View from 100
View from 100 is the Douglas County Sheriff's Office Podcast hosted by Sheriff Jay Armbrister.
The show highlights both the inner workings and external community partnerships of the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office in Kansas. The goal through these long-form conversations with Sheriff Armbrister is to connect with audiences who might not have as much in-depth knowledge of the Sheriff’s Office and other issues related to public safety and criminal justice in the community.
View from 100
Care & Community: Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center
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Douglas County Sheriff Jay Armbrister sits down with Dr. Kirsten Watkins, CEO of the Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center, and Emily Farley, Chief Advancement Officer, to explore how a community of Lawrence’s size has built one of the most comprehensive behavioral health systems in Kansas. They outline the Bert Nash Center’s role as a safety-net provider for all ages and all levels of need, describe its network of facilities and explain the vision for the forthcoming Youth Recovery Center, which is a “urgent care for the mind” where youth can receive crisis stabilization and ongoing outpatient care under one roof.
The conversation highlights how Douglas County residents have repeatedly “put their money where their mouth is,” from approving sales tax for crisis services to driving a 73% increase in private donations, ensuring that local youth and families don’t have to travel hours away for psychiatric care.
The episode also dives into the deep collaboration between the Bert Nash Center and the criminal justice system, including embedded clinicians in the Douglas County Jail, participation in specialty courts and the high-utilization Mobile Response Team that often responds to mental health crises instead of or alongside law enforcement. Armbrister recounts how local partners, including Bert Nash, devised an in-county solution to long state waits for competency evaluations and restoration, reducing decompensation in jail and freeing scarce state hospital beds.
Throughout, Watkins and Farley emphasize that early intervention is lasting prevention, that the severity and complexity of mental health needs are rising and that Bert Nash’s core message to Douglas County remains simple and urgent: you are not alone, we are here for you, and if we’re not the right place, we’ll help you find the one that is.
Ep-09-BNC
Thu, May 07, 2026 3:31PM • 1:14:24 SUMMARY KEYWORDS Law enforcement, mental health, Bert Nash, community support, crisis services, Youth Recovery Center, mobile response team, behavioral health, Douglas County, jail services, philanthropy, public service, treatment recovery center, collaboration, stigma reduction., music festival, Austin City Limits, concert experience, White Zombie, Sturgill Simpson, Fox Theater, local law enforcement, Douglas County, community service, collaboration, compassion, social media, long-form conversation, professional support, common good SPEAKERS Jay Armbrister, Emily Farley, Kirsten Watkins, Dalton Welsh
Jay Armbrister 00:10 There's very few things that are as selfless as coming into law enforcement, into the corrections, coming to a sheriff's office in this day and age,
Dalton Welsh 00:21 from the heart of the country in Douglas County, Kansas, this is view from 100 a behind the scenes look at law enforcement community and the stories that shape our county.
Speaker 1 00:31 It's
Jay Armbrister 00:31 an honor and a privilege to serve not just the community but my community. I mean, I was born and raised here,
Dalton Welsh 00:37 hosted by your sheriff, Jay armrister, bringing you insights from the badge and beyond.
Jay Armbrister 00:49 All right. Well, welcome back to the next episode nine. I'm seeing here of the view from 100 podcast. I've got two fantastic guests here with me today, and I'm looking forward to it. Been looking forward to this one for a long time. For those of you who may not have seen this or heard of this before, we called the view from 100 because I am the Sheriff of Douglas County, Jay Armbruster, and my radio number is 100 and the sheriff is always numbered 100 so we hope that maybe the next sheriff, who will be coming sooner than you think we'll keep this thing going and but for now, it's my opportunities to speak with community partners and just folks I think are really cool and learn more about who they are, what they do, why they do it, and that kind of stuff. So I will let the ladies introduce themselves, but I have some big wigs from the Bert Nash Center community mental health center, and I'll start with Dr Watkins and tell us who you are. Why are you here? How did you get here? What are you doing, and why do you do it?
Kirsten Watkins 01:47 Oh, okay, I'm Kirsten Watkins. I am a clinical psychologist, and I am the CEO at Bert Nash Community mental health center. I'm originally from Texas, and I went to a university in Texas, and my now husband, was born and raised in Lawrence, he found his way down to this school in Texas.
Jay Armbrister 02:06 What school was it?
Kirsten Watkins 02:07 Southwestern University.
Speaker 1 02:08 He
Kirsten Watkins 02:08 was the only Kansan there. It's right outside
Jay Armbrister 02:10 of Austin.
Kirsten Watkins 02:11 Okay, gotcha. Only Kansan. There's
Jay Armbrister 02:12 no other schools in Austin.
Kirsten Watkins 02:14 There are many schools in Austin, but this Austin is so great, and it was such a great school, and loved being there. And so met the one and only Kansan there. So I like to say that the odds of me ending up in Kansas were pretty small, but I'm so happy to be here. And in fact, some of my family has moved up here from
Speaker 1 02:31 Texas. Oh, no kidding,
Kirsten Watkins 02:32 yeah, yeah.
Jay Armbrister 02:32 What part of Texas were you from
Kirsten Watkins 02:34 Austin?
Jay Armbrister 02:35 Oh, from Austin.
Speaker 1 02:35 So
Jay Armbrister 02:36 Lawrence is just a small version of home, exactly. Okay,
Kirsten Watkins 02:38 exactly.
Jay Armbrister 02:39 Yeah. I've always been jealous of Austin because they have those T shirts says, Keep Austin weird, yes. And I always think that Lawrence would be perfect to have. Keep Lawrence weird,
Kirsten Watkins 02:46 exactly.
Jay Armbrister 02:47 Let's face it, we're weird.
Kirsten Watkins 02:49 All the best parts of Austin, I feel like, are represented in Lawrence. So it's, it's been wonderful to live here. That's what brought me to Lawrence, originally, and then what brought me to Bert Nash Center. You know, I've been a clinical psychologist for years. I worked at the VA jails and prisons for a while, and I wanted to be a part of the community mental health center, sure. So I actually cold called them. It was like, hey, there's no jobs for a psychologist, but I would like to work for you, and that was almost five years ago, sure.
Jay Armbrister 03:18 Wow. Yeah. Thank you to whoever answered the phone.
Emily Farley 03:23 Marcia
Kirsten Watkins 03:23 Paige white,
Jay Armbrister 03:24 yeah, 25 fantastic. Okay, well, thank you. Well, thanks for being here. Thanks. Thanks for taking your time to do this. But also, just think for the work you do. We're gonna get into all that stuff, but
Kirsten Watkins 03:33 yeah, thank you.
Jay Armbrister 03:34 You cool.
Emily Farley 03:34 She is very cool.
Jay Armbrister 03:37 Oh,
Emily Farley 03:38 right. So I'm Emily Farley. I am the chief advancement officer for the Bert Nash Center. And
Jay Armbrister 03:44 what is that title
Emily Farley 03:45 that is always the follow up. So it's really I have a great team that we work with the public affairs, both internally and externally, marketing, community outreach, health, equity and philanthropy.
Jay Armbrister 04:01 And
Emily Farley 04:01 so we are advancing. Bert, Nash Ford, is
Jay Armbrister 04:04 there a chief retreating officer? I wouldn't know. No 08 good.
Emily Farley 04:08 We would fire him anyway. But I do think there is a moment where sometimes, when you want to advance, sometimes we have to pause and be really strategic and thoughtful of the meaning of the work we're doing. And so my job, I very much enjoy my job. But there are days where you you fight some challenges and but, you know, I've it's never wavered in terms of, like, what am I doing? It's always driven by, first, the mission of Bert Nash Center, and just my own personal convictions of wanting to do public service and so how I got to Bert Nash? I have been in the public health field for 18 years. I started working. I went to Baker University. How you and I have we
Jay Armbrister 04:55 know one we know
Emily Farley 04:58 one another. Very much. Um, for those
Jay Armbrister 05:00 of you that are following along at home, she used to babysit my children when she was in high school.
Emily Farley 05:04 Oh my gosh, yes, yeah, yeah. So, um, so Baker University was great. I ended up getting a degree in print journalism,
Kirsten Watkins 05:12 yes,
Emily Farley 05:13 but, you know, I just, I didn't want that type of hustle. I really was driven by public service, just from growing up, and so I ended up working for the state of Kansas, doing public relations. Ended up getting my masters in public administration from KU and when I graduated with my masters while working for the state, there were some conflicting values of what I had learned and where I was working. The work was great, but it just wasn't filling the cup that I felt was purposeful. State government
Jay Armbrister 05:53 is its own animal. It is and
Emily Farley 05:54 federal government
Jay Armbrister 05:55 is even different animal
Emily Farley 05:56 well, and I was kind of teetering on both. So I was doing public health preparedness, so I was working in bioterrorism.
