This week I was pleased to welcome the Ardmore Behavioral Health Collaborative (ABHC) into the studio and our Lawton community.
The ABHC team along with members or their parent organization, Lighthouse Behavioral Wellness Centers, joined me at our Phase II Community Action Forum in town, before we met back at the studio.
Ardmore Behavioral Health Collaborative Director, Ellen Roberts, provided me with a great interview that you can listen to in its extended version above. She shares information and details about some of the groups that ABHC helps to facilitate in the Ardmore community.
One of those groups evolved from their local Homeless Coalition to address the needs and circumstances around their community's growing unhoused population. The 3H Task Force was designed to focus on Homelessness, Housing and Health. With the help of ABHC, 3H partnered with community leaders and local non-profits to address and combat their local needs in Ardmore. Roberts details the methodology behind their task force's plans, and the way they came together to organize and tackle this complex situation.
Since June of 2020, Roberts has been in the role of ABHC Director and immediately set out to listen to her community, identifying the needs and shortcomings that her organization could help with. "Over and over again, knowledge of resources and access to resources came up," Roberts said.
So, with the help of a grant, ABHC created their website,
https://www.ardmorebhc.com/ and established a Community Resource Page housed on their new platform. They committed to keeping it up to date with accurate information via annual audits and a designated employee overseeing the project. ABHC is taking an innovative approach to keeping this valuable resource page accessible and well-advertised across their community with more than 70,000 magnets containing a QR code that have been dispersed over the last three years.
Taking this endeavor a step further, Roberts shares about an annual event they host with ALL of their Ardmore community partners, for the service providers and organizations — which isn't open to the public. This resource fair helps their collaborators to network, share best practices, creates discussions around issues, and gives them all an opportunity to find solutions to common problems addressed.
It was announced recently that Lighthouse Behavioral Wellness Centers will soon take over state entities for a new approach to handling mental health services and education, including the local Jim Taliaferro Community Mental Health Center. The Oklahoma Department of Mental Health awarded Lighthouse eight additional counties, including Comanche, Stephens and Cotton, which will significantly expand their reach into SW Oklahoma, and Lawton residents can expect them in our community by October.
Lighthouse CEO, Jessica Pfau said in a recent interview, "we are honored that they (OK Dept. of Mental Health) are giving us that responsibility — it's a huge task, but we are up for it, and ready to go."
Communities across Oklahoma can learn from the initiatives, efforts, and organization that Lighthouse and Ardmore Behavioral Health Collaborative are establishing within their community.
We thank them for taking the time to come down to Lawton, to share their insight and experience with the Community Action Forum and especially with our KCCU audience.
