McLean County is set to host a series of behavioral health forums in 2025 with yet to be determined focuses, said Director of Behavioral Health Coordination Marita Landreth.
These mini forums are a departure from the historical Behavioral Health Community Forum, which would span multiple days and topics, bringing in between 200 and 300 people.
While there’s value in the largescale forum, Landreth said, the county's Behavioral Health Coordination [BHC] department decided it would be more beneficial to hold a few one-off forums spread throughout the year. That way, each forum can be more targeted.
“What I'm hoping that will be able to help us with is being able to reach out to different demographics, or folks in our community that have more specific needs,” she said, adding that BHC plans to do so by “breaking it up so that we can focus either by topic or by audience, so that the offerings can be as high quality as possible.”
Some ideas BHC is mulling over now include a legal-focused option to get attorneys more involved and a forum suited for educators and parents, but the BHC is still very much in the planning phase, Landreth added. There may be only two forums, or there may be four — with one per season.
Landreth said planning is dependent on community input, which is currently being sought. Some individuals and community groups have thrown out ideas on a BHC Facebook post, including forums on rural mental health, child mental health and affirming care for people who are neurodiverse.
The behavioral health department hopes to have a rough schedule and outline for the forums by the end of this year, Landreth said.
