COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
WORKSHOP MEETING
July 20, 2005 10:00 A.M.

MEMBERS PRESENT

Jeff Haste, Chairman
Dominic D. DiFrancesco, II, Vice Chairman
George P. Hartwick, III, Secretary

STAFF PRESENT

Marie Rebuck, Controller; Robert Dick, Treasurer; Chad Saylor, Chief Clerk; Julia Nace, Assistant Chief Clerk; Jim Zugay, Recorder of Deeds; Tom Guenther, Director of IT; Randy Baratucci, Director of Purchasing; Steve Chiavetta, Director of Registration & Elections; Bob Christoff, Conservation District; Barry Wyrick, Director of MH/MR; Sandy Moore, Director of Human Services; Sandy Pintarch, Children &Youth; Dave Schreiber, Personnel; Kay Sinner, Personnel; Diane McNaughton, Press Secretary; Faye Fisher, Director of Personnel; Carolyn Thompson, Court Administrator; Guy Beneventano, Esq., Solicitor's Office; Dan Eisenhower, MH/MR; Edgar Cohen, Director of Facilities Maintenance; Jena Wolgemuth, Commissioners' Office; Lena Martinez, Commissioners' Office; and Richie Martz, Commissioners' Office

GUESTS PRESENT

Jack Sherzer; Michael Milligan, Jeff Stonehill and Joe Longenecker

MINUTES

CALL TO ORDER

Mr. Haste, Chairman of the Board, called the meeting to order at 10:00 a.m.

MOMENT OF SILENCE

Everyone observed a moment of silence.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

Everyone stood for the Pledge of Allegiance.

APPROVAL OF MINUTES

Mr. Haste: We have three sets of Meeting Minutes that will be voted on at the Legislative Meeting.

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Mr. Haste: We are at the point in time for public participation. Is there anyone in the audience that would like to address the Board at this time? (There were none.)

DEPARTMENT DIRECTORS/GUESTS

1. Jeff Stonehill, Middletown Borough Manager
   1. Check presentation for 2005 Arts & Crafts Fair
   2. Update on the Borough of Middletown

Mr. DiFrancesco: We have two items to take care of this morning. First, let me say congratulations on the birth of your new child. You became a father again about a week ago.

Mr. Stonehill: This is my second.

Mr. DiFrancesco: We have an opportunity this morning. This past year has been quite crazy as everyone is aware in terms of tourism in Dauphin County and so forth. The Board has been limited in what it can possibly do for different communities, but in certain circumstances where we have emergency situations that come up we want to do our part to try to fulfill those roles. I think it is a common understanding among the Board that some of the best things that happen in Dauphin County are some of the local community events that take place. The spirit of our town shows in that we have so many people committed to their communities. Recently, we were contacted from the Borough to say that they are having some struggles down there and a little bit of financial assistance might be able to help them through some of those struggles and keep some things going that may have otherwise failed. This morning the Board is pleased to present you with a check for the Historical Society to uphold some of the facilities down in Middletown. We are pleased to give you this $2,000 check to help out in some of the local community interests. We can do the check presentation first and I would invite you to come back to the microphone and give us an update on some of the things that are going on down in the Borough. I know there is a lot going on.

The Commissioners presented Mr. Stonehill with a check.

Mr. Stonehill: I appreciate the opportunity to come before you this morning and give you a brief update on some of the key issues that are going on in the Borough of Middletown. Thank you very much for this opportunity with the 2005 Arts & Crafts Festival. It is something that the Historical Society in the Borough has been doing since 1976 and it is an important event for the community. On the note of historical events, I don't know if the Commissioners are familiar, but this year is the 250th Anniversary of the Borough of Middletown. Middletown is the oldest community in Dauphin County. As part of our year-long celebration, there is one key date that I wanted to pass onto the Commissioners and that is September 24, 2005. On that date, the Borough will be having a parade in commemoration of the 250th Anniversary, at 10:00 a.m. If there is any interest please contact my office. I think there were letters that went out to elected officials throughout the State. We would love to have you participate in the parade.

