TACOMA, WA – Tana Senn, the director of the state’s Department of Children, Youth and Families, began a note to the governor’s budget director lamenting her agency’s predicament.
“I wish times were better in writing my first budget request letter,” she wrote Monday to K.D. Chapman-See, the director of the Office of Financial Management.
The request is among those state agencies have submitted in recent days to Gov. Bob Ferguson’s office as he prepares a budget proposal ahead of the 2026 legislative session.
Senn’s sprawling agency faces twin crises.
There’s the issue of overcapacity in the state’s juvenile detention system. Lawmakers couldn’t figure out systemic fixes to address these concerns this year, and Green Hill School in Chehalis remains dozens of young people above its safe capacity.
Senn is now asking for nearly $8 million to open a new, 16-bed juvenile facility in Pierce County. This would be a medium-security detention center focused on serving young people with acute mental health needs. If granted funding, the agency would seek to buy the facility in fiscal year 2027, with detainees potentially moving there in April 2027.
Of the $8 million, $3 million would go toward buying the property, and the rest is for operations. The state would be buying the building, a shuttered treatment center near Parkland, from nonprofit hospital system Multicare.
The department is also seeking $12 million to improve staffing at Green Hill and the state’s other juvenile detention facility, the Echo Glen Children’s Center in Snoqualmie. Officials also want money for security improvements at the two facilities.
Then there’s the spike in child fatalities and near fatalities in the child welfare system that the Department of Children, Youth and Families oversees.
While lawmakers debate a recent state law’s role in that rise, Senn wants more money, $4 million to be exact, to address the issue.
The money would go in part toward getting drug treatment for parents before their child welfare cases are closed. The highly potent opioid fentanyl has driven increases in fatalities and near-fatalities for the state’s children in recent years.
The funding would also look to help connect families to services after their cases close.
“Families need support in their communities to mitigate risk factors,” Senn wrote to Chapman-See. “Investing in increased community-based supports to better engage parents in substance use disorder treatment, to create safe home environments for young children, and to more successfully connect families to services after a case is closed can mitigate risk and prevent tragedy.”
Overall, the agency is asking for 37 new full-time equivalent employees to improve staffing in the child welfare system.
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