Jay Armbrister 06:02 Oh my gosh, yes, really,
Emily Farley 06:03 yes. And so the Strategic National Stockpile I was helping with in the state of Kansas,
Jay Armbrister 06:10 don't we have, didn't KU have, like, a big bio defense, something that's fairly new, and or is that K State? K state also has something to do with agricultural
Emily Farley 06:20 Oh, yeah. I mean, so there's a lot of ways to to use different means,
Jay Armbrister 06:25 sure,
Emily Farley 06:26 but we won't go no, no, no, don't tip them off, deep and dark and doomsday.
Speaker 1 06:30 We
Emily Farley 06:30 have enough of that. So honestly, I was in Colby, Kansas, working, and I saw on LinkedIn, opening for a development specialist, and I'd never fundraise in my life, but I really like people, and I had known about the Bert Nash Center center because of the signature, and as a communications marketing person, I just thought it was so incredibly cool that that was the logo. And then I started exploring more, and I'm like, wait a second, Bert Nash Center is a mental health center. It serves Baldwin and Lawrence. And at Baker, just my own personal mental health journey. I had my own struggles, and at a bit, as a baker student, I could have received services, but I didn't know about Bert Nash Center. And so all of a sudden I got really just like, fired up about, like, people need to know what this is. And so I interviewed for it and back in 2014 and I've been at brightness for 12 years.
Jay Armbrister 07:25 Oh, man, wow, 12,
Emily Farley 07:28 yeah. So it's been a good, it's been a good roller coaster, yeah? But definitely a
Jay Armbrister 07:32 roller for sure, with few stops, yeah? Okay, well, thank you. That's so what? How long were you in Colby, Kansas? I mean,
Emily Farley 07:43 oh, I was just there for a rest stop. And Colby, it is palm trees are really like, what brings you there at the gas station?
Jay Armbrister 07:50 I didn't know if that was or Oakley. Yeah, it's Colby. Colby. Okay,
Emily Farley 07:54 I was there for work
Jay Armbrister 07:56 we were doing, though. I mean, compared to
Emily Farley 07:57 what it was when I was a kid, it was a tiny little spot, yeah, honestly, after Baker, I always live. I've lived in Douglas County since, really, 2004 but Colby, I was just there for work, and I was in a hotel, and you just always in this with the suitcase traveling. And I just wanted something local, and Lawrence, it just felt just the drive was there, yeah,
Jay Armbrister 08:20 yeah, everybody, it's all. It always sounds so romantic to be on the road all the time, traveling and working, and it after about two weeks, it's old. Yeah, old. So, so tell me. I know, but tell, tell my mom and the nine other viewers, what is Bert Nash Center? How would you explain it to somebody who is not from Douglas County or Lawrence, but also, well, I'll save that. I'll save my follow up for the end. So how would you how would you nutshell Bert Nash Center and what it is? And I know I'd have to be a very large nutshell, but how would you explain it to somebody just doesn't understand?
Kirsten Watkins 08:57 I would say that Bert Nash Center is a community mental health center that is designed to be a safety net for behavioral health services for an entire community and the spectrum of all of those behavioral health services. So not just one age group, it's all ages, and not just one type of mental health need, it's all of them, and really trying to help the entire the whole person, as we say for
Speaker 1 09:21 sure,
Kirsten Watkins 09:22 receive the care and support they need in in their own community.
Jay Armbrister 09:26 Yeah, okay, well, that's a pretty good nutshell.
Kirsten Watkins 09:29 Yeah, yeah. I could say much more. That's, well,
Jay Armbrister 09:33 tell me how, how many, how many staff? How many people work?
Kirsten Watkins 09:37 About 320 staff, right? We're much larger than people significant
Jay Armbrister 09:42 well, people just think it's you go for therapy or,
Kirsten Watkins 09:45 yeah, for
Jay Armbrister 09:46 something. But I think, I think that people don't understand the the tendrils that that run underground and out into the community and other places. But how many facilities or buildings does, does do you manage or have?
Kirsten Watkins 10:00 Oh, I'm counting in my head right now, one, two, exactly, right. 3456, technically, right now.
Jay Armbrister 10:06 Okay, so the main campus there, across the hospital, the TRC,
Speaker 1 10:10 what
Jay Armbrister 10:11 else you got?
Kirsten Watkins 10:11 We have bridges and transitions, which are transitional and supportive housing. We have some staff at a location at 346, Maine, because we have so many staff who need some more space. We also have a building that we purchased for the Youth Recovery Center that's in development and is a very important component of our crisis services for youth that we're hoping to to complete in the next couple years. And then right next to that is another building that will house many of our our administrative and child and family services staff,
Speaker 1 10:46 so
Jay Armbrister 10:46 right next to the Youth Recovery Center. So okay, on Clinton
Kirsten Watkins 10:48 Parkway. You know
Speaker 1 10:49 where
Emily Farley 10:49 Jayhawk pharmacy is?
Jay Armbrister 10:50 Yeah,
Kirsten Watkins 10:50 in that building?
Jay Armbrister 10:51 Because 52 I always drive by, and I honestly, I mean, let's just full disclosure, I'm on the Bert Nash Center board. But, um, I was always curious, because there's a couple of buildings. There's, like, there's the one on the if you're, if you're, if you're looking out of 23rd street, brewing patio, or Hy Vee, right there, Ivy. There's, there's a building to the left, and there's one kind of in the middle, yeah. And then I can't remember if there's one in the front, but, and then there's one way in the back, which is where, like, oh, there's some
Kirsten Watkins 11:19 dermatologists,
Jay Armbrister 11:19 yeah. So which care? Yeah, which building? So
Kirsten Watkins 11:24 it's the front two. Okay,
Speaker 1 11:25 there's one
Kirsten Watkins 11:25 that is kind of a pinkish color, and that was an original LMH imaging center. So it's zoned for medical and that would be the youth Crisis Center. The one next to it, which is kind of whitish color, maybe an off white color, administrative, and that's where Jayhawk folks he is, and we're totally
Jay Armbrister 11:43 gotcha on the on the YRC, the Youth Recovery Center, will that have inpatient as well as outpatient, or just outpatient
Kirsten Watkins 11:50 inpatient. So the really special thing about it is the vision is to have all of those services for youth in one setting. So technically, the top floor would be crisis services, and that would be very similar to what we have for trc right now, which is for adults, so a crisis center where youth could come and be able to access services and stay there for a needed time, until they're stabilized, and then the bottom floors are the follow up care for those so that outpatient services will be there. That's where individual therapy, group therapy, medication services would all be there in the same building.
Jay Armbrister 12:23 Okay, sounds great.
Kirsten Watkins 12:25 It's amazing. And I hope you have no
Jay Armbrister 12:27 work ever,
Speaker 1 12:28 because
Jay Armbrister 12:28 we don't want kids to be in crisis and all that stuff. But it's well, and that kind of leads into my next question. Is, here in Douglas County, I'm always, I'm constantly telling everybody how proud I am of this community that we put our money where our mouth is and we see a need, and we fund it ourselves, where this quarter since sales tax came up and people demanded we want this treatment and recovery center. We want mental health services covered, and we did it on our own. And but my question to you is, do you know of another community in this state, or in the Midwest or in the country, which I'm sure there are that have the same things that we have, or that are we are building between the TRC and YRC, as well as just the overall services that Bert Nash Center provides, I mean, because it Feels really unique and special. But I think sometimes everybody thinks that every community has a Bert Nash Center, and I don't think that's the truth.
Kirsten Watkins 13:26 It is not the truth. It is very unique and very special. And our community has, I think, had vision and also had investment in us developing these kinds of services. So for a community our size, there really is no comparison for that breadth and continuum of services. There are sites that we are trying to learn from across the country. I know there's one in Tennessee, there's one in California, there's one in Phoenix, but no one has what we have in our state, certainly, and it is very unique for a community our size, again, to have such breadth of resources for our our community members
Jay Armbrister 14:02 Well, and that's got to create quite an avenue for you to work as far as getting that out to people, but also to help the philanthropy side of things.
