Mental Health Organizations AWARE and Western Montana Mental Health Center Announce Merger
The two organizations have already begun integrating services and there should be little to no disruption for patients
By Zoë Buhrmaster
Two mental health organizations that provide services in northwest Montanans are merging.
The statewide nonprofit AWARE Inc. and Western Montana Mental Health Center (WMMHC) announced the move on Tuesday, with the new organization to operate under the AWARE name.
The two organizations have worked together for years providing mental health services. When WMMHC’s new CEO Bob Lopp met AWARE’s CEO Matt Bugni last year, they began discussing each organization’s strengths and brainstorming ways they could work together more efficiently. When the organizations started delivering select joint services, “it became apparent it would be a great marriage, where we could expand quality and capacity,” Lopp said.
“AWARE and WMMHC have been working together for years, and as the need for behavioral health care continues to increase, we realized that we would be stronger together and increase access across the state,” he said. “This will also make us a more financially stable organization that can weather the changes in health care.”
In Flathead and Lake counties, WMMHC provides mental health outpatient treatment, substance use disorder treatment, medication management, adult case management, along with other mental health services.
The organization also offers the Program of Assertive Community Treatment (PACT) and Projects for Assistance in Transitions from Homelessness (PATH) program out of its Kalispell office. PACT helps those with serious mental health conditions to live on their own and PATH supports those with disabling mental illness or substance use disorder who are experiencing homelessness or at risk of becoming homeless.
Meanwhile, AWARE offers community-based support for people with mental health or developmental disabilities, including Early Head Start intervention programs, Severe and Disabling Mental Illness (SDMI) case management for those over 18 years old who need longterm support, and Family Assertive Community Treatment (FACT) for families, among others. In 2017, AWARE closed its Kalispell campus, including two group homes, due to statewide budget cuts. The closest office to the Flathead Valley since then has been in Missoula.
Each organization will keep their brick-and-mortar locations, streamlining services for clients by combining resources. The merger should result in little to no disruption for patients, said Bugni.
“Both organizations are working incredibly hard to ensure a smooth transition,” said Bugni. “All staff of WMMHC will have a very similar job at AWARE, and clients and families will see few, if any, changes to their care team and where they get support.”
The organization will also hire additional employees, which Lopp said over the next year or two should result in a “sizable increase.”
The merger will finalize in a few months, with Bugni continuing as CEO and Lopp taking on the role of Chief Business Strategy Officer.
The teams began integrating services around six weeks ago to help ease the transition, which Lopp said is going very smoothly.
“You couldn’t align the jigsaw pieces better,” said Lopp.