Cowlitz County officials, residents debate centralized behavioral-health facility; commissioners agree to workshop

At a county meeting, Cowlitz County commissioners and residents debated a proposal to organize a centralized behavioral-health effort and explore a long-term inpatient treatment facility for people with severe substance-use and behavioral-health needs.

The discussion centered on how the county should organize leadership, focus existing resources and create treatment capacity that currently does not exist in the county. Resident Larry Crosby pressed the county to name a single leader and hire “a project manager” to coordinate day-to-day work and bring weekly updates to the Board of Commissioners so the effort would remain public and accountable. “You need the need what I'm what I'm defining as a project manager. Somebody that can actually go out and do the day to day coordinating all of the groundwork, keeping everybody on board, and getting getting all of the comments, getting them assembled, and then bringing them back to the individual in charge,” Crosby said.

Why it matters: speakers and commissioners said the county lacks long-term…