To help inform local policy and system improvement, the Sonoma County Commission on the Status of Women convened a public panel of mental health experts and community leaders in November 2025. Panelists described women’s mental wellness as a life-course issue shaped by cumulative stress, trauma exposure, unequal belonging, and disproportionate burden.

Findings from the Commission’s 2023 Report on the Status of Women and Girls in Sonoma County reinforce this framing. After the 2017 and 2019 fires, about one in four households reported fire-related depression or hopelessness affecting at least one household member. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the share of Sonoma County women who reported feeling “stressed” or “very stressed” rose from about one-third to nearly nine in ten. The report also identified significant gender disparities: across 2019- 2021, Sonoma County women were more than twice as likely as men to show signs consistent with a serious psychological episode in the prior year.