Other things that are going on and I will keep it brief. I know that Commissioner DiFrancesco is familiar with this situation with the Elks Theatre. This is obviously a very important project in the Borough. Our Greater Middletown Economic Development Corporation has stepped forward with the desire to acquire the Elks Theatre and preserve it as a community movie theatre and also as a performing arts center. Any one who is familiar with Middletown knows the significance of the Elks Theatre to our downtown and to our community as a whole. We are very appreciative for the actions of the County Commissioners in supporting the acquisition. I know that there was a grant that was awarded last week, which was quite generous and is helping us move forward in that project, both the GMEDC and the Borough Council support the work down there to preserve that very important landmark for the Borough of Middletown.

The second issue that I would like to bring to your attention and I know there has been some discussion is the issue of regionalization of waste water treatment. This is an ongoing discussion in the greater Middletown area. It affects Lower Swatara, Harrisburg International Airport, Middletown, Londonderry and Royalton. There has been a lot of dialogue back and forth about the best way to address the current situation with respect to waste water, as well as any potential future projects that need to be done. I know that we all want to make sure that the communities have all their needs addressed. I know there is a lot of development potentials in the greater Middletown area and waste water, although it is not always the most interesting subject, is key to making sure that the economic revitalization of the Route 230 corridor continues. That is something that I know is very important to the Commissioners. We appreciate all your interest and participation in trying to bring those subjects to resolution.

I wanted to bring a subject to your attention which you might have read about recently in the newspaper. A number of the local communities in Dauphin County have been joining the West Shore Council of Governments. This is an interesting development and I know that we all support in general regionalization as long as we continue our autonomy. The Council of Governments is a interesting balance between those two things. There was at one point I know a Dauphin County Council of Governments, which did exist for a while. The reason that most of us are joining the West Shore Council of Governments is first because they have opened up their membership to Dauphin County communities and secondly because they are going to provide certain services to our local governments, which are very necessary and would be very expensive for us to provide on our own. Specifically, because of the new Uniformed Construction Code each one of our municipalities must maintain a Code Hearing Board. That is a Board to hear appeals of code decisions. The UCC makes the requirements of that Code Hearing Board a little more cumbersome than existed beforehand. It is much more logical to do it as a group than to do it individually. Currently, the West Shore Council of Governments provides Code Hearing Board services for all of its member communities. There will be one Code Hearing Board for every member community of the West Shore Council of Governments. The second thing as you know there has been a Lower Dauphin cable TV cooperative that we used to maintain our relationship with Comcast and other telecommunications providers. That service is also provided by the Council of Governments. The more communities that participate the lower the cost associated with our interaction with the telecommunications industry is. It makes logical sense to use the West Shore or some council of governments. One thing that we are hoping is that the name West Shore Council of Governments can be amended, because obviously now that it is no longer just an entity of the West Shore, but something of the entire region.

Mr. Hartwick: I am sure that is something the County Commissioners in Cumberland County will oppose.

Mr. Haste: That probably would be a good thing, because Nick and I spoke when I saw the governments were joining the West Shore COG. The West Shore COG doesn't have a great reputation. They are sort of known as the renegades and even though this is a good step towards regionalism, they have not been known for supporting regionalism in the past. So, maybe with our municipalities joining them some saneness will be brought to that Board.

Mr. Stonehill: We will have representation on the Board of Directors. You're right, that may change some of the policies and decisions.

Mr. Haste: And a name change may help, because when you say the West Shore COG most folks in county and state government don't get a warm and fuzzy feeling.

Mr. Stonehill: This may be an opportunity for change.

Mr. Hartwick: I'm all for regionalization. I think the way the Cumberland County Commissioners will support that is as long as you move to the West Shore and as long as you keep the name West Shore, I'm sure they will be supportive as well.

Mr. Stonehill: I hope this is a good opportunity for some positive changes.

Finally, the last project that I want to bring to your attention is that Middletown Borough is going to open soon a new youth center at our main street gym facility. I think a lot of our communities in Dauphin County have these kind of youth facilities. I know that it is very important for us to concentrate on the needs of the youth in our communities and we are certainly making a financial commitment to that effort and we want to commend the County Commissioners for their support.

Mr. Hartwick: Is that the one that Barbara Layne is still involved with?