Speaker 1 14:11 Yeah,
Jay Armbrister 14:12 I suppose I have a couple of questions, but one of them is like, do we see, do we receive much help from outside, as far as philanthropic people who just are totally into what we're doing or trying to do here, from the outside, who may not live here, may have, you know, connections somehow, but, or is it mostly, you know, 95% or more local donors, local people,
Emily Farley 14:37 it would be The latter. So you're looking in like high 90s of private philanthropy that support the Bert Nash Center center, and very much so towards the Youth Recovery Center. So that is which can be a little challenging in itself, just because the work. That's happening here is a ripple effect right in mental health. And so we want to really articulate that when someone comes in our door, we're not just helping them, that we are, you know, impacting their family, their employer, their teachers, their teachers, the the other children, their peers. So it's really helping articulate that, yes, private philanthropy in our local community is great, but also, what we're going to be doing with the Youth Recovery Center will greatly impact the metro. It will greatly impact Topeka and Wichita and Hayes, because those are the communities where there's inpatient hospitalization for children and psychiatric distress. So there's nothing in Douglas County that supports a child in a mental health crisis or substance use crisis. We have to have them go outside of this community, which then puts on a burden to those communities, because those beds now are not available, and many times our community members came and access those facilities because the beds are not available. So if we can create a another system of care, and one that truly stabilizes very in a very urgent way, you know your question about like, how do you explain what Bert Nash Center does. So trying to explain that to my six year old and my nine year old, it's really about, you know, we get to help people feel better, both with their emotions about how they're navigating life. So my husband's a first responder. He's a paramedic firefighter. That's very easy for them to understand what they do. And I'm like, I help people's heart and mind, right? Like it's so when I talk about the treatment Recovery Center, when it first came online three years ago, I told folks, it's an urgent care for the mind.
Jay Armbrister 16:51 Oh, well,
Emily Farley 16:52 for youth and for the Youth Recovery Center, that's what we'll do for kids. It's an urgent care for the mind, which
Jay Armbrister 16:57 has been neglected for generations,
Emily Farley 17:00 which, yes, and it puts a strain on your system,
Jay Armbrister 17:03 sure, oh, geez,
Emily Farley 17:05 justice system, and at our local LMH in the emergency department, and again, in those surrounding communities as well. And so philanthropy wise, we're trying to tell that story, and that can be kind of difficult. I will say we are very fortunate that even the donors that move away, they're still very connected. We have a, you know, we have about over 600 donors at the Bert Nash Center center. Last year we saw, well, 2025 we saw a 73% increase in private donations because this community saw the need to help us when we were experiencing some challenges because of the demand of mental health and a very complex healthcare system that we continue to navigate.
Jay Armbrister 17:51 That's
Kirsten Watkins 17:52 a good understanding in our community, that having a Behavioral Health Center in our community is essential, and especially in a time when we were struggling, in the last year, the community showed up for us and enabled us to continue to show up. I
Jay Armbrister 18:06 can't tell you how much I appreciate that about our community. And in fact, I had a whole other line of thoughts until this, but at the end of the day, and being a member of the board, this was, I know I said it, and I've heard it from other board members. At the end of the day, we have to keep these resources flowing. So because no matter what's going on internally, any challenges that we're trying to address, they have to be addressed, because we have to keep the services going out the door and the people coming in the door. And I saw that in real time, because there was, there was a lot of worry. I mean, let's, let's just say it out loud, the last 12 months have been in a few and some change have been stressful and tough, and at times they felt existential for Bert Nash Center, depending on who you listen to, but I never lost faith in the fact that this was going to get ironed out. We just didn't know what Bert Nash Center was going to look like after this and the way, and there was worries at the time that people may not support Bert Nash Center, or they may, but it turns out to be quite the opposite. Yeah,
Emily Farley 19:09 oh goodness. I mean, very, very much the opposite. And again, this is our community. We're, they're built to support one another.
Jay Armbrister 19:18 They are 18 money 19 where our mouth is,
Emily Farley 19:20 yeah, like very much. Where you're kind of takes your breath away.
Jay Armbrister 19:23 Yeah, yeah. It's, it was just, it was, it was extremely humbling, but it was also just kind of heartening in that I learned that people felt the same way I did about it, and so and, and I'll admit to like, growing up, born and raised right here in LFK, like I was born and raised, the name Bert Nash Center was not foreign to me because I played soccer as a child with Bert Nash Center's grandson. Yeah, so And Al Nash. Al and Barb Nash were the parents that were sitting there cheering me on in the so, like, I've always known about Bert Nash Center and what, but it was just, it was a, it was a place for therapy. You know, that's where people went for therapy.
Speaker 1 19:59 Yeah?
Jay Armbrister 20:00 I didn't. I had no idea until I got elected in 2020 and got into office in 21 the depth and the breadth as you the word to steal your Word of the work that they that you all do. So I'm just I was you really find out who your friends are when the chips are down. And I came out of that situation, feeling much, much better about about the relationship between Bert Nash Center and the community, and also just, I love my community so much I know the rest of the state doesn't love us the way that I love us, but, but that's what I love about us, is that we've kind of, we've kind of put up middle fingers at times to be like, You know what? We're going to do this ourselves, because we need this, but it also it, it drives kind of, I hadn't really thought about the the Youth Recovery beds and the fact that we have to send people out. That's been a blind spot of mine until you just said that, and I don't think our community knows that either, and and so for us to get into that ball game just makes perfect sense. Well,
Kirsten Watkins 21:05 you don't, you don't know it until you're in that
Jay Armbrister 21:07 situation.
Kirsten Watkins 21:08 And what an awful time to discover that we don't have the resources locally and
Jay Armbrister 21:13 we'll send your child to Hayes,
Kirsten Watkins 21:14 yeah, and that wherever we send your child to get the support that they need, that that location may not know what appropriate follow up resources are, and there may not be someone to help you with that follow up care, and you may have a hard time getting to that place and back because of transportation barriers. So again, to have that all here, that is exactly what I think our community members, our youth deserve, and we will make that happen. It's pretty exciting to be a part of that, and to have that be the next era for us.
Emily Farley 21:44 Yeah, and, you know, I was thinking about just the Youth Recovery Center just now with your question about local, I will say, two large funders, the Miller group. They're out of Kansas City and security benefit. They their main office is Topeka. They do have a satellite at KU Innovation Park. But there are, there are businesses and around here that they're they're folks team members. They live and work here, or they live here. Might not work here, but it is. We are going to have to get out and talk and tell that story. We are now halfway through our fund, our capital campaign. And so in the philanthropy world, we're now in the public face. So we will, we will start really taking the megaphone and saying, Did you know that if your child is in crisis,
Speaker 1 22:37 you know
Emily Farley 22:37 they might have to wait in the emergency department, and that's no fault to LMH,
Speaker 1 22:43 no,
Emily Farley 22:43 and it's no fault to the treatment Recovery Center, our program, that we can't have children back there. It's not safe.
Jay Armbrister 22:50 Yeah,
Emily Farley 22:51 we need to create a safe place, and we need to also create a very warm and welcoming place, because you don't want to create a scary feeling
Speaker 1 23:00 right
Emily Farley 23:01 for that little person, yeah, for sure, or the teenager, to feel like I'm in trouble,
Jay Armbrister 23:06 right,
Emily Farley 23:07 like you're not in trouble.
Speaker 1 23:08 All right,
Emily Farley 23:08 we need to make sure, though, that you're safe.
Jay Armbrister 23:11 Make sure you're good, yeah? Well, and I think it's good too for the folks here in Lawrence to hear that we're sending folks, or have been, and we're trying to fix that, because when the TRC was built, and I'm going to Mya culpa, I was, I was one of the people thinking and saying the same thing is that if we build this, other communities are going to be sending all of their people. And I would, I even said it, there's going to be a line of police cars from not Lawrence and Douglas County lined up down the street to put people, and that has not been the case. But the argument at the time was like, they can't do that. They can't take our beds that we pay for and for for our people. You know, turns out that's what we've been doing with our children or for some time. So it just just reiterates the fact that we're, we're looking after our own, making it better for for the people that you all treat,
Speaker 1 24:00 and
Kirsten Watkins 24:00 also investing in the health of our community as a whole. So the earlier that we can identify problems and respond to those youth who need problems or have need help, I think the the more healthy our community is as a whole, and the more we can just help sustain the mental health of our entire community.
Emily Farley 24:19 Yeah, one last thing I'll say is we had a one of our team members, she was sharing her own experience as a mom about her child needing psychiatric emergency care, and she said, you know, this just talks about the Early intervention is lasting prevention. And I was like, well, now I'm going to be taking that and using it, because that's literally what this is.
