Title VII of the Departments of Veterans Affairs and Housing and Urban Development, and Independent Agencies Appropriations Act, 1997 is entitled the "Mental Health Parity Act of 1996." This act amends ERISA to establish parity between mental health benefits and medical/surgical benefits for employers that choose to offer both.

Full text of the law (PDF): http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=104_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ204.104.pdf

A detailed summary of the law: http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/cmhs/ManagedCare/Parity/Summary.asp  

Consumer Questions and Answers on the Mental Health Parity Act: http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/cmhs/ManagedCare/Parity/Consumer.asp 

Employer Questions and Answers on the Mental Health Parity Act: http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/cmhs/ManagedCare/Parity/Employer.asp 

Interim Rules HIPPA Mental Health Parity Act; Proposed Rule: http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/cmhs/ManagedCare/Parity/PRTYREG.asp 

Contained within the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, Title V, Subtitle B, is the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008. This act builds on the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996 and now requires private group health plans of 51 or more employees to cover mental health and substance use disorders at the same levels as medical and surgery benefits, if the plan offers mental health and substance use benefits.

Full Text of the Legislation: Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (pdf)

CRS Summary: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:HR01424:@@@D&summ2=m&

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), also known as the "stimulus bill" or "stimulus package," contains supplimental approproations to many federal entities, as well as several states. The funds distributed by the bill, about $787 billion, will go towards tax cuts, unemployement benefits (including COBRA extensions), and domestic spending on programs in healthcare, infrastructure, eductation, and agriculture, along with other programs. While the funds don't directly affect SAMHSA, the bill does provide signiciant additional funding for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) which may benefit studies on M/SU or other M/SU programs. Additionally, funding to the states could help to shore up budgets, which may help to prevent cuts to M/SU state programming.

The White House has set up a site, http://www.recovery.gov, to help provide information about the specifics of how the money is being spent.

Text of legislation: American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (pdf)

The Medicare Improvments for Patients and Providers Act of 2008 amends "titles XVIII and XIX of the Social Security Act to extend expiring provisions under the Medicare Program, to improve beneficiary access to preventive and mental health services, to enhance low-income benefit programs, and to maintain access to care in rural areas, including pharmacy access, and for other purposes." Pertinent to mental health, Title I, Subtitle A, Part 1 specifies dates for the gradual elimination, by 2014, of differential copayment rates for outpatient Medicare psychiatric services. This section is not applicable to substance use services.

The legislation became law on 7/15/2008 as PL 110-275

Text of the legislation: The Medicare Improvments for Patients and Providers Act of 2008

The Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2009 (CHIPRA) reauthorizes the CHIP program through FY2013 and makes funding determinations for the CHIP programs in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The reauthorization also requires CHIP programs to comply with parity provisions in the 2008 Wellstone-Domenici Mental Health Parity and Substance Use Equity Act. Full text of the legislation is below:

Text of Legislation (PDF)