Mr. Stonehill: It is the one that Barbara is involved with. She has graciously accepted the change of the name of the center from the Barbara Layne Youth Center to the Youth Center at the Main Street Gym, because it is a community effort and she didn't feel it was appropriate that her name alone be on it.

Mr. Hartwick: Are you working still with the Boys and Girls Club to come in and work programming?

Mr. Stonehill: We are talking to the Boys and Girls Club. We do not have a formal agreement with them yet. The Middletown Area School District is actually the operator of the youth center at the moment. It is through the Communities That Care Program, which is managed by the Middletown School District. I think that the eventual goal would be to have the Boys and Girls Club involved in the long term maintenance of that facility. Although that has not been resolved.

Mr. Hartwick: I am on the Board of the Boys and Girls Club and that has been something that we have been working on about the last two or three years.

Mr. Stonehill: It has been a slow process, but starting these youth programs does take time to bring them to fruition. I think their goal is to actually open their doors to coincide with the school year.

Mr. Hartwick: So, the Communities That Care representative would be the contact person.

Mr. Stonehill: It is Dr. Richard Weinstein at the Middletown Area School District. Dr. Weinstein is the chair of the Communities That Care Committee and also the chair of the Youth Center.

Are there any questions?

Mr. Haste: You will see at times that I had recused myself from the Middletown Elks Building situation and I think you understand why. Having been a member there since 1982 and an Exalted Ruler in 1989, I am sort of on the other side of that issue at times. Not in a bad way, just in the down side of us losing that building.

Mr. Stonehill: I think in the end this is a very positive development that has occurred and I certainly know that personally being a resident of Middletown Borough, I want to see that facility maintained and whatever is done to do that is the most important thing.

Mr. DiFrancesco: Have we received the official notification on the anchor grant?

Mr. Stonehill: We have not, only unofficially we have been told that it is a very positive reaction from the Department of Community & Economic Development.

Mr. DiFrancesco: I was told that the letter already went out, but I guess it has not.

Mr. Stonehill: That's possible, it may be in-between. I think that is probably going to happen, but it is not nearly the end of it. There are many more grants that will have to be applied for. Your continued support on any of those grant applications would be welcomed.

Mr. DiFrancesco: Just an update. We did have a meeting Monday evening to talk about some of the sewer issues, sort of as a preliminary meeting. The real intent and purpose of the meeting was to pull all the parties involved into one room and say can we or can we not get along. Can we or can we not move forward as a region without any binding issues. It was just a matter of simply asking if we can work in the same room together. It was a positive meeting and I do believe that each of the communities will elect to move forward with further discussions. But, what came out of that was probably a $30 million potential project. It is a combination of the Middletown Sewer Plant showing its age. The Chesapeake Bay standards are really being tightened up, which made it a lot more severe and it is going to create a very expensive problem to that area. It is something to get on the radar screen and for us all to start thinking about ways we may be able to help out if the regional effort does develop.

Mr. Stonehill: On that note, the challenges are great, but the opportunities are excellent as well and we know that there is a tremendous amount of economic development in that area. I think, yes, very large numbers in terms of making sure the waste water works correctly. But, when compared to the amount of economic development that is potentially there, it makes sense.

1. Jim Zugay, Recorder of Deeds
   1. Discussion of software selection for the Automation Imaging Project

Mr. Zugay: It is my pleasure to have the opportunity to speak with you this morning. As you know when I took over the Office of Recorder of Deeds it was important for us to become more technologically savvy. One of my commitments with my staff was to select a new automated imaging project and a group that can get that done. Just to give you a little bit of history. The Dauphin County Recorder of Deeds Office does approximately 60,000 to 70,000 documents a year. The way that we process those documents, they include mortgages, deeds and other items, currently and have for several years is that we receive that document, we physically hand stamp it with a machine and then it gets photocopied and placed in a book and then that book is microfilmed. What we would like to do in the future and many counties surrounding us have done that, is we now take that document and rather than photocopying it we scan it and it becomes available. We get to save it on a hard disc and we can put it on the internet and provide more services for our County.