Jay Armbrister 24:43 Yeah,
Emily Farley 24:43 like,
Jay Armbrister 24:44 yeah, if
Emily Farley 24:44 we can, like, get in early, sure, so many things can be preventable, and if not preventable, at least the skills are there to help on Oh, I'm having a I'm having this moment, and my and it's not just for the child, it's for the. Family, or the those that they're around, like, how can we help support you, right? And not feel like you're by yourself, you're alone?
Jay Armbrister 25:10 Yeah? Well, I mean, in in my own story as a parent, you know, we had a situation where one of my children needed help as well, and we had, she ended up in Topeka at Stormont. And I remember at the time thinking to myself, like, what if we didn't have the means or a reliable car, or the ability and that kind of stuff, to go over there and do the things that that we were just dying to do, to go in and see hold hand, you know, all those things. And this is just another way to break down that barrier, to allow that, because, again, that's that is that will have lasting effects. That mom and dad were there, mom was there, dad was there. You know, those things that that were there to support those kids when, when it could have been like, maybe I can't get there, like, I can't be there. And that's that can have devastating effects. So, all right, well,
Kirsten Watkins 25:57 or can I say one more thing, the vision, the vision I have, too, is that the provider who will be the follow up provider, so who will be your therapist after a crisis, would be on the floor right below, so could come up and meet you prior to discharge from a higher level of care and be able to navigate that transition for you. So there's already that kind of setup care before you even complete your stay.
Jay Armbrister 26:20 Oh yeah, that's, yeah, what do you call the continuum of care?
Kirsten Watkins 26:24 Really beautiful opportunity to do that.
Jay Armbrister 26:26 I've been to fundraisers well, and I, I'm a huge proponent in mental health, especially for first responders. And what I found was that there's a great book in a there's a great quote in a book called turtles all the way down, where she says, I couldn't I couldn't make myself happy, but I could sure make everybody else around me miserable. And what I learned was, is that I had me, and I'm speaking only for myself, but I had a way of bringing the temperature in a room down, or affecting other people's moods in a household negatively because of the way I was feeling and but I also learned, and that's what we call collateral damage. You know, you don't mean to do it, but it happens. But what I found was, when I began working on myself, getting myself better, getting back everybody around me started getting better as well. And so I came I thought of the term, it's collateral repair, like, as you get better, everybody else around you gets better, and it's kind of the same way as if we handle this group of individuals, we'll just talk about youth, handle them in a better way. Everything around them is going to get better. And so that's kind of what you're saying, is like this is not just about making standing them back up and making sure that they're good. This is a whole family being better and everything
Kirsten Watkins 27:39 absolutely and our whole community system,
Jay Armbrister 27:41 which will eventually spread into our schools and spread into, you know, their eventual jobs and that kind of stuff. So okay, well, thank you being being the sheriff, I like to tell people I operate the largest mental health facility in this county, but that's probably not true, but, but the sheriff's office, we obviously, we run the jail, and so kind of talk through, and I'll talk through my part is about, how is it that we intersect as two entities, the Douglas County Sheriff's Office and Bert Nash Center, and what, what that has meant for this community and for our incarcerated population over the last, I don't even know what's been 1015, years since this has been going on. So how does that look from the Bert Nash Center perspective? Well,
Kirsten Watkins 28:30 we integrate in so many ways, and that relationship is really important for so many reasons. So you know, first off, we have staff that are embedded in the Douglas County Jail. So we have a number of therapists, licensed mental health therapists, that are in the jail to provide those services there. I think that's incredibly important, as I mentioned, someone who worked in jails and prisons previously, to be able to have that expertise in there, and to be able to offer those services as quickly as possible and identify needs and help with the transition. I think that's really important for those folks coming out of jail to have some follow up support for mental health and for other things set up. And that's part of what those folks do, is help with that discharge planning. We also are really connected with the probation and parole systems. We obviously are providing treatment for many people and coordinating with those officers to support them, continuing their process and completing whatever requirements that they might have. So that's really important, and also to make sure that they're getting the treatment that they need and maybe even identifying issues that contributed to them being incarcerated in the first place. So, you know, trying to have some role in decreasing recidivism in that way, largely with the criminal justice system, we are involved in behavioral health court that's a really important aspect of helping people recover and navigate through their legal issues. Use. We are participants in the Veterans Treatment Court too. That's a new thing, really special, and other communities have had that. So it's really special that our community now has a Veterans Treatment Court. And obviously the treatment part is often with us and some other community partners
Jay Armbrister 30:15 too.
Kirsten Watkins 30:16 I could go on many things, mobile Response Team. I'll just say one more. Yeah, that's a pretty, pretty critical piece. It's
Jay Armbrister 30:24 becoming even more critical.
Kirsten Watkins 30:25 It's very critical, and I think it's really important our partnership in that. So just for folks who don't know, a mobile response team is a team of mental health providers who go out into the community and respond to crises. And the intention is to support our officers who may be there also and also to support each other in terms of safety, of making sure that we can address mental health crisis, mental health needs in the community.
Jay Armbrister 30:52 Well, I mean, and they, we call it MRT Mental Health Response Team. They also, and for the folks who don't know is that the police department will have or the sheriff's office will have, a phone call from a concerned citizen. Hayes, a person walked past my house was appeared disheveled, and was yelling and screaming, and nobody was with them. I think we can all agree that that law enforcement is not set up or trained to handle that call unless there is some sort of a criminal element that needs to be looked into. And for generations, we were the only people who could respond to that call or felt like we should, and we've seen across the country supremely negative interactions and disastrous outcomes from a mental health call that started as something extremely innocuous, such as yelling at themselves
Speaker 1 31:51 or
Jay Armbrister 31:51 at somebody else that wasn't there. MRT will now step in and actually respond to that call before or without a law enforcement officer, and if they get there and need help, we will somebody will be close by, will be able to respond right away. But I don't, I'm sure there's numbers out there, but I don't think that happens all that often. I mean, it happens periodically, or the officer will just swing by, but we've had it seems to have been extremely successful in in de escalation, and also to talking these folks into seeking some sort of treatment. They don't put handcuffs on them. They just talk them in like, Hey, let's go and let's, you know, I think that you could really benefit from this. Wouldn't you like to go and have some place cool to sit and and think about this, and we can talk through it, and it's been extremely successful. I know that's that they've had different programs across the country, but this is new to us, you know? I mean, it's really only been up and going,
Emily Farley 32:47 you know, it'll be four,
Jay Armbrister 32:49 four. I mean,
Emily Farley 32:49 this year it'll be four. Yes, it was in 2022,
Jay Armbrister 32:52 there you go. So, yeah, yeah, it's, so it's, it's still relatively new, but I don't know how long it takes for something, a program, to be in place, for it to become, to become something that you cannot live without. But four years appears to be the it, because we don't ever want to go back to the way it was and and that kind of segues into that team that's embedded in our jail. Is when I worked in the jail in 99 and 2000 we had, it was a new, brand new building. We had very few cameras, and we had a part time nurse that came in once a week. I, as a corrections officer or deputy, was the one handing out medications to inmates. Like, we push a little card around. Had a little chart, we did, we gave them their the meds. And that's crazy. Like I'm just a knucklehead, but that's what we had to do. And, and, and our nurse was fantastic. Nurse, Judy was so awesome. But she was there six hours a day, you know, Monday through Friday, when I left and went off to do the the other parts of my career and came back full time, 24/7 nursing staff, and we had Bert Nash Center team embedded, and that those are the two things that they would have to pry from my cold, dead, icy fingers, like those, like if Bert Nash, if you came to me today and said, Jay, we can't do this anymore, I'd say, Well, you might as well fire those people, because I'm gonna hire them myself, and I'm gonna figure out how to find great people, but that's you would have a fight on your hands to the point where I would steal them from you and in so it's they can speak a language that I do not possess. They can deescalate a situation that I simply don't know how they have saved. I mean, it's the old theory, like, how many lives have have seatbelt saved? Well, we don't know, because the people didn't die. You know, we can't quantify it, but I'm here to tell you that those ladies and Paul have saved countless lives, and they've saved us. I can't imagine how much pain and agony resources money, but maybe lives we don't. Know, just by being just doing what they do. And sometimes it's as simple as standing at the window and talking to somebody, or, I mean, it weak, and I can do that same thing. I can stand there and talk to him. I'm not gonna have the same outcome, because I'm not, I just don't possess the skills that they have. So that is one place that I am deeply thankful for my predecessors having stood that program up, but then also for our community, county commissioners and our community to support the funding to continue to do that. Because