system just to find the support they need.
This initiative is an important step toward improving access, particularly for people who may not know where to begin or have struggled to connect with services in the past. We hope the City will continue building on this approach by ensuring that New Yorkers can easily find voluntary, community-based services, including peer support, recovery programs, and other resources that help people remain connected to their communities.
Making services easier to find must also go hand in hand with ensuring those services are available, adequately funded, and staffed to meet growing demand. We applaud the City’s commitment to making the system more accessible and look forward to continued efforts to connect more New Yorkers with the services and supports they need to recover and thrive.
New Yorkers can explore the new resource at mentalhealthconnect.nyc.gov.
When It Comes to New Yorkers’ Mental Health, No One Should Have to Guess Where to Start
By Alister F. Martin and Jorge R. Petit | AMNY | October 27, 2026
One of us is an emergency physician, the other a psychiatrist. Between the two of us, we have spent decades caring for people in emergency rooms, clinics, and community programs.
Throughout that time, when it comes to treating peoples’ mental health concerns, the question we hear most often isn’t about a diagnosis or a medication. It’s simpler, and yet harder to answer: Where do I go for help?
New Yorkers have long deserved a better answer to that question than “it depends,” or “let me make a few calls.”
A few years ago, we asked New Yorkers about their mental health. Through that survey, we found about 945,000 New Yorkers needed mental health treatment and did not get it. One of the most common reasons was that they didn’t know who to contact or where turn for help.
That’s because, for years, the focus has been on building a robust system of mental health services that can meet a wide range of needs. But that system lacks a front door for people to walk through, ask questions, and ultimately access the services they need.
Asking for help is hard enough without a maze in front of it. When a mother is awake at night worried about her teenager, or a man is trying to figure out how to help his brother, the last thing they should face is a system that was never built to be seen from the outside. That is a design problem, and it is ours to fix.
That is why, earlier this month, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and the NYC Health Department launched NYC Mental Health Connect, a website where anyone can search for mental health services across the city. Funded in partnership with the New York State Office of Mental Health, New Yorkers can use Mental Health Connect to search for what they need, who a program serves, what languages are spoken, and what it costs. It includes programs that are free, available on a sliding-scale, and those that accept Medicaid. If you aren’t sure where to start, a short questionnaire can point you toward options based on your concerns, appointment availability, or whether you want care in person or online.
Mental Health Connect is the front door we’ve always needed, and behind that door is the system the City and State have spent years building: clinics, outreach teams, supportive housing, clubhouses, peer programs, crisis response, and more. But we want to be clear that it isn’t a crisis line. If you or someone you love is in crisis, call or text 988, any hour of any day, and a trained counselor will answer.
This resource could not come at a more important time. Federal changes to Medicaid eligibility are putting coverage at risk for thousands of New Yorkers. People who lose coverage don’t stop needing care. They put it off, and too often they end up in an emergency room, a shelter, or in crisis. As more of our neighbors look for help, Mental Health Connect is needed now more than ever.
A website can point someone to an appointment, but it takes people and programs to provide the care, and those programs can keep their doors open only if the funding behind them is sustainable.
When it comes to taking care of your mental health, no New Yorker should have to guess where to start. Now, you don’t have to.
If you or someone you love has been waiting for a sign to reach out, this is that sign. Start at mentalhealthconnect.nyc.gov.
Dr. Alister F. Martin is New York City’s Health Commissioner; Dr. Jorge R. Petit is the Executive Deputy Commissioner for Mental Hygiene at the NYC Health Department.