Committee vote sends two critical behavioral health workforce bills to Joint Ways and Means

The Oregon House Committee on Behavioral Health and Health Care has passed HB 2651 and HB 2977 which are part of Washington County’s behavioral health workforce incentive package.

“We appreciate the support shown by the House Behavioral Health and Health Care Committee for investing in Oregon’s behavioral health workforce,” Board Chair Kathryn Harrington said. “As people, individuals and collectively as a community, we each hope to enjoy long fruitful lives. From time to time, we each may need some mental health supports to deal with the challenges of our lives and relationships. As our population has grown and as societal complexity has evolved we are ever more reliant on having a long-term mental health care system just as we have a reliant physical health system. There are good careers in the behavioral health field and there is certainly a demand for more skilled workers in this field. These state legislative investments will help at a time when so many Oregonians are experiencing behavioral health challenges, the ability to develop, recruit and retain behavioral health care staff is critical.”

• HB 2651 provides $75 million in funds for the Oregon Health Authority and counties to recruit and retain behavioral health workers through a variety of incentive tools. The bill also provides funding for clinical supervision thus boosting worker take-home pay.
• HB 2977 provides $10 million in funding to educational and training programs to prepare students for entry into the behavioral health field. The bill would also fund workforce boards to promote pipeline development activities in behavioral health fields.

“Continuing to invest in evidence-based practices to improve culturally and geographically diverse representation in the behavioral health field is critical to the success of Oregon’s behavioral health system,” said Marni Kuyl, Washington County Assistant County Administrator. We are grateful that the committee members are investing and innovating upon investments that were made in 2021.”

The eventual passage of these bills would have a tremendous impact on Washington County community members and all Oregonians.

In his February testimony to the committee, Washington County Behavioral Health Division Manager Nicholas Ocon explained, “House Bill 2651 provides a short-term strategy to meet our behavioral health workforce needs by making an investment in incentives to recruit and retain our needed workforce, and by directing these funds to the counties to ensure that the funding gets to our organizations who need it the most. This will help stabilize the current workforce, and hopefully attract workforce members who entered other fields during the pandemic to return to behavioral health.”

He went on to say, “House Bill 2977 provides a long-term strategy of increasing our behavioral health workforce pipeline by preparing students for entry into the field and promoting higher education institution’s ability to increase the number of students that they can train on an annual basis. It has become clear it will take several years for our state to meet the current workforce needs, and this bill focuses on investing in our local community and creating pathways to enter the field.”

The bills now move to the Oregon Legislature’s Joint Ways and Means Committee.