Hearth Record

Assisted living in Santa Barbara County

Shortlist up to four to read them side by side.

Filter them by what their records say, and open any one to read it: every fact with its source and date.

149 assisted living facilities in Santa Barbara County, California.

From the California Department of Social Services, Community Care Licensing Division: state data file for adult residential facilities and state data file for elderly residential care. The record lists 15,776 assisted living facilities in California.

149of 149 assisted living facilitiesshown with your filters

What the words on these cards mean9
Inspection (survey)
A visit by state inspectors, often unannounced, who check a place against the rules it must meet. For nursing homes and other places Medicare pays, CMS calls these visits surveys: a standard survey of a nursing home comes at least every 15 months, and a complaint survey whenever a complaint calls for one. Source: CMS; 42 CFR 488.308.
Deficiency, citation, violation
What inspectors write up when a place didn’t meet a rule: the rule, what they saw, and when. CMS calls it a deficiency; states may say citation or violation. It is the inspectors’ finding, not a court’s, and the place is usually asked for a plan to correct it. Source: CMS, statement of deficiencies (Form CMS-2567); each state’s licensing agency.
Type A and Type B citations
California grades each citation by risk. Type A, the most serious, is a violation that poses an immediate risk to residents’ health, safety or personal rights. Type B is one that could become that risk if it isn’t corrected. Source: California Department of Social Services, Community Care Licensing Division.
Substantiated complaint
A complaint allegation the state investigated and found true: the evidence showed it more likely than not happened. Inconclusive means the evidence couldn’t show it either way. Neither inconclusive nor unsubstantiated proves it didn’t happen. Source: California Department of Social Services, complaint findings; each state’s licensing agency.
Licence status
Whether the state’s licence lets the place operate now, in the state’s own words: licensed, on probation (allowed to keep operating on conditions, after problems), provisional, pending or expired. Source: Each state’s licensing agency.
Capacity
The most people the licence or certification lets the place care for at once: residents, children, beds or apartments, as the state counts them. It isn’t how many are there now. Source: Each state’s licensing agency.
Memory care
Care for people living with dementia. Some states license a separate dementia or Alzheimer’s unit; others ask a facility to say what dementia care it gives. This record uses the state’s own field. Source: Each state’s list.
Accepts Medicaid
The state’s own list says the place takes part in a Medicaid program (a waiver, a contract or a program like Illinois’s supportive living) that can pay for care for people who qualify. Source: Each state’s list.
Not published
The source has no such field for this place. It isn’t a zero, and it isn’t a clean record. Source: How this site reads each source.

The list

Order the list

    Source:

    California Department of Social Services, state data file for adult residential facilities and state data file for elderly residential care. Released Nov 1, 2026. Updated weekly.

    Side by side

    The same published facts for each, in the same order, in their sources’ words.

    Every line is a fact its source published, in that source’s own words. On a line whose figures can be ordered, the one that leads is marked; that is not a rating, and no line is weighed against another. “Not published” means that state’s file has no such field, which is not the same as a zero.

    How to read a record

    Four things every record does, shown on an example record made up for this guide.

    An example record, made up for this guide

    An example nursing home

    Made up for this guide: no real place is shown

    Not fully inspected in over two years (CMS flag)

    11 health citations at the latest inspection cycle

    The state average is 14.3.

    Source:

    CMS, State and US Averages and Health Deficiencies. Released Oct 28, 2026. Updated monthly.

    From the homeNone yet. Replies and paid listings aren’t open, and when they open they will sit here, below the record.

    1 of 4

    Every fact names its source.

    Who published it, when, and how often it changes sit beside each fact, with a link to the agency’s own file.

    Sign in

    A free account keeps your watch list, shortlists, comparisons and saved searches on every device, and can email you when something you watch changes. Browsing never needs one.