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Dr. Harold Cook was named Administrator
of the Division of Mental Health and Developmental Services
(MHDS) in February 2008.
The MHDS Administrator, appointed by
the Governor, is responsible for establishing policies and
procedures to ensure adequate development and administration
of services for mentally ill and developmentally disabled
Nevadans, as well as oversight of the State’s Substance
Abuse Prevention and Treatment Agency (SAPTA). MHDS has an
annual budget of more than $320 million, employing
approximately 1,900 staff.
A disabled veteran from the Vietnam
War, Dr. Cook has served as MHDS Director of Northern Nevada
Adult Mental Health Services since 1999. He began his MHDS
career in 1978 as a mental retardation technician at Sierra
Regional Center.
Dr. Cook worked as a psychologist,
primarily responsible for program evaluation activities at
Nevada Mental Health Institute, from 1979-81, and he
directed program evaluation services for Northern Nevada
Child and Adolescent Services in 1981-1988. While at NNCAS,
he developed a computerized management information system
used by the agency until 2006. As Director of the
Intermediate Care Facility at Sierra Regional Center from
1988-1999, Dr. Cook developed the first community based ICF/MR
small program in Nevada, as well as a children’s program
which allowed 16 Nevada children to return home from
out-of-state placements. As an aside to his duties with the
State, Dr. Cook served on the editorial board for the
journal, Behaviorism, from 1976-1983.
A 1973 graduate of the University of
Nevada, Reno (UNR), with a Bachelor of Arts degree in
Psychology, Dr. Cook earned his Master of Arts in Psychology
from Drake University (Des Moines, Iowa) in 1975, and a PhD
of General Experimental Psychology from UNR in 1981. He is
a member of the National Alliance of Mentally Ill (NAMI) and
the Western Psychiatric State Hospital Association (WPSHA).
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