Portland's Letty Owings Center closes after 37 years

The Letty Owings Center, a residential treatment program where mothers could live with their children during addiction recovery, will close permanently by the end of October.

Central City Concern, which has operated the 29-bedroom facility since 1997, stopped accepting new patients in July and could not find another provider to take over the program.

About 10 women with children were still living at the center as of this week, KGW reported Wednesday, Sept. 9. KGW described the program as "one-of-a-kind."

The center has served pregnant women and mothers with substance use disorders since 1989.

Dr. Amanda Risser, Central City Concern's chief medical officer, told KGW that the potency of fentanyl and methamphetamine pushed patients' needs beyond what staff could safely handle.

Fentanyl spread through Portland's street drug market around 2019 or 2020, Risser said, and patients began arriving with far more severe mental and physical health conditions, including postpartum psychosis.

"Most of our population for the last few years have needed a higher level of care, but one doesn't exist for them," Risser told The Oregonian in a Sept. 3 report. "We've done our best … because there's no other place for them."

Financial pressure also drove the decision. The center hardly ever broke even despite always being full, according to The Oregonian. Risser said sustaining the required round-the-clock staffing would need millions of dollars in additional annual funding, plus changes to how such centers are licensed.

A statewide gap

Dr. Andy Mendenhall, Central City Concern's president, estimated that no more than 150 beds exist across all of Oregon where children can live with their mothers during treatment. That count included the 29 beds at Letty Owings.

Laura's Place will also close. The transitional housing program was connected to the Letty Owings Center.

Risser said the closure will likely mean fewer women and children are admitted together to treatment programs, and that some families will face separation. Regional programs still exist, she said, but they will not replicate what Letty Owings offered.

What comes next for families

Women at the center will work with staff to move out on their planned schedules, according to Risser.

Some may transfer to Central City Concern's 16 x Burnside Recovery Center, a 74-bed facility at 1616 E. Burnside St. that opened in May 2025. Children and infants cannot live there, the organization said.

Central City Concern directed pregnant and parenting women to contact these alternative programs: