OLYMPIA -- Martin Thies, a veteran compliance officer with a background in education, has been named the new Quality Assurance and Compliance Manager for the Mental Health Division in the Department of Social and Health Services.

Thies, who has worked with internal audit teams within the agency for the past seven years, is a Certified Internal Auditor (CIA) and a board member of the Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA). In his most recent position with DSHS, he was a Senior Auditor and Consultant, supervising six auditors and serving as consultant to dozens of audit teams.

Richard Kellogg, Director of the Mental Health Division, said Thies brings extensive experience in the arena of compliance as well as a solid management background.

"He brings proven judgment and technical skills to our division, and he will be an important part of the state's mandate to improve the quality of our services and their delivery," said Kellogg. "We are moving forcefully in the direction of evidence-based practices and better accountability, and we need exactly this kind of oversight and review to make sure the work continues on the right path."

From 2000 to 2006, Thies worked as an auditor and consultant with DSHS, providing consultations for DSHS management and internal control audits that zeroed in on the agency's handling of federal funds. He also worked with algorithmic payment review software used to review Medicaid reimbursements in a pioneering initiative called the Payment Review Program (PRP).

Thies' academic background was in education, and with over a past decade of work in auditing, he married the two disciplines by teaching leadership skills to auditors from across North America attending IIA seminars.

In private business before joining state service in 2000, Thies was owner and president of Martin-Greene and Associates Inc. of Asheville, N.C., for three years. Among other projects, the firm managed a $1.9 million expansion and rehabilitation effort for historic downtown preservation and also managed a business marketing operation for local organic farm problems.

Earlier, he was General Manager of a regional farmers' cooperative called Carolina Organic Growers. In the early 1990s, he was Project Director for MAGIC Community Gardens in Asheville. The non-profit program established individual vegetable gardens for families living in public housing or receiving public assistance.

In 1980 Thies earned a B.A. in English from Whitman College in Walla Walla, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and he received a teaching certificate from the University of Puget Sound in 1982. He later received his Master's and Ph.D. in English from Duke University in 1984.

FOR ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND, CONTACT: Jim Stevenson, Communications Director, HRSA, DSHS, 360-902-7604 (Pager: 360-971-4067)