Portland, Ore.-based Central City Concern will permanently close the Letty Owings Center, Oregon’s largest residential addiction treatment center for pregnant and parenting women, at the end of October, InvestigateWest reported Oct. 29.
The 29-bed center opened in 1989 and allowed mothers to keep children up to age 5 with them during treatment. Central City Concern is also closing Laura’s Place, a transitional housing facility that served about 16 women and their children each year after they finished treatment at Letty Owings.
The nonprofit faced a projected $1 million deficit at the center in 2027, plus expensive building repairs. Restructuring operations to meet residents’ increasingly complex clinical needs would have added $2 million in annual costs, said Andy Mendenhall, MD, CEO of Central City Concern. Dr. Mendenhall said no other provider had the capacity to take over the program.
Letty Owings stopped new admissions in July. InvestigateWest estimates Oregon has lost about 20% of its residential treatment beds for pregnant and parenting people this year, leaving roughly 120 statewide. Volunteers of America Oregon permanently closed a women’s residential treatment center in Portland in April.
“Our last resident has left Letty,” a Central City Concern spokesperson told Becker’s. The spokesperson said other options are available for pregnant and parenting mothers, “though none quite the same as Letty.”
Women who need Level 3.7 residential care under American Society of Addiction Medicine criteria can be treated at Central City Concern’s 16 x Burnside Recovery Center or at Fora Health, the spokesperson said. Neither program is currently designed to keep mothers and babies together during the earliest phase of treatment.
The spokesperson also pointed to other substance use disorder residential programs in the Portland area, including Project Network, CODA and Shepherd’s Door, and to transitional housing for parents with children, including Our Father’s House, Project Patchwork and Central City Concern’s FAN Housing.
“I just wonder, are we the canary in the coal mine?” said Tina Bialas, director of the Letty Owings Center. “I think we are.”
Gov. Tina Kotek has directed the Oregon Health Authority and the Oregon Department of Human Services to form a cross-agency team to address funding and operational risks facing these programs, a spokesperson said. Health officials said the team will begin work this month.
Central City Concern, which reported more than $200 million in 2025 revenue, is also preparing for Medicaid cuts that begin taking effect this year.
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