The Abandonment of Our Youth: How Budget Cuts Become Body Counts in America's Suicide Crisis

A Crisis in Plain Sight

Weeks after a stabbing incident at Watsonville High School that left a student and staff member wounded and four students arrested, the Pajaro Valley Unified School District faces a decision that reveals everything wrong with our approach to youth mental health. Rather than strengthening support systems in the wake of violence, the district is considering eliminating every mental health clinician and most school counselors to balance its budget. This isn’t just fiscal management—it’s institutional abandonment during a national emergency.

The statistics are not abstract numbers; they represent children in crisis. Youth suicide ranks as one of the leading causes of death for people ages 10 to 24. The gender disparity is particularly alarming: men and boys constitute nearly 80% of suicides in the United States, a rate almost four times higher than for women. For LGBTQ youth, the picture becomes even more dire, with a national survey finding that nearly 39% seriously considered suicide in the past year, and 12% attempted it.

The Context of Violence and Neglect

What we routinely frame as “school safety” often reflects untreated pain and systemic neglect. The proposed cuts would eliminate the equivalent of 15 full-time counselors, all 13 mental health clinicians, and dozens of intervention staff. These positions represent the frontline defense against the silent crises unfolding in our schools daily. When a boy explodes in violence, we see a threat that demands security measures. When a boy shuts down emotionally, we often assume he’s fine. Both responses represent symptoms of a system that teaches boys to swallow their pain until the pressure becomes unbearable.

The timing of these proposed cuts reveals a profound disconnect from reality. They’re happening in winter—when depression, isolation, and suicidal ideation typically increase. They’re occurring in communities still recovering from violence, and after the federal government removed the LGBTQ-specific option on the national 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. We are witnessing the systematic dismantling of lifelines precisely when young people need them most desperately.

The Human Infrastructure of Safety

School counselors and clinicians constitute essential safety infrastructure, not budgetary luxuries. These professionals serve as the adults who notice when a student stops being themselves, when academic performance suddenly declines, when friendships change, or when a typically vibrant child becomes withdrawn. Their role transcends academic guidance—they are trained to recognize the warning signs that precede both self-harm and violence toward others.

The irony is staggering: in response to a stabbing incident that demonstrates the consequences of unaddressed mental health crises, the district proposes eliminating the very professionals equipped to prevent such incidents. This approach reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of safety. True security doesn’t come from metal detectors and surveillance cameras alone; it emerges from relationships, trust, and early intervention.

The Contradiction of Investment Versus Implementation

California has made significant investments in youth behavioral health in recent years, but these commitments mean little if local school boards eliminate the positions that translate state dollars into daily, life-saving support. The proposed cuts represent a catastrophic failure of implementation that undermines the state’s entire mental health infrastructure.

The district’s consideration of these cuts during a youth suicide crisis demonstrates how budget decisions can become matters of life and death. When we remove mental health professionals from schools, we’re not just cutting positions—we’re eliminating the adults who might notice a child’s cry for help before it becomes a tragedy. We’re dismantling the safety nets that catch students before they fall beyond reach.

The Moral Failure of Budget-First Thinking

As someone who has lost loved ones to suicide, I can attest that sometimes the difference between survival and silence is a single adult who knows your name and notices when your light dims. The proposed cuts represent more than poor fiscal management—they constitute a moral failure of epic proportions.

We have created a system where budget documents carry more weight than children’s lives, where spreadsheets outweigh suffering. The district’s proposal suggests that mental health support represents an optional extra rather than essential infrastructure. This thinking fundamentally misunderstands both the nature of the crisis and our responsibility to address it.

The “Break the Stigma Not the Vibe” movement led by youth ambassadors on the Central Coast understands what district officials apparently do not: visibility itself can be an intervention. When students see messages affirming that asking for help represents strength, that they don’t have to suffer alone, and that they deserve support before reaching crisis points, we create cultural antibodies against isolation and despair. But these messages mean little if we simultaneously remove the professionals trained to respond when students finally reach out.

The False Economy of Cutting Mental Health Services

Eliminating mental health positions represents the worst kind of false economy. The immediate budget savings pale in comparison to the long-term costs of untreated mental health crises: emergency room visits, hospitalization, lost educational opportunities, and—most tragically—preventable deaths. More fundamentally, we cannot calculate the cost of a child’s potential unrealized because no adult noticed their suffering.

The district’s proposal comes at a moment when we should be strengthening, not weakening, our mental health infrastructure. The recent violence at Watsonville High should serve as a wake-up call, not an excuse for austerity. When children demonstrate through their actions that they need more support, our response must be to provide it, not withdraw it.

A Choice Between Two Futures

We face a fundamental choice: continue cutting lifelines while hoping for the best, or recognize that in a youth suicide crisis, the most dangerous decision we can make is to remove the people who keep children alive. This isn’t about budgeting—it’s about values. It’s about whether we believe our children’s mental health represents an essential investment or a disposable extravagance.

The proposed cuts would particularly devastate already vulnerable populations. Boys, who are socialized to avoid emotional vulnerability, need targeted support to overcome cultural barriers to seeking help. LGBTQ youth, who face unique challenges and higher rates of suicidal ideation, require specialized understanding. Students of color, who may encounter additional barriers to mental health care, deserve culturally competent support. By eliminating mental health positions, we abandon those who need help most desperately.

The Path Forward: Prioritizing People Over Spreadsheets

If we’re serious about preventing suicide—especially among boys and historically marginalized youth—then counselors, clinicians, and trusted adults must be the last consideration for cuts, not the first. We need to reconceptualize mental health support as essential infrastructure, as fundamental to school safety as fire alarms and emergency exits.

The district should reconsider this disastrous proposal and explore alternative solutions that don’t sacrifice children’s wellbeing. Community partnerships, grant opportunities, and creative staffing models might offer pathways to maintain services during fiscal challenges. What we cannot accept is the normalization of treating mental health as disposable.

Conclusion: Our Collective Responsibility

This moment demands more than budget analysis—it requires moral clarity. The proposed cuts represent a betrayal of our most fundamental responsibility: to protect and nurture the next generation. We cannot claim to value education while dismantling the support systems that make learning possible. We cannot claim to care about safety while eliminating the professionals who prevent crises.

Every child deserves at least one adult who notices when they’re struggling. By eliminating mental health positions, we gamble with children’s lives based on spreadsheets that cannot capture the value of a saved life. The stakes are too high, the crisis too urgent, and our moral responsibility too clear to accept such reckless austerity. Our children’s lives depend on choosing compassion over calculation, and people over politics.