I am pleased to announce that we have done an exhaustive search for the past year and a half, my staff and myself, along with two other organizations that I would like to recognize in Dauphin County. One being our Dauphin County IT department, which I work hand-in-hand with, Greg Bush and Tom Guenther, as well as our Community and Economic Development team, with Dan Robinson and Skip Memmi. We have been able to select a system in which we think is the best system out there. There are several. We have demonstrated several and we have gone to visit their sites. We have gone to see where they are working in other counties. We selected the best system, the most price comparable system and the system that is the best system for Dauphin County.

Let me explain why that system is the best for Dauphin County. One of the things that I have always said is as a row officer I believe all row officers are the fourth commissioner. We are here to promote Dauphin County and make Dauphin County look good, as well as you. One of the things when I looked at all the systems I said "what can you do for Dauphin County". The system that we selected through our office is one that has a commitment to Dauphin County. They are based in Castleberry, Florida; which is near Orlando. It has committed to moving its business here, in other words putting a satellite office in Dauphin County. If we selected them, they said that they would put an office in Dauphin County. This is where Dauphin County Economic Development comes in. I have toured the Veterans Building with this group and they have committed that they would sign a three-year lease, at the minimum, to put space in our Dauphin County Veterans Building and generate tax revenue and revenue for the Dauphin County Industrial Development Authority.

Since 1979 I am sure you have seen many times the red record books that are in my Office. Back in 1979, the Recorder had a great idea. Let's consolidate all the records that we receive, mortgages, deeds, miscellaneous documents, and call them records. Since 1979, we started Record Book #1 and put every document in the Record Book rather than separate deed books, separate mortgage books and separate miscellaneous books. From that date in 1979 to the present, we have approximately 4 million images or 4 million pages, one side pages. We need to take those pages and convert them so they are available so when someone comes in to do a search they have those documents available and they don't have to switch back from an electronic system to a system of looking in the books for the paper. This company has selected as a subcontractor a local Dauphin County business to do that. Not only are they a quality business, they provided a very low cost to get in and do some Dauphin County work. We are pleased to announce that Aptitude Solution from Castleberry, Florida has been the group that we agreed to enter into contract negotiations. We, when I say "we" it is the IT department and myself, issued a 100-page RFP out on this project. We received four responses regarding that and this Aptitude Solution still came out on top. I would note as one of the most important things to you, no general fund dollars will be used for the selection of this process. Neither will scanning all those 4 million documents or the selection of the software or we hope the annual maintenance cost of this software.

Mr. Haste: When will we have the contract ready to move forward?

Mr. Zugay: We have a contract right now that has been submitted through the RFP. It is a general contract. Mr. Guenther has selected that and put it on so it is in paper form now. I am going to look over that in more detail, the contract itself, and work with the Solicitor's Office to hammer that out. Obviously make the RFP part of the contract so all the promises that they made in the RFP, including the promise of putting an office in the Dauphin County Veterans Building are realized. I certainly look forward, hopefully by the end of the year, to standing there with all three of you with a ribbon and a scissors to open up that office.

Mr. Haste: When do you think the system will be up and be automated? What is your timeframe?

Mr. Zugay: By the end of the year.

Mr. Haste: This year?

Mr. Zugay: Yes.

Shortly thereafter, the following question should be where are we then with online, for the Internet. The first stage would be getting this stuff ready for the Dauphin County Recorder of Deeds Office. We anticipate a short term after this gets up and running so we can get it online. Several groups out there, when they put documents online, want to take a piece of the pie. In other words, when you get internet revenue for someone going online they want to take a piece of the pie. This group allows us to do it all and capture all that revenue. We hope for a revenue generator for Dauphin County as well as putting us in the forefront. One of my main concerns was to make the access as easy as possible. My focus was not only to have a system that is very good for searchers, but as I've called it "the regular joe", who at 2:00 in the morning says boy I need a copy of my deed and he or she is able to go to their computer at 2:00 in the morning and be able to navigate a system where they can go on and click a button that says I want a copy of my deed and it walks that person through the system to get a printed copy of that deed. Hopefully this can occur at 2:00 or 4:00 in the morning or at any time.

Mr. Haste: Are you going back a certain number of years for documents that have been filed?

