 The Crowing County Board approved to send a list of recommendations to legislators on the state's behavioral health continuum of care. After the state shifted to a community-based model of mental health care, there's been a shortage of psychiatric beds. Many clients end up in the county jail or emergency departments while they wait for services to become available. Somebody may be getting service from one organization can't anymore because there's not enough service providers and then they have to look at other organizations and that kind of trickles down to then when you have these emergency situations at the jail or the state. We're at the courts that people can't get those immediate services like they always need to because there's such a backlog of appointments. The county plans to recommend funding for the jail staff to be trained on crisis intervention and funding for community-based residential options. The county also will recommend the state restore funding for county costs of treatment at the Inoco Regional Treatment Center. The state never developed the continuum of care that they promised when the state hospital system closed and as a result of that, counties are picking up the tab. And so the real question is, do you want to fund a mental health delivery system across the state of Minnesota using state resources or would you like that to be a patchwork quilt, county by county by county? Crowan County hopes to gain monetary support from the state to invest in the mental health services in the community. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.