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HomeMy WebLinkAbout07 SOCIAL SERVICES BOARD MINUTES 07-06-2022 SOCIAL SERVICES BOARD MINUTES July 6th, 2022 The Grant County Department of Social Services Board meeting was held, with some board members appearing via zoom (z). The meeting was called to order by Chair Don Splinter at 9:00 AM. Roll Call was taken with Robert Scallon, John Beinborn, Diane Nelson. Also present Fred Naatz, Director, Bob Keeney County Board Chairman (z), LeaAnne Smith, Office & Financial Coordinator (z), Shane Drinkwater, Director of IT(z), Joyce Roling, Personnel Director (z), Amanda Degenhardt, Finance Director, (z), Lori Reid, ADRC Director, excused from meeting Brian Lucey, absent Brandon Snyder, Adam Day. The meeting was found to be in compliance with the open meeting laws. John Beinborn made a motion to approve the agenda without change. Bob S seconded, the motion carried. Minutes of June 1st, 2022 meeting: Bob S made a motion to approve the June 1st minutes. Diane seconded the motion, the motion carried. FINANCIAL REPORTS: Summary of Vouchers: Fred stated we are 42% in. The Trempealeau County Health Center only contracts with counties. The guardian reimburses DSS the cost. LeaAnne tracks this. Bob S made a motion to approve the Financial Reports Diane seconded the motion, the motion carried. Administrative Report: Fred stated we are 42% through the year, revenue is right on. Out of home we are a little under. We have been able to use Safe and Stable funding for this. These funds are used up, so we will see this go up. We have two kids who are in The GROW program. Corrections run this, which is a 120 day program and has had good results. The down side is it is $1,500 a day per kid. The Family First focus, part of the federal legislation is a lot of the residential care centers needed to go through more hoops too be licensed at a higher level. The biggest change is it requires them to have nursing care available 24 hours a day or minimum of someone on call 24 hours a day. Due to this most of the placements have gone up $100 per day. The supportive home care we run the Trempealeau cost through this. We are 47% revenue and 45% expenses. Training Costs: Fred explained most of the trainings are the Ethics and Boundaries. This training requires workers to go through every 2 years and is provided through the Training Partnership. A few workers went to an Opioid Stimulant Summit training, which the focus was on methamphetamines as this is a big problem in our area. These workers are also going to a one day training, which will go over all the different treatment options. Fred does attend a Southwest Wisconsin meth meeting that is hosted monthly. Diane asked if this was open to the public, Fred stated we have not had it open to the public. Diane made a motion to approve the Administrative Report and Training Costs, John seconded, the motion carried. CORRESPONDENCE: Foster Parent Support Grant - Fred explained we received a letter from Wendy Henderson, Division Administrator. She stated there were 54 agencies who applied for the Foster Parent grant and they were able to award 20 grants. DSS was one of the agencies awarded the grant. Amber and Morgan apply for this grant and have received it three years in a row. They use this funding to help out foster parents. For Example, if a foster kid breaks something this funding can be used to replace it. ADMINISTRATION – GENERAL: Child Welfare Case Load standards: Fred explained the Department of Children and Family is contracted with a company to come in and do research to determine what is a recommended case load level for social workers in the Child Protective Services area. They followed a third of the state workers time studies for three months and analyzed the data and broke it down. They are recommending 9 to 11 families on a caseload. Right now are workers lowest case load is 14 and the highest is 17 to 20 cases. There is a tool that Clark used to go through this and we should have 29 social workers versus 16 and 5 supervisors versus 2. Fred explained he is going to have a conversation with Ben Wood as he wonders if there is liability with this. Diane asked if we have had interns come in. Fred stated we do, but COVID destroyed this as it would not have been a good experience for the students. Fred stated we would like to get with Clarke University as they have the closest social work program and develop a good relationship to have ongoing interns coming in. Diane asked what is being done for retention for staff so they don’t get burned out and feels appreciated. Fred stated we have a Good Spirit Committee that does a lot of stuff and individual supervisor’s does stuff for their staff. One of the biggest things now is the flexibility of being able to work from home a couple days a week. Request to refill social work position: Fred explained a Social Worker is leaving in August. Fred asked if the board could approve to refill this position. John asked if there was someone in mind. Fred stated there are a couple people interested, once the position is approved to refill it interviews will be set up. John made a motion to refill the social worker position; Diane seconded the motion, the motion carried. 2023 Budget planning and input from Board: Fred explained The Family First Legislation was implemented in Wisconsin, which focuses on prevention rather than after services, so they are going to limit funding for the Long Term Care placements. If someone is in residential placement more than six months there are a lot of reviews you have to go through to extend the six months. They are trying to cut this down and do more stuff on the front end. We took a little more money out of the out of home care placements as we did the contracted services through Orion. Orion is very helpful, but didn’t quite go to the level we wanted them to be at. Fred wanted input from the board on switching some money around. For example there is money in mentoring, $25,000. We want to try and do peer mentoring, where we could find someone who has gone through the child protective services program to help someone out, but was unable to find someone. Fred is hoping to move this $25,000 to different areas. Fred asked the board if there could be flexibility to move this money around. Don stated there should be flexibility if the money is not being used. Safety Update: Fred stated we have been trying to get a monitor by the back door. A laptop was put on the counter by the back employee door. There was feedback from the staff that it works fine. Fred stated we had a client who made a significant threat to the department and worker. They had sent a text directly to the worker that they were going to “clean house”. The supervisors did a good job responding to this and had the Sheriffs involved as well. The front door was locked and a sign was put up to knock to come in. A Deputy had recommended we get a camera on our front door, so we can see who there. The Deputy was surprised that our front door was not locked and we did not have a buzzer. Garry and Shane came over and looked to see if a camera we have showing the waiting room could be moved to show the front door. Our front desk staff feels they are sitting ducks; if someone does come in. Fred Stated if someone comes in upset and our door is locked will they go to the next door. Right now the situation we assessed calmed down to where we don’t have the door locked now. Fred explained the way it is set up the front desk is not facing the front door. There is also going to have a doorbell put on the door, so when someone opens the door it will ding. Fred stated there might be times where we have to lock the doors again. Don asked if there was any follow up with this person to make sure they calmed down. Fred explained we are still working with this person. He talked with the worker on how they are going to do their meetings and they will probably have to come into the office. We had set up a Sheriff to come over and search this person before meeting with the worker. The hard balance is we can make it safe in the office, but then when workers have to go to their homes. The workers do have a county smart phone now they can use when they are in the field. The 13th the Sheriff’s Department will come over and do an active shooters training. 1st Amendment Auditor recommendations: Fred stated to the board if they are interested to go to you tube and search First Amendment Audits. These people come in and video tape. They state it is a public area and have a right to be here. Their intention is to provoke people and post it on you tube. There was training through the Wisconsin County Association. Per Andy Phillips we can post signs on the doors stating “No Video Taping”. We would need to be able to answer the question “why”. Fred stated the county needs to come up with a policy on this. Director’s Report – Fred explained what the Public Participation Hearing was for. CITIZEN COMMENT- None ADJOURMENT- At 10:25 AM, John made a motion to adjourn until August 3rd, 2022, which was seconded by Bob S. The motion carried, the meeting was adjourned.