I'm not kidding, I will fight tooth and nail to keep what we have, if not expanded. So. So that's but another place that your predecessor, predecessor, Patrick Schmitz actually came to us in early 21 to somewhere where we were suffering under competency evaluation and restoration. So for those, for the folks who may have haven't heard me complain and yell and scream about this, an individual commits a crime in our in our community, is arrested. They're mentally unhealthy. They go to court. Their attorney says, Your Honor, this person can't assist with their own defense. I believe them to be mentally incompetent, whether that be under the influence of drugs or mental health or a combination of all nine of them things. And so what will happen is the judge will be like, I agree. I'm going to schedule a competency evaluation that can only be done by very specific people in very specific places. And at that time, it was taking months to get them to that evaluation, so they go off to the eval. And in those during those months, we cannot, and I'm looking right into the camera, I cannot force medication. I cannot force people to take medication. It requires a judge signature, a doctor's signature, and a sheriff who is willing to do that. And those three things are not typically met. They've never been met in my 28 years, but we would send them to larned state hospital or Osawatomie hospital, and they would get evaluated. Evaluators say, yes, you're right. This person has income. Person is incompetent. Here's the medications that we think they should take. Again, I cannot force them to take that, but they would, they would do what they can, and then they put them on a new list for competency restoration, and that is anywhere from 12 to 14 months where this person just sits in our jail and languishes, in my opinion, decompensates Almost always, because they are not getting treatment that they need, the medication they will not take, and they just sit and they are extremely high, high utilizers of our resources. They're dangerous at times. They're just, it's a very difficult but also their freedom is not moving forward. Their case is not moving they are in a stasis. The pause button has been held. If you, if you have 180 days to bring that person to trial, this doesn't count towards 180 days. So we as a community were like, how can in at any given time, I have anywhere from seven to 14 people on this list that are waiting, some people waiting over a year, and that was where we as a group, the district attorney, Suzanne Valdez, Patrick Schmitz, myself and doctors from Bert Nash Center were extremely pivotal in being like, how can we do this as a community? And so we came together. Bert Nash Center was willing to provide the doctor, the DA and the judges were willing to be partners in signing off on this stuff if we needed to, and then I was willing to let that happen inside our facility. I don't know of another county in this in this state, much less in the Midwest, that is actually doing that in house. Maybe there are but, but it is. It is an absolute anomaly. And I just don't think that our community sees some of those innovative ways that we are trying to lessen the the damage that we are we have to do to a person by allowing them to just sit and decompensate so. So that's kind of my think, thinking to you all, is that without a partnership like that, this wouldn't happen. We would simply be sitting out there just watching somebody through a window making sure they don't hurt themselves or somebody else. And instead, we're able to take the the low hanging fruit, the people who are willing to be medicated, or people who are a bit more have more, I don't know, faculties to really try to make that change. We're able to lessen that, and we've cut our wait times way down. But also by taking those people off the list, it's taking that bed and giving it to somebody else on the list, ahead of the people who are so other counties are even thanking us, because they're like, I got my person in in eight months, because, you know, the four beds you saved, you know, so it's been. I think those are the kind of things I want our community to know that happen amongst ourselves, that we we don't. We find roadblocks with bureaucratic, state legislation, federal legislation. But. Again, this community stops, like, why are we waiting on them to fix it? Let's fix it ourselves. And that's that's been a huge success story, and Bert Nash Center is a key and pivotal part of that. Because without it, like the three legged stool, without the courts, Bert Nash Center in the jail, that doesn't happen. And so it's been, it's been a quiet victory, which, you know, people are still in custody, people horrible things have still happened that
Kirsten Watkins 40:27 changes lives. I mean that,
Jay Armbrister 40:29 but
Emily Farley 40:29 we
Kirsten Watkins 40:29 are in the business of being people, helping other people and trying to change their lives
Jay Armbrister 40:35 better. Yes, do as little harm as possible. So
Kirsten Watkins 40:37 that's a great example of, I think people being innovative, being focused on solving problems, collaborating together, being open as partners. I think there's so many examples like that. I'm just really appreciate you bringing up that example because that it is quiet, in the sense that people don't know about that, but it's
Jay Armbrister 40:55 until they do, until their love, right, is on that list.
Kirsten Watkins 40:57 But it's, it's really significant. That's a that has had very significant ripple effects in many people's lives in a positive way.
Jay Armbrister 41:06 Well, in the vein of success stories, like, I know there's been some not successes, you know, over the years, but that's part of doing business. But what over the especially over the last year, what? What's, what do you look back and be like, that was we actually, we nailed that. You know, what are your successes going on right now?
Emily Farley 41:27 I mean, I I could say, yeah, so many things. Well, no, I mean, I think we, that's, it's such, it's a great, loaded question, and it's just almost so hard to think about it, because we've had some really great successes.
Kirsten Watkins 41:41 I mean, I would say from the outset, we survived. We our agency, our agency has had a tough go, and for many different reasons. You know, this is a tough time to be providing health care in the context of our state, of our federal system, and we obviously had some changes in the last year, I have been in this position for nine months now, almost 10.
Emily Farley 42:05 Like 10,
Kirsten Watkins 42:06 we were joking, I think I told you earlier, just like dog years. But, um, we, we survived. And I think one of the interesting things about the last year is that our agency had our 75th anniversary in in the right smack in
Jay Armbrister 42:22 the middle of when
Kirsten Watkins 42:23 things were really challenging for us. And I will say that one of the things that was really noteworthy for me during that time is our agency has sustained so many things over 75 years, and here we are again, continuing to sustain and finding ways to evolve and continue to be focused on the mission and the important work, and we will be around for another 75 years at least. So I think the first answer that comes to mind is that we we have survived this last year and and not only just survived, but we are thriving in some ways. The work never stopped in all of this time and all the 75 years we have provided services on a consistent basis to those folks who needed it most. I am the most proud of that, that whatever was going on, whatever we were dealing with in board meetings, the work never stopped, like every day people were being met in the jails, in schools, in the community, in our clinics at trc,
Emily Farley 43:19 our weightless. We didn't have wait I mean, yeah. And if we did have a wait list, it was very as it was a manageable one. And our staff, they were saying, What can they're like, What can we do? Like,
Speaker 1 43:33 yeah. How
Emily Farley 43:33 can I help?
Speaker 1 43:34 Yeah.
Emily Farley 43:34 I mean, we had to make some extremely difficult decisions, and we had to change programs. We had to align some programs to be more mission focused. You know, we were, if you will, mission creep on some things that that's because we want to help,
Jay Armbrister 43:51 right?
Emily Farley 43:52 And we want to do all, want to do all the things. But unfortunately, what was happening is why we were trying to help others, we weren't able to help ourselves in some ways. You know, part of this too is we, as a community mental health center. We serve anyone and everyone, regardless of where they live,
Speaker 1 44:11 sure
Emily Farley 44:12 if they can pay and their diagnosis right, we will serve them. When you see a population, I do think the stigma mental health is less, if you will, more people are like talking about it, everything, but we also are seeing very, frankly, a very sick community,
Jay Armbrister 44:33 100% physically,
Emily Farley 44:35 mentally,
Speaker 1 44:35 all
Kirsten Watkins 44:36 severity, very complexity of Symptoms has gotten more significant, more significant,
Speaker 1 44:41 more
Jay Armbrister 44:41 significant? Yeah, in my business, I say that crime is down and violence is up. And I think it's kind of similar, is that in that, and I'll say, just from the jail, not only we seen the most severe and persistent mental ill, mentally ill individuals we are seeing. I mean, as far as a number of them, we are. Seeing the most intensively severe and persistently mentally ill individuals, like when I was coming up through this agency, we would have people in jail who were dangerous or had done something really bad, but none of them were so unhealthy and unwell to the point where they had to be that you couldn't be around them like you just simply couldn't even you had to take very special precautions. We find ourselves in that position now where people simply don't know what's going on, and they are dangerous for themselves and for the people around them, and I think that has changed, and I have a bevy of opinions on how we got here. That's
Emily Farley 45:41 a whole other podcast
Jay Armbrister 45:42 or three, but, but I do. I love what you say too about how the stigma is changing, and I totally agree with that as well. Say what we will about millennials, about their work ethic and whatever it is that these these urban legends are about them. They are more prepared to talk about and deal with their mental health than any generation before them and and me Gen X are weird. I'm stuck in the middle where I was raised by boomers, baby boomers, and we just kind of did what we could to survive. Because, you know, like my parents didn't know what where I was for most of the 80s. And we, we we were kind of self reliant, but now we're realizing that the old way didn't work, so maybe we need to look in a new way. But then these millennials and the Gen Z and all that, they're like, Duh, why don't we take care of each other like your brains broke down?
