For immediate release
Dec. 22, 2025
Snohomish County Health Department Unveils Strategic Plan
Aims include boosting vaccination rates, improving water quality, and helping everyone achieve optimal health
EVERETT – Improved vaccination rates to protect Snohomish County communities from infectious disease. Water so clean that shellfish can safely be eaten again. Diversified sources of funding.
These are a few of the Health Department’s priorities under a new five-year strategic plan, available on the department’s website.
Other key aims include improved operations and being better prepared for public health emergencies. The plan’s ultimate goal? Helping everyone in the county achieve their highest state of health and well-being.
“As County Executive, the health and safety of all who live, work and play here is of the highest importance to me,” Snohomish County Executive Dave Somers said in the plan’s opening message. “This document lays out a path to focus on key areas, from improving day-to-day healthy living to being ready for health-related needs in an emergency, and from strengthening our public health workforce to improving equitable health services for diverse communities.”
Strategic planning began in early 2024 under former Department Director Dennis Worsham, now Washington State Secretary of Health, and was driven by input over dozens of meetings with staff and community partners.
“Shaped by the voices of our community and our staff, this strategic plan sets a clear direction by defining long-term goals and priorities,” said new Department Director Kim Van Pelt. “It will help leaders, staff and community partners focus on what matters most while helping us align people and resources to ensure we are working toward the same objectives.”
The strategic plan is not static. It will evolve as the department learns from its work and adjusts to changing community needs and opportunities. “It is a dynamic plan designed to grow along with Snohomish County,” said Nicole Thomsen, public affairs and policy manager, who oversaw development of the plan with consultant Mark Del Beccaro, M.D.
Increased vaccination rates
One of the department’s key goals is to “protect Snohomish County from infectious disease and environmental threats.” A strategy for achieving that is to increase childhood and adult vaccination rates, which have been on the decline for several years. The strategic plan sets two targets:
- By Sept. 15, 2029, 90% of all children entering kindergarten will have received recommended vaccines. (The current rate is under 89%.)
- By Feb. 28, 2029, 65% of adults over 65 will have received one dose of the annual flu vaccines. (The current rate is about 56%.)
Said Health Officer Dr. James Lewis: “It’s the first time we’ve had a comprehensive strategic plan with measurable goals attached to it that will provide accountability and allow us to show the impact of our work. The community will be able to see if we’re meeting our goals and, if not, why.”
Protecting water quality from untreated sewage to support shellfish harvesting
Another key priority is to protect water quality from chemical and bacterial pollutants. The department’s aim in this area is to work with the Washington State Department of Health (DOH) and the Tulalip Tribes to get more information about the status of onsite septic systems to support Tulalip Tribes’ treaty-reserved right to harvest shellfish on the Reservation’s shoreline.
“As filter feeders, shellfish draw in seawater and strain out tiny food particles that may have absorbed contaminants in the water,” said Hailey Fagerness, a Healthy Communities Specialist in the Health Department’s Environmental Health Division. “If contamination levels are high enough, eating shellfish can make people sick.”
Currently, three shellfish growing areas off the coast of Tulalip’s Reservation are “unclassified” by DOH. This means that health standards have not been evaluated and commercial harvesting is not allowed.
A primary reason for this lack of classification is incomplete installation and maintenance records of septic systems near the shoreline, Fagerness said. Because septic systems can be a source of pollution, missing information regarding the effectiveness of their treatment makes it harder to confirm that shellfish beds are safe from septic-related pollutants.
Snohomish County is working with the Tulalip Tribes to address this data gap and achieve ongoing septic monitoring and maintenance to make sure that systems are functioning properly, according to Fagerness. Once health officials have a clearer understanding of these systems and confirm there are no public health hazards, DOH would be able to move forward with classifying at least one of these shellfish areas as “approved” by 2030, enabling safe commercial and Tribal subsistence harvest.
Contact:
Jeff Hodson, shd.pio@co.snohomish.wa.us