New wellness hub opens in White Salmon

WHITE SALMON — The Community Roots Wellness Hub, a collaborative, co-located model of service delivery designed to better support youth and their parents, officially opened its doors on Oct. 29. A concept predating the COVID-19 pandemic, organizers hope the hub can fill a gap in resources across the western half of Klickitat County.

“The true, original motivation for this space is the kids,” said Abby Brandt Whalin, the community wellness department director for Washington Gorge Action Programs (WAGAP). “We all have, because we live here and love this community, been personally affected by the comings and goings and changes in services that have happened over the years — whether it’s any of the providers you name, ours included.”

Along with WAGAP, which applied for a grant from Southwest Washington Accountable Communities of Health to get the hub up and running, Education Service District (ESD) 112, Washington Therapists Collective, Carelon, One Community Health and The Next Door, Inc. will all offer services at 431 NE Tohomish St.

Just up the road, WAGAP’s Community Youth Center provides safe, free afterschool care for children ages 6 and up, but as Brandt Whalin explained, it doesn’t offer intervention services, therapy and other types of wrap-around care that address more fundamental needs. Rita Pinchot, the regional behavioral health specialist for ESD 112, compared the hub to her own therapy practice, which focuses both on the individual and their environmental factors, and emphasized the benefit of having free-flowing systems centralized in one place.

“A young person might need therapy, but they also might really need food, and they can’t benefit from therapy if they aren’t housed and fed,” said Pinchot. “Now, not only can they see a therapist, but they can meet with a community health worker and maybe apply for a driver’s ed scholarship. Things like that.”

Beyond mental health issues like anxiety, depression and eating disorders, Pinchot emphasized the space will help confront a trend that she’s seeing more and more: disengagement from school. She said an increasing number of children are pursuing alternative pathways of learning, leading to isolation and loneliness, while simultaneously severing them from resources that are more accessible within a formal school system.

And there’s support for parents, too. Every Friday, the Columbia Gorge Perinatal Mental Health Initiative invites parents to have an hour-long conversation with a peer like Pinchot about the realities of moving through pregnancy and postpartum, addressing behavioral problems early on and how to navigate raising children in a rural area. The Washington Therapists Collective also serves parents, and community health workers can assist anyone.

“It really empowers families,” Brandt Whalin said. “If I’m the mom sitting in the waiting room and reading that there’s a community education event happening, or seeing that there are other people in this space who willing to meet with me and talk about the really hard reality of what my needs are, that just provides families with access to hope, which is a commodity you can’t pay for.”

Since the hub is still working on its referral system, Brandt Whalin said anyone interested in accessing their services should contact WAGAP at 509-493-2662 or info@wagap.org. Additionally, Pinchot encouraged folks to direct their input to her at rita.pinchot@esd112.org.

“We really want as many community voices to be involved as possible in building the space and also deciding what happens here,” Pinchot said.

To donate, visit wagap.org, click the donate button, and select the Community Roots Wellness Hub in the dropdown menu.