Emily Farley 46:35 Yeah. And I think, I think for think for us, for the last couple years, you know, and we were becoming a certified community behavioral health clinic which had more requirements criteria for us to meet. And we are that designated agency for Douglas County. I think the sex the successes are through all of that. We are an accredited organization. We are. We have a like, I think, about 122 clinically licensed providers
Speaker 1 47:08 from the
Kirsten Watkins 47:09 highest level of licensure,
Emily Farley 47:10 yeah, from nurses, APRNs, psychiatrists, psychologists, it's the gamut. And so we also want to make sure that we retain, I mean, we're also one of a large employer.
Speaker 1 47:22 We want
Emily Farley 47:23 to be able to retain staff. And so I do think we saw a culture shift too in the last year, a very positive one, and that is my experience. I mean, I don't want to speak for all 320 sure, but I do feel as what I see, it does feel. The spirit has a little bit more light to it. At Bert Nash Center, we are digging deeper and making sure we're making sure our team members feel heard. How can we help make things better? You have an idea, let's, let's talk about it. And not that we weren't doing it before, but I just think things can be different with different leadership and different ways to navigate challenges where get a little scrappy,
Speaker 1 48:17 yeah,
Emily Farley 48:18 but with some grit, scrap, but like, with like, really, like, meaning behind it? Like, yeah, well,
Speaker 1 48:26 yeah,
Emily Farley 48:26 we're not, we're not gonna rush. We're not gonna react. We will. We will react, though, with a little bit more purpose. Two
Jay Armbrister 48:35 things can be true at the same time. We can deeply respect those that came before us and laid this groundwork and foundation 42 deeply 42 for what we do, but also being ready to move in a new direction or change some things, just to adjust to what what what our community demands of us, what we're seeing nationally. Just like you said, print newspapers aren't really a thing as much of a thing anymore. So I mean, you have to adjust and adapt. I always because I am, I'm like, I was, I was handed a juggernaut of an agency when I took over, like, everything was was lined out and running, and because it's because of the staff that was doing the work. But that didn't mean there weren't things that I saw that I felt like we could just do a little better or do different. And I think it's the same in in that. And it's not that the past administrations or the past, you know, leadership within Bert Nash Center was a problem. It was just that things, things move and change. They're constantly moving and changing. But we always want to pay deep respect to those that came before that, because without them, like I always joke, it's like, I got handed this, this golden egg, you know? And they're like, Don't drop it. And that's, and that's what our job is, yeah, is to not to a do no harm, but to try to improve it. And that's, that's exactly what it it feels like you've been doing and are doing. So, yeah,
Emily Farley 49:57 well, and our mission statement, which has. Like for the 12 years I've been there, has not changed. It is really Burt Nash evolves with the changing environments,
Jay Armbrister 50:07 right?
Kirsten Watkins 50:08 Yeah,
Emily Farley 50:09 we are. We are. We do it every day. Yeah. We are evolving with our community. And sometimes our community has to evolve with us. Sure, too. There are things like the treatment Recovery Center. We're the first in the state to operate a Crisis Intervention Center. Well, with that comes some lessons learned, trials and tribulations, if you will, but also some really life life saving work that's happening. And so the success stories are just so hard to grab just three or two.
Kirsten Watkins 50:45 Well, I mean, I would say there, there are so many you could go on a micro level, literally every day, I feel like I come across someone who shares a story about how their life was impacted by Bert Nash Center in a positive way. I was just at an event at KU last week, I think it was and someone came up to me and told me about how their son was involved in the DBT program years ago, and it changed his life. And she just wanted me to know, and it was like, wow. And then I was at another event, and someone you know, had another story. So every day, there are those kinds of stories. On a more programmatic level, we are developing programs. We are finessing those programs to continue to evolve and meet the needs. Like we have a new acute care therapy program that allows folks who are in crisis to meet with a licensed therapist, usually within one business day. That's amazing. Our treatment and recovery center, we just got data from the state that we served more people than any other CIC, our crisis center, in the state, our mobile response team is one of the highest utilized mobile Response Team teams in the state, and that's comparing to Wichita and Kansas City. Yeah, right. I mean, these, this is really something to be proud of, and really special in terms of, again, the breadth and depth of services, but and then again, on that macro level, like we are surviving and thriving and continuing to evolve. And, you know, I've said this many times, but when times are tough, like, like a family, people can pull apart, right? Or they can pull together, and our agency pulled together, and we refocused on the things that make the that are the most important for us as an agency, that are the essence of who we are, and I think the role that we play in the community, and we'll continue to pull together, for sure, do this, and
Jay Armbrister 52:29 I love that. The that, I think, was you said it was a mother came and said that their child was was better and doing great because of this one thing, yeah, and I am probably the worst of everybody is to only listening to the negative. If you listen, if you just like, like, if you just just read the comment section. And you know, I know I don't, I can't, I can't because, and I look back on my career in the same way is that the the bad shit was 1% but it's 99% of my memory, you know. And, and it's hard to to try to flex, you know, to move that around and start to see those things. And in a second, that is a huge success story that, that a, she felt the need to tell,
Speaker 1 53:15 but,
Jay Armbrister 53:16 and then B, that it happened,
Kirsten Watkins 53:17 yeah,
Jay Armbrister 53:18 but also, even if, even if, it hadn't gone well and her son was still struggling, at least her son is still alive, you know. And that is a victory in and of itself as well. Like, like, the we just we lose focus and lose sight of the good that gets done because of some of the negative, negative stuff, or just the feelings like we're not doing enough. I mean, nobody's harder on us than ourselves. And so I just, I love hearing that, that that people are recognizing it, but I'm also hoping that you're hearing what they're saying, yeah, and and letting that drown out the noise of the rest of that
Kirsten Watkins 53:55 we do that. I think that's part of the essence of who we are as being in this business to begin with, but we talk in crisis services about how there's no way to account for how many lives we saved
Jay Armbrister 54:06 Exactly.
Kirsten Watkins 54:07 There's no data points
Jay Armbrister 54:08 because they didn't die, yeah, let's just say it like because they didn't die, we can't put a check mark right? Thank heavens, we can't.
Kirsten Watkins 54:15 Yeah,
Jay Armbrister 54:16 yeah.
Kirsten Watkins 54:16 So the work we do is so meaningful, and we don't always hear the success stories, but we know those success stories are happening. And I think every day we see little glimmers or indications even of what we know is going to come for people. So we we cling to that. I as a provider. That's how I would have to that's how I did the work. For so many years, you cling to the positive stories and the ways in which you know that you had a positive impact on someone's life, even it's even if it's just a tiny impact, yeah? Well,
Jay Armbrister 54:46 you know, when people, we had one of the specialty courts, and somebody was like, they only served six people last year,
Kirsten Watkins 54:53 six lives. That's humans. Yeah,
Jay Armbrister 54:56 give me, how much money are you willing? What? What was each one of those six? Lives worth to you, and give me that dollar amount, and then we'll figure it out, and we'll extrapolate it out, like, but I want you to tell me the dollar amount. And of course, nobody's gonna do that, but when you just look at it in 2d and you're like, Oh, it's just six people, and then the courts are seeing 1000s of people. Yeah, that's six people that had a new lease on live there six people now have hope that didn't have hope now have a family around them. So I am. I've always been a proponent of helping anybody we can. You know, I use this, this analogy all the time. It was a this little old man would come in every Friday afternoon and buy a five pound bag of bird, bird food, and because he liked to feed his birds. And then he stopped coming by, and the guy that owned the store found him one day. He's like, I haven't seen you forever. What's going on? He said, The damn squirrels keep eating all my bird feed. And the store owner says, but what are the birds eating? And the old man was like, Well, I don't know, and I am perfectly happy letting the squirrels take what they're going to take. They're just going to do it. That is the fact of life. If life, if we can still keep, keep feeding the cert the songbirds and and that's to me, that is, that is our job, and you cannot quantify it if we lived our life based on x and y axis graphs and paragraph, you know, Venn diagrams and stuff like, we're failing in every aspect of our lives, but when you quantify it, and having saved a life on what's that worth, you know, tell me what it's worth. And so it that it's a very, it's a very weird space that we have to operate in, but that's also how you have to, you have to convince yourself that you're still doing the right thing,
Emily Farley 56:37 yeah,
Jay Armbrister 56:37 even if the data shows otherwise, yeah. Well,
Emily Farley 56:39 and I think sometimes, and we really, I mean, I'll we have a quality improvement director, Tim Nolte, and he is all about the data.
