Washington County plans July 2025 ‘bridge’ Community Health Improvement Plan; seeks broader partner input

Washington County Public Health outlined a two-year plan on a recorded forum to update its Community Health Improvement Plan (CHIP), announcing an interim "bridge" CHIP to be released in July 2025 and a full CHIP scheduled for July 2026. The agency said the bridge plan will connect the county's 2020 CHIP with process improvements and partner feedback while the region's updated community health needs assessment is completed in October 2025.

The bridge CHIP is intended to reorganize committee leadership and participation, revise how the county distributes community grant funds, and create clearer goals and evaluation measures before the full CHIP is released. "A CHIP identifies priority issues about the health of the community and the people in the community, and identifies goals and strategies to address those issues," said Laura Daley, coordinator for the Community Health Improvement Plan, summarizing the plan's purpose.

Why it matters: The CHIP guides cross-sector public-health work in Washington County and is a requirement of national public health accreditation; the county said it wants the updated plan to center health equity and trauma-informed approaches and to better reflect community priorities. The county participates in a regional community health needs assessment through the Healthy Columbia Willamette Collaborative (HCWC), which includes Multnomah, Clackamas and Washington counties and regional health systems. Washington County staff said the regional assessment reduces community burden but requires supplemental, county-specific data to be fully useful for local planning.

Details of the proposed process and timeline: Staff outlined a five-step CHIP cycle—conduct a health assessment, review data with partners, set priorities and metrics, select strategies and implement, and evaluate impact. Genevieve, senior program coordinator on the county's strategy team, described the first step: "Step 1 in the CHIP process is to conduct a health assessment." The county said an updated regional assessment is scheduled for October 2025; in the meantime it will compile Washington County–specific data and supplemental data partners provide.

From January through June 2025, staff will plan process improvements and collect supplemental data; in July 2025 the county will release the bridge CHIP and begin reconvening partners and committees. After the HCWC report is released in October 2025, the county plans to review the combined data with partners and work from January through June 2026 to finalize priorities, goals, strategies and metrics, with a full CHIP release planned for July 2026.

Committee structure, funding and participation: The presentation listed current CHIP committees (Access to Care Committee; Aging and Connection Committee; Youth Substance Use Prevention; Suicide Prevention Council; Healthy Communities Committee) and said some committees have paused or disbanded since 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic or insufficient county support. The county said it will explore different leadership and funding models, noting past practice included competitive grants and committee-directed projects. Daley said some partners told staff that competitive grant processes do not work well for smaller organizations; Washington County said it will "take a hard look" at how funds are distributed to improve equity and accessibility.

Evaluation and accountability: Staff emphasized building evaluation into strategy selection and providing support for partners to track outcomes. The county plans to propose an evaluation framework during the bridge phase and refine it with partners before full implementation.

Engagement opportunities: The county said it solicited input this fall through focus groups, interviews, tabling and a survey and encouraged attendees to complete the HCWC survey (staff noted the survey was open at the time of the recording and closing soon). Daley invited listeners to stay connected via the CHIP website, the slide PDF linked to the recording and an email contact provided at the session.

What the presentation did not include: There were no formal votes, ordinance actions or budget approvals during the recorded forum. The county presented proposed timelines and processes rather than legally binding decisions.

Next steps: Washington County Public Health will release the bridge CHIP in July 2025, collect supplemental county data and convene partners to refine priorities and metrics after the regional assessment is published in October 2025. The agency expects to release a full CHIP in July 2026 and begin implementation and evaluation thereafter.