Mr. Zugay: What we are doing is we would have a go live date as they call it. That is the date that we start accepting documents and scanning them. In the meantime, as soon as we sign the contract, it will be the company that I told you, which is called Scan Man. The gentleman with Scan Man is Joe Fagan. He was with the group called File X for several years and has now moved out on his own. File X was not a Dauphin County company. I believe they were on the West Shore. Scan Man is a Lower Paxton Township company. We are getting him to come in and back scan all the documents to 1979. They basically take those documents and scan them and put them into TIF images and then the marrying of those documents to the data that is going to be converted. Coincidentally, in 1979 as I told you we started with Record Book #1, we also started with our Cobalt Based NX View system, the green screen, and that is when all the data in 1979 went electronic. Prior to that it is all just in typed books. We will be able to take the data, starting in 1979, the paper starting in 1979, a great starting point and move 4 million images hopefully by our go live date.

Mr. Hartwick: Do you know the amount of space that the company from Florida is going to require?

Mr. Zugay: There has been some discussion. I think they were actually looking at the space that Buchart Horn had on the 4th Floor, that corner office. I believe that space has been taken, but around that area. I think about 800 to 900 square feet.

Mr. Hartwick: Following this project, which you have done a good job moving forward and I am glad to hear that you are meeting your timelines as I expect you would. How soon thereafter can we concentrate on the joint project between our Tax Assessment Office and your Office as another revenue generating opportunity for the County?

Mr. Zugay: I think this system as we have talked about the parcel identification number, the PIN system I think you are referring to where every document is assigned a PIN as it goes through Tax Assessment. I think it can happen very shortly thereafter. This system is compatible with doing that right off the bat. What we liked about this system was the fact that it has a lot that we are not going to use right away that is free; one being a parcel identification system. So, that field will be there to plug in when we are ready to go with that. The other thing it does and this is boring stuff to you folks, but kind of exciting to me, is electronic recording. So some day, I hope in the future, five to ten years down the line, where mortgage companies and these folks won't be bringing documents into our office, they will be electronically sent from their offices to ours and we will be able to reduce a lot of costs, most likely through attrition in the Recorder of Deeds Office.

Mr. Hartwick: Moving in the right direction. Good job Jim.

Mr. Zugay: We hope so.

Mr. Haste: Thank you and thanks Tom.

1. Robert Christoff, Dauphin County Conservation District Joe Longenecker, Skelly & Loy
   1. Presentation of the Act 167 Stormwater Management Plan for the Paxton Creek Stormwater Mangement Plan

Mr. Christoff: With me today is Joe Longenecker of Skelly & Loy. They were the technical consultants for the plan that we are going to present.

This is the Paxton Creek Stormwater Management Plan. It is very similar to several of the plans that have been presented over the last several weeks. It is done under Act 167. It is a stormwater management plan that provides peak flow management, water quality, infiltration and channel protection standards for the Paxton Creek Watershed. The process of implementing this plan goes through a review through the Watershed Plan Advisory Committee and municipalities, which has already happened. There is a public hearing, which has happened. The next step would be for the Commissioners to adopt the plan, by resolution. After that it would go to DEP for final approval. Once that is approved then it goes to the municipality to implement. We are presenting it today and as I understand it there is no Legislative Meeting next week, it would be two weeks from today. We ask that it be adopted at that meeting.

Mr. Haste: Where are we with our watershed plans? What do we have to do? Are we current?

Mr. Christoff: The County has several watersheds that are contained entirely within the County. Some of our watersheds are multi-county. At this point, after this Plan, we have one more watershed plan that we are working on which actually encompasses four watersheds. That is Beaver, Manada, Bow Creek and Kellock Run, West Hanover, East Hanover, South Hanover and a little bit of Swatara Township and Lower Paxton Township. The remaining area that we would like to move into to plan for would be is sort of a hodgepodge of watersheds. Without getting into all the detail, DEP had broken the County into various watersheds. Some of which is termed direct river drainage and some of which is the Swatara Creek. There are several communities down there where we know there are stormwater problems and they have asked us previously to look into doing one of these plans. What it would encompass are areas like Lower Swatara, Middletown and places like that. As it stands now, there are actually designated watersheds that we would like to get DEP possibly to combine that into one project for us. Beyond that the rest of the watersheds are multi-county and we are not sure if we are going to get multi-county support for doing one of these watershed plans.

Mr. Haste: At the public hearing were there any objections?

Mr. Christoff: No.

