Health wellness

New Youth Mental-Health Hotline Expands 24/7 Crisis Support Capacity

Colorado Scales 24/7 Youth Mental-Health Hotline, Expanding Crisis Counselor Ranks by 40%

Denver, CO – November 26, 2025 Colorado’s Behavioral Health Administration (BHA) today announced a $4.7 million surge in funding that will add 60 full-time crisis counselors to the state’s two 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline call centers, pushing total staffing past 200 and guaranteeing round-the-clock youth-specific support within three rings. The expansion—effective December 1—comes after Colorado youths initiated more than 38,000 calls, texts and chats to 988 in fiscal 2025, a 52% jump over the prior year and the fastest-growing segment of all crisis contacts statewide.

“When a young person reaches out, every second matters,” said BHA Commissioner Trina Brown. “This investment moves Colorado closer to a true ‘zero wait’ system and gives teens a confidential, judgment-free space to de-escalate before a trip to the ER or involvement with law enforcement ever becomes necessary.”

Nationwide, youth suicide rates have climbed 62% since 2010, with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data showing 2024 on track to be the deadliest year on record for Americans aged 10–19.

Colorado’s own rate remains 38% above the national average, driven by rural provider shortages and social-media-linked isolation. The enhanced hotline is the first deliverable under Governor Jared Polis’ Youth Mental Health Recovery Plan, a five-year framework that dedicates $54 million in opioid-settlement dollars to upstream interventions.

“We are not just answering phones—we are building an ecosystem,” Commissioner Brown added. “Additional counselors mean we can offer follow-up check-ins for up to 60 days after the initial contact, a practice shown to cut repeat crisis episodes by 34% in peer-reviewed studies.”

Market research firm IBISWorld estimates that U.S. demand for youth crisis services will grow 7.8% annually through 2029, outpacing the 4.2% expansion of provider capacity and widening the treatment gap. Colorado’s new staffing model leans heavily on certified peer specialists—counselors under 30 with lived mental-health experience—who now comprise 45% of the youth-shift workforce. Early outcomes from a six-month pilot showed 88% of teen callers rated their interaction as “helpful” or “extremely helpful,” compared with 71% in shifts staffed only by clinicians.

The state has also negotiated satellite bandwidth agreements that extend 988 chat and text services to 14 remote mountain counties where cell coverage is spotty, eliminating the “dead zones” that previously forced rural youth to drive an average of 47 miles for in-person crisis care.

About Colorado Behavioral Health Administration

The BHA is Colorado’s single state agency for mental-health and substance-use programs, overseeing a $1.3 billion annual budget that funds prevention, treatment and recovery supports for 1.2 million residents. The administration operates the state’s two 988 call centers in Denver and Pueblo and partners with 22 community mental-health centers to provide mobile crisis response and stabilization services.