Three Years of Impact for the Behavioral Health Forum

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BHT received an Integrated Managed Care (IMC) Incentive through Washington’s Section 1115 Medicaid Waiver to create and develop projects and activities to improve our healthcare system. In 2021, our Board allocated Integrated Managed Care Incentive funds to support behavioral health (BH) workforce initiatives. This included support for organizations with substance use disorders (SUD) and master’s level BH staff to provide supervision to ensure staff can gain critical licensure. In 2022, the Behavioral Health Forum used participatory budgeting to allocate $150,000 to continue funding behavioral health supervision.

The BHT Behavioral Health Forum is a group of behavioral health provider organizations and educational institutions that has met regularly since 2021 to collaborate on solutions to behavioral health workforce challenges. In 2022, the group became a self-governing body and began using participatory decision-making practices to allocate $1.2M to initiatives that support the behavioral health workforce. As of November 2024, all funds have been allocated and we are celebrating the group’s successes by highlighting the impact the group has had in our region!

Overall Impact

$1,206,906 allocated to regional behavioral health workforce initiatives using participatory budgeting

33 BHT Behavioral Health Forum member organizations

20-30 attendees at bi-monthly meetings

Workforce Recruitment and Retention

  • $130,000 distributed to 13 organizations to support behavioral health internship programming.

  • 30 supervision support contracts awarded in two rounds to 22 organizations that provide clinical behavioral health services.

  • Over 4500 hours of supervision provided to 174 mental health and substance use disorder professional staff…and counting! Contract work is still underway and final numbers are not yet available.

Training

  • 46 people trained in Motivational Interviewing by the Institute for Individual and Organizational Change.

  • Trained individuals on Intergenerational Colonial Trauma: Long-Term Impacts on Native American Communities by Indigenous woman-led consultancy Swan Innovations.

  • Certified Peer Counselor and Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP) Peer training offered by partner organizations Passages.

Education

  • $287,864 allocated to scholarships for students in the first-ever Bachelor of Applied Science in Integrated Behavioral Health cohort.

  • 28 licensed clinicians provided funding to complete the substance use disorder professional alternative certification coursework at the Community Colleges of Spokane.

This is only a snapshot of the impactful work that the Behavioral Health Forum was able to complete in three years. If you are interested in learning more about the work, click here. Stay tuned for updates. Contract work is still underway and final numbers will be available soon!