Now there are nine counties interested in a regional network to deliver services for mental health and the developmentally disabled (MHDD).

Linn County Supervisors Linda Langston and Ben Rogers, both D-Cedar Rapids, participated in an early discussion Tuesday with representatives from counties interested in forming a regional agency. The multi-county cooperatives are all but mandatory under state MHDD reform legislation passed early this year.

Linn County already has formal memorandums of understanding with Benton and Jones counties to pursue development of a joint agency. Those counties’ representatives were joined Tuesday by those from Johnson, Bremer, Delaware, Dubuque, Iowa, and Buchanan counties.

County representatives attending Tuesday’s meeting have until Oct. 9 to decide whether to join the Linn-Benton-Jones effort.

“It allows us to sort of spread the risk” of delivering MHDD services to a rural area, Rogers said. He said Tuesday’s meeting was “a 30,000-foot look” at creating an agency. “We didn’t get down into the minutae.”

That will be up to MHDD officials from each county.