Kirsten Watkins 56:49 We have lots of data.
Jay Armbrister 56:51 I'm a baseball fan, all about analytics.
Emily Farley 56:54 And as a communications person, I can respect it. Yeah, I also though, what's this? What's this? Who's the person behind that data point?
Speaker 1 57:03 You know,
Emily Farley 57:03 you're just talking about the six people, yeah. So what I love about my job is I get to help that person have a courageous voice and share what that, what their life was like, and what we, what they were able like. I don't want to say what we because it's not what Burt Nash is doing, it's what that person is doing, and we're walking alongside them, and we're guiding them to to what their goal is. And so for us, my team in the community engagement world, we get to lift that up, and I get to share it with those clinicians. I get really beautiful handwritten notes that come to us with a donation, or just someone sending us a note, and they're giving something back to Bert Nash Center, and it's why their Why is in there. And I get to hand it to, like, the mobile Response Team, and they'll like, oh, we remember that person. I'm so happy they're doing well, you know, like, because like, probably like, You, you, you touch someone's life, and you go to the next right. And so sometimes I have the pleasure of being like, you want to know how this is going for someone.
Jay Armbrister 58:19 Yeah.
Emily Farley 58:19 It was like, yes, yes, yes. And so, you know, on the Bert Nash Center website, shameless plug, like we have such beautiful stories of people sharing their experience. There are people that that we know, there are people we don't know, but other people know them, right? And so it's kind of like the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, which, by the way, I have met Kevin Bacon, so you're welcome. But I do think there is something about allowing someone to share that experience. It can be a positive, and then sometimes those they're interweaved with negatives, for
Jay Armbrister 58:54 sure,
Kirsten Watkins 58:55 like so they're trying to find their way, and that's okay too. We need and want feedback across the spectrum. That's that's how we get better. You know, we have 320 employees, 40 some programs. There's lots of things that we can continue to do better, can continue to evolve, and so that that experience, that feedback, is important too for us. Yeah, we obviously love hearing when people are doing well, yeah, that our services impacted them positively, and it's, it's our job to continue to be here and to keep trying to be better.
Speaker 1 59:29 Yeah,
Jay Armbrister 59:30 well, if you could, and this is a question I ask most everybody is like, if you could whisper into the minds of everybody in this community one thing that you think they you want them to know about Bert Nash Center or about the job you do, but you don't feel like they've that they've heard what is being said. Like, what would be? What would be something that you could just, if you could just sit down and explain to everybody in this community about what you do, what would that be? Wow.
Kirsten Watkins 59:58 I. I Well, so what went through my brain first was, you are not alone. We are here for you. We have experienced highly trained professionals in a spectrum of behavioral health services available to help anyone who seeks treatment. We accept anyone who is coming or who needs help, who comes into our doors, and we have all kinds of methods to support you in getting the treatment that you need. So any barrier that you might have, any fear that you might have, please come and talk to us and we'll help you address that.
Jay Armbrister 1:00:35 Yeah.
Emily Farley 1:00:36 I mean, honestly, there's nothing else I would really add. It's that's it, yeah, yeah. I mean, we're just, we're here,
Jay Armbrister 1:00:44 yeah?
Emily Farley 1:00:44 And if we're not the right place, we're gonna get you to the right place,
Speaker 1 1:00:48 right?
Emily Farley 1:00:48 I think that's also,
Kirsten Watkins 1:00:50 it's also our job. It's our help find, yeah, the next place, or, or help you find another resource that maybe we don't have. So that's, that's our job too.
Jay Armbrister 1:00:58 No, I think that's,
Kirsten Watkins 1:00:59 there's no harm in reaching out. So, yeah, reach out for
Emily Farley 1:01:03 I just had a mom share her experience about just walking into Bert Nash Center for the first time with their their young child, and she just said, Bert Nash Center is the guiding star.
Speaker 1 1:01:16 Yeah, it's, yeah,
Emily Farley 1:01:18 like they, they helped us get to the next part, and that is something that they had no idea.
Jay Armbrister 1:01:26 Yeah,
Emily Farley 1:01:26 what existed? Sure, they just walked literally in our doors and started talking.
Jay Armbrister 1:01:33 Can't ask for more than that. Yeah. So, okay, what else is there, anything else that you just feel like the world needs to know, or can I get on to the crazy, random questions I'm
Emily Farley 1:01:44 nervous for that that was blank, that was like, really provided crazy,
Jay Armbrister 1:01:51 almost by design.
Emily Farley 1:01:52 By Design?
Jay Armbrister 1:01:53 No, it's super easy.
Speaker 1 1:01:56 We do
Emily Farley 1:01:56 hard things.
Jay Armbrister 1:01:57 I mean, I have a I always have a series of just weird questions. But what movie Can you recite from beginning to end?
Emily Farley 1:02:08 Grease, White Christmas.
Jay Armbrister 1:02:10 Wow, really? What's your favorite quote or part of that of said movie?
Emily Farley 1:02:15 Okay, mine is the song I will not sing. It's the the sister one where, yeah, and then also with when Bing Crosby does it with the
Jay Armbrister 1:02:28 only, the only line from that entire movie that I can remember as a kid, where he was, they were talking about, he was on a phone, talking about the price, and he said it was somewhere between ouch and Boeing boing, yes, yeah. That's how my mind works. I remember now, grease. I used to love that movie.
Kirsten Watkins 1:02:42 Oh man, I recall. I was just telling someone today about our pink lady one time for Halloween, we dressed up. I recorded it off the TV. I didn't learn until many years later, that I missed parts of it, like there were parts of the movie I had not seen for years and years anyways. I mean, every part of the movie that's
Jay Armbrister 1:03:06 funny, you say that because I had the same thing. I had only watched The Sound of Music up until the German like, until they got married. I'm like, It's a love story. Fleeing into the mountains. Yeah,
Kirsten Watkins 1:03:22 took a turn.
Jay Armbrister 1:03:23 Yeah, I thought Old Yeller was still alive. So what's your favorite part of that?
Kirsten Watkins 1:03:31 I mean, at the you got, I gotta say at the end, where Sandy comes out, tell me about it. Stud. John Travolta sings,
Jay Armbrister 1:03:39 my dad was a huge Olivia Newton, John
Kirsten Watkins 1:03:41 family, it's hard not to be,
Jay Armbrister 1:03:43 I admit, I admit, so if you could, if you could have a beer or a cup of coffee with anybody alive or dead, non family member, they can be famous or not, but somebody you would just love to sit down and talk with. Who would that be?
Kirsten Watkins 1:03:59 Well, my mom passed away, and I would, I would, I would kill, I'm sure, opportunity to have more time with her. So totally understand
Jay Armbrister 1:04:09 that, but
Kirsten Watkins 1:04:10 that's the sentimental one. Yeah,
Emily Farley 1:04:16 Michelle Obama, I was gonna say
Kirsten Watkins 1:04:17 Barack
Jay Armbrister 1:04:19 Obama. Let's get them both. Oh, that would be Yeah. I mean, agree with him or not, I always thought it would be amazing to sit and have a beer with George Bush. George W Bush, yeah, just to hear the what actually happened, what was really going he'll tell you. I think I bet he would. I mean, I'd go sit at a baseball game with him any day a week. So,
Speaker 1 1:04:41 yeah,
Jay Armbrister 1:04:41 yeah, no, that'd be good.
Kirsten Watkins 1:04:42 His daughter went to UT University of Texas, by the way, when I was in college, and you could tell what fraternity she was hanging out at.
Jay Armbrister 1:04:49 And there was another one, Barbara's mom
Emily Farley 1:04:53 or No, Barbara was heard her twin sister, or is her twin sister's name? Barbara
Jay Armbrister 1:04:58 was grandma. That was.
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:00 Yes, yes, she was named, yeah,
Jay Armbrister 1:05:01 that's right.
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:02 Jenna was the fun one. Went to University of Texas. You could see when the Secret
Jay Armbrister 1:05:08 Service What was your first concert, what was your most recent concert, and what was and kids concerts don't count, and what was your favorite
Emily Farley 1:05:20 first
Jay Armbrister 1:05:20 and first
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:21 concert, an
Jay Armbrister 1:05:22 acceptable answer is the same concert for all three or I've never been to a concert, I will judge you harshly. But no, no,
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:29 not true.
Jay Armbrister 1:05:29 You'd be surprised how many times I've heard that.
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:32 Okay, first concert was Beach Boys.
Jay Armbrister 1:05:34 Okay, that seems to be a popular one. I think that was my wife's first one, because their parents, parents took you to and
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:39 John Stamos was the drummer.
