Dear Governor Ferguson,
I am writing on behalf of thousands of Washington families whose children are navigating serious behavioral health challenges in a fragmented system with so many gaps. You know well that our state ranks 48th nationally for youth flourishing. For too long, investments in children’s behavioral health and education have lagged behind need. Although recent efforts have begun to move us in the right direction, most notably through the work of the Children & Youth Behavioral Health Workgroup, the current multi-billion-dollar budget shortfall threatens the progress underway.
This moment calls for strong, clear leadership to ensure that Washington’s children do not lose ground again. Investments in early prevention and timely intervention are not only critically necessary but also fiscally sound. Every dollar spent supporting children before crises emerge saves exponentially more in long-term residential stays, emergency placements, lost instruction, family disruption, workforce instability, and future public costs.
In your inaugural address you praised Representative Callan for her commitment to addressing the youth behavioral health crisis. She has now delivered a comprehensive roadmap, Washington Thriving, for the 2026 Legislature to consider. It reflects the collective experience of families, providers, youth and youth advocates, school leaders, and community members who came together with a collective vision to design a sustainable, developmentally aligned behavioral health system for our state.
Reforming government requires more than preserving what exists. It requires choosing a different path when the current one is failing too many children. Washington Thriving provides that path. It offers a strategy rooted in prevention, early support, equitable access, and accountability. It outlines what children need from birth through young adulthood rather than forcing them into fragmented, diagnosis-driven, crisis-only systems that were never designed for them.
While protecting existing investments in children and youth behavioral health must remain a priority, it will not be enough. Washington needs a champion who is willing to call out the fragmentation, insist on coherence, and set a clear expectation that children belong to all of us. Children’s behavioral health crosses many sectors including healthcare, disability services, education, child welfare, and juvenile justice. A challenge that spans so many systems requires leadership from the top, from you, to bring the work into alignment. Your leadership can unify siloed agencies, align funding with developmental need, and ensure that families do not have to navigate impossible systems to get basic help.
You have an opportunity to reshape the trajectory of generations of young people and to leave a legacy defined by restoring hope to families who feel unseen and unsupported. We ask that you make children and youth behavioral health reform a signature priority of your administration. With your support, Washington can become a place where every child has the chance to grow, heal, learn, and thrive.
I will be sharing this message with my network of families, providers, and advocates, and encouraging them to write to you as well. Together we are asking you to take up this charge and place the well-being of Washington’s children at the center of your administration’s priorities. Thank you for your attention to this urgent work and for your willingness to consider what is possible when we choose to act together on behalf of our youngest residents.
Respectfully,
Peggy Dolane
