WASHINGTON

Community & Family Resources (CFR) is a substance abuse and mental healthcare clinic that serves the greater Iowa City area.

In January, they opened a satellite office in Washington, giving the community much needed attention after a service hiatus.

“Ideally, [people should] not have to travel 30 to 40 minutes to access treatment. If they can travel five minutes, 10 minutes, they’re much more likely to be able to consistently attend,” CFR’s Iowa City Regional Director and Licensed Mental Health Counselor Kayla Borja Frost said.

“Being in those rural communities that don’t have as many options has really been important to us for a long time. [It] was frustrating that we weren’t able to find staff to make that happen [until now],” Borja Frost added.

The Washington out patient clinic had been open for roughly 20 years before closing due to a retirement in 2022.

“It was a consistent option for the community, and then all of a sudden, it wasn’t. That’s not really fair, we didn’t want to do that,” Borja Frost said. “The barrier to opening them has been staffing. There is a workforce shortage in a lot of industries, but I think the behavioral health field is feeling it even more so.”

CFR’s Washington location offers mental health services on Wednesdays with Leanne Bender, a Temporary Licensed Mental Health Counselor (T-LMHC). Bender is from Washington and is “excited” to be a part of the Washington expansion, according to the companies press release on the matter.

Bender joined CFR in 2023 after completing a practicum and internship as a substance use counselor. She’s experienced in working with youth, sexual assault victims and those suffering with trauma and grief.

CFR plans to have a different staffer in Washington on Mondays for substance use services. Borja Frost hopes the staffer will be available sometime between the end of March and beginning of April, though no timetable is certain.

Iowa’s behavioral health landscape

In Iowa exists 19 different service areas for substance use and gambling problems set by the Iowa Department of Public Health. Johnson and Washington counties are in service area 17 along with Iowa and Cedar counties.

Because CFR wanted to expand services, they applied for an Integrated Provider Network (IPM) grant. Any provider who secures the grant is expected to use it for expansion. That helped CFR expand in both Washington and Tipton.

CFR has a Marengo office as well, although it has yet to be staffed.

This made CFR the behavioral health provider for service area 17 – they also operate in service area six.

As CFR expands, the behavioral health landscape gradually evolves around them.

Gov. Kim Reynolds announced an intention to consolidate the different nets of mental health regions on Feb. 8 for more unified services.

The alignment bill would create seven unified regions under the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), tying 19 substance use and 13 mental health regions together.

Some mental health professionals have praised Reynold’s proposal. Borja Frost remained optimistic, stating, “It’s possible that this could be very positive. We could end up accessing more funding than we have in the past and serve more people and that would be great.”

Despite the positivity, many questions linger.

“Are we going to be expected to serve a larger area or make an attempt to? How are we going to [do that]? What are the expectations going to be? How will we get the funding to be able to continue serving?” Borja Frost wondered. “It’s nerve racking.”

Borja Frost was able to ask these questions and more when she, along with other professionals, went to Des Moines on Feb. 20 for a yearly “Mental Health Day on the Hill,” which advocates to keep Iowa’s GuideLink Centers open.

“We ended up talking to a lot of legislators about [the alignment bill] because they wanted to know our questions or concerns. More than anything, we just have questions at this point,” Borja Frost said. “There’s a lot of things that aren’t spelled out at all for how we will be able to operate.”

As the landscape morphs, so will CFR’s function within the area. For now, they’re simply happy to say they’ve opened new satellite offices to broaden their reach.

*GuideLink Centers are locations which provide 24/7 mental health services. They operate as an alternative to going to hospitals, which are overburdened, expensive and potentially scary. They do not perform medical services, just mental health services.

CFR offers a plethora of other programs/services at their Iowa City location and afar, such as inpatient care, prevention and education, detoxification, recovery housing, problem gambling services and more.

To be reached, CFR’s eastern Iowa region phone number is (319) 351-4357. Their web address is cfrhelps.org.