Speaker 1 1:05:42 Do you
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:43 remember
Emily Farley 1:05:43 that? Yes, I do look it up. Yeah. He
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:46 traveled with the Beach Boys,
Speaker 1 1:05:47 like in
Emily Farley 1:05:48 full house. It was a part of his persona was the Beach Boys. And
Kirsten Watkins 1:05:52 I just remember that part. So Beach Boys was my first concert. Most recent concert was Lyle Lovett in the big band. He's still alive, yeah, this wasn't his best showing. Well,
Jay Armbrister 1:06:03 he's probably, yeah,
Kirsten Watkins 1:06:04 I've been to many Roberts
Jay Armbrister 1:06:06 years, you know, just
Kirsten Watkins 1:06:07 Yeah, but the band is amazing. That was a great I think that was the most recent concert. What was the other question?
Speaker 1 1:06:13 Which
Kirsten Watkins 1:06:17 favorite? Oh, man, I have to think about that for a second, yeah, so mine,
Emily Farley 1:06:21 I'm pretty sure, besides, earlier wasn't recording, but Kansas, I've seen several times with my parents, but I think my like, big concert at whatever T Mobile used to be called Bon Jovi.
Speaker 1 1:06:33 Oh,
Emily Farley 1:06:34 my amazing.
Jay Armbrister 1:06:36 Really,
Emily Farley 1:06:36 that was like, Yeah, we had floor seats. Oh, my goodness, it was really great. And then recently, head in the heart,
Jay Armbrister 1:06:44 oh, yeah, yeah,
Emily Farley 1:06:45 I went to a music festival hinterland out in Illinois with my girlfriends. It was right after I had my first kid, and it was a two day concert. It was so maybe it was not in two days. I'm in three that's all. I'll say there fair so fun. But it rained.
Speaker 1 1:07:07 Oh,
Jay Armbrister 1:07:07 wow.
Emily Farley 1:07:08 And we had ponchos, you know? And my friend forgot to put her hood up, and so when she went to fill it up, so we call it the poncho of despair, she was very unhappy. Oh,
Jay Armbrister 1:07:22 we'll go right down your neck.
Emily Farley 1:07:23 Oh, it was just Yeah. And it was summer, so thankfully it wasn't cold, but yeah, it was unpleasant, yeah. But I would say that was my favorite, because it was just a multiple Day concert, just amazing.
Jay Armbrister 1:07:35 Oh, and
Emily Farley 1:07:35 bands, music
Jay Armbrister 1:07:36 festivals are just such a unique experience with the people watching and just, oh yeah. This the opportunities to do all of these different things, but see some great shows. And yeah, it's
Emily Farley 1:07:46 Yeah,
Jay Armbrister 1:07:46 yeah,
Emily Farley 1:07:47 yeah.
Kirsten Watkins 1:07:48 I think that would be my favorite. I know that's a cop out a little bit, but Austin City Limits Music Festival, yeah, many times, really, every time you, you know, get to see so many bands that are so amazing, or discover people that I didn't know about prior,
Jay Armbrister 1:08:01 when I was a kid, Austin City Limits was on, I don't know it was every Friday night or Saturday night, or whatever it was, and my dad watched it all just like now, I'm just, I wish I would have sat down and watched it. There was amazing artists on there, you know, the Doobie Brothers and, you know, Waylon and all the great the greats have played that that been on that program. So yeah, I bet that would be pretty fantastic. Everybody wants to be a part
Kirsten Watkins 1:08:27 of that
Jay Armbrister 1:08:28 kind of legacy. So
Kirsten Watkins 1:08:29 agreed.
Jay Armbrister 1:08:31 Well, is there anything else that that you feel like the people need to know about, or I didn't ask you about, or you want to ask me dumb questions, I don't care, but what's
Kirsten Watkins 1:08:39 your favorite concert?
Jay Armbrister 1:08:40 Well, I don't know. I've been to a lot of them. When I Was this the summer after my senior year in high school. I've always been kind of a metalhead. I went, I got to go see a show at sandstone. It will for always be sandstone to me. But the band, White Zombie, not Rob Zombie. White Zombie played Pantera and Megadeth and being an 18 year old boy in the grass, and we were in the grass, that was a pretty significant moment and in my in my life. But no, I've been fortunate enough to see some amazing shows over the last five to 10 years, and I got to see sturgell Simpson at a beautiful venue in St Louis called the Fox Theater. And always reminds me it was a big version of the Uptown Theater, but it reminds me I felt like the Muppets should it like the two old dudes just talking on people. It was so good, and it was a great venue and everything. As I've gotten older, I like shows where we sit down. I'm not a Florida guy anymore. I
Emily Farley 1:09:46 will pay for
Speaker 1 1:09:48 those
Jay Armbrister 1:09:49 well this way. And he the ticket, said, Show at eight. He came on at eight. No opening band, right on time. He played for three hours. He was gone. No encore. All right. Well, thank you so much for being a part of this. Like I said, those, those, my mom is going to be thrilled to hear about Bert Nash Center and and all the things that you do. But I do think that this is a great long form conversation for people to hear context. Not just, you know, I know we have to put out things on social media, but it's, it's, it has to be by design, so almost surface level and and catchy in a tiny little package, sometimes it's better to just talk about these things. And I think you learn so much more. Like, I know I learned a lot today just about what goes on, and I felt like I had a pretty good handle on the place, and I don't so
Emily Farley 1:10:41 well, there's like, there's so much to learn. I mean, I've been here for 12 years, and I'm still learning, learning things, but thank you for inviting us to be here and for your service on the board, and just really, what the sheriff, what you all do? I do. Think there is a very special thing about our local law enforcement across Douglas County, locally in the city surrounding Lawrence, you all have some really beautiful compassion for folks in their hardest time. Yeah,
Jay Armbrister 1:11:16 it's what this community demands, and the work that we do doesn't translate to many other places and and, yeah, so thank you. I'll just that's I'm learning to say thank you. And so great
Kirsten Watkins 1:11:30 job.
Jay Armbrister 1:11:32 I really appreciate it, because you're right. We get, I get stuck in the negative circle of we're not doing enough. Everybody's pissed at us. What? What are we? Why are we even doing this, you know, and, and it's, it's it. You find, though, that just if you watch the news, you think we're at the first step, the first gate, like we're there, like, this is, this is this whole thing is burning down. But then you go and push your cart through checkers, and everybody is just so polite, glad to be there. They're They're loving their beautiful, little, awesome checkers and hometown grocer. Everybody in that building is getting along just great. So we're not falling apart. And we are. We are doing okay locally. And so I just, I have to remind myself that people still like each other
Speaker 1 1:12:19 for
Jay Armbrister 1:12:20 the most part, and and we still do pick each other up when we're down. But if you, if you fall into that cycle, it's, it's nothing, it's doom. I mean, it's terrible out there. Don't
Emily Farley 1:12:31 read the comments.
Jay Armbrister 1:12:32 Jay, oh, I never, I can't I seriously, I can't.
Kirsten Watkins 1:12:36 This relationship is another example of that. Like, you know, again, this is humans working together
Jay Armbrister 1:12:41 and
Kirsten Watkins 1:12:41 trying
Jay Armbrister 1:12:41 to common interest,
Kirsten Watkins 1:12:42 yeah, for common good and common good for our community. And I also want to say thank you for all you're doing and how you know your support of us professionally, your collaboration professionally, but also who you are as a person.
Speaker 1 1:12:53 Well, yeah, I support
Jay Armbrister 1:12:55 you guys because it serves me. Yeah, it makes me. It makes my job much easier. But no, it's easy. It's easy to say nice things when you meet them and and and I find myself constantly talking about how how amazing Bert Nash Center is, and telling other sheriffs and agencies How unfortunate it is that they don't have something like that. So, so that's that I thanks for coming on. Thanks for giving me an hour and a half a year was it didn't feel that long so. But if you ever need anything else, maybe if you have other other things coming up or here in a year or two, and you want to come back on and tell my mom about what you're doing next,
Speaker 1 1:13:32 Wait,
Emily Farley 1:13:33 does Betsy not watch this?
Jay Armbrister 1:13:35 I doubt it. No, she works. Besides, I tell her everything. Anyways.
Emily Farley 1:13:42 Hi, Jay's mom,
Jay Armbrister 1:13:44 all right. Well, thank you so
Speaker 1 1:14:02 much. You
Sheriff Jay Armbrister
Host
George Diepenbrock
Producer
Dr. Kirsten Watkins
Guest
Emily Farley
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