A review of the partnership between the Northern Health Region and the Canadian Mental Health Association has been released. Chief Executive Officer for the NHR,  Helga Bryant , says this review was needed because of accountability challenges. Bryant talks here about the NRHA's responsibilities within this partnership.

 

“To determine what services we believe our client population needs, and really that the Service Purchase Agreement  (SPA) delineates what services are needed and who is going to be providing those services.”

 

In this report it’s recommended that the current Service Purchase Agreement be changed. It's been recommended that there be separate SPAs for each program offered by the CMHA and funded by the NRHA.  Bryant explains why.

 

“This will be program component by program component with very clear ‘here are the deliverables, here is the funding allocation, and here are the monitoring requirements.’ It will be much easier for both parties to stay accountable with a document that is that clear to what is expected.”

 

Bryant says both organizations seemed pleased with the review that has 19 new recommendations.

 

“When the reviewer presented the recommendations to both the CMHA board chair, executive director and myself there were no surprises. We were welcoming of the recommendations. Overwhelmingly we thought we could do this, this makes sense and we were happy to receive the report and move forward.”

 

Work should be finished by December on the new SPAs. The implementation committee is ready to proceed with the development of one of the new SPAs.

 

No spokesperson from the CMHA was available for comments at this time.