Mr. Haste: The municipalities are okay with it?

Mr. Christoff: Yes, we got very good support. In fact, the City of Harrisburg is the one that came to us years ago and asked us to do this. This is actually an update of a previous plan.

Mr. Hartwick: I actually was approached by Joe Link about a grant or potential grant to be submitted to try to resolve a lot of the flooding issues that have occurred around the Farm Show. Could you sort of give me an update on where we are with that, if there has been any formal grant submitted, and how the Commissioners may be able to help in order to secure those resources?

Mr. Christoff: I'm not up on that grant.

Mr. Haste: Who did they make the grant to?

Mr. Hartwick: I think there are plans to make a grant application to DEP.

Mr. Longenecker: There are several grants that were submitted through the Growing Greener Program. Some of which dealt specifically with the Wildwood Lake area. A picture is actually on the cover of the Act 167 Report. It is referred to as the "morning glory outlet". There are actually two outlets that leave Wildwood Lake. One is through the north area and discharges directly into the Susquehanna River and the second actually feeds the lower portion of Paxton Creek and leaves through the morning glory outlet. The concept would be if we can promote an increased amount of water to discharge through the northern outlet directly into the Susquehanna River it would improve the flooding conditions at HACC and the Farm Show Building below the Wildwood Lake Area. That is one grant application that is pending with the Growing Greener Program at this point in time. There are some others that deal with some improvements to Asylum Run. Water from Asylum Run also is contributed to Paxton Creek, right in the vicinity of the Farm Show Complex and that portion of Paxton Creek has very mild grades. There is a major problem with back water and storage of floodwater. The concept on some of those grant applications would relate to providing flood storage above the critical flooding areas and again with the intent of minimizing and improving the flooding conditions at the Farm Show area. We preliminarily ran some rough numbers and accomplishing some of these projects would have significant improvements in terms of shrinking the areas that would be affected by the flooding and improving some of the conditions.

Mr. Hartwick: Joe actually made a good point. There was one flood that caused them to cancel a show, which cost the Farm Show about $250,000 or more. The total amount of the one grant that was submitted is only $250,000. From an economic sense if you could provide or work with Joe to help provide the Commissioners with that information we would certainly write a letter of support and make personal contacts if we can with DEP to help secure those resources.

Mr. Haste: Any other questions? (There were none.) We will take action at our next meeting.

1. Sandy Moore, Director of Human Services
   1. Needs Based Program

Ms. Moore: Ms. Pintarch is handing out a copy of the presentation that we have. As you know every year Children and Youth is required to submit what is called a "Needs Based Plan and Budget". It includes an implementation year, which is the current year that the County is in and it includes a Needs Based Year, which would start July 1, 2006 and ends June 30, 2007. There are actually two portions that were sent to the County. The first was the Integrated Childrens Services Plan and the second was the Needs Based Plan and Budget. The State wanted those documents integrated and combined. Most counties have refused to do that and sent them in separately. Our County was one of those counties that opted not to do that. We sent in a notice to the State letting them know that our Integrated Childrens Plan would be coming four weeks later, which was an option. We could request that of the State. I have to say that there has been correspondence going back and forth through the Administrator. Some counties have been denied their request to do that. Dauphin County Commissioners, as a Board, took a stance that you weren't asking for it, you were just letting the State know that you were going to be doing it. We got approval for that. I will be coming back in several weeks to talk about the Integrated Childrens Service Plan. We do have a little bit of information about that in this presentation.

Provision for human services, which is the Children and Youth Plan, the Mental Health Plan, Drug and Alcohol Plan, all of them are supposed to eventually link to a vision that you all approved last year. Some of the components that were blended into our Needs Based Plan and Budget are our System of Care Initiative that is the Federal five-year grant that we have, obviously Family Group Conferencing, our Family Service System Reform Grant. We are really focusing on once again outcome driven, both internally through our Agency, and providers. We are really looking at increasing family involvement so that families take more ownership of the solutions rather than the agency doing that and then connecting that also to the vision. Some of the planning partners include the Commissioners and the Juvenile Court Judges played a significant role this year as the Governor's budget was being proposed.

The Needs Based Plan is the connection of what we want to do programmatically in Children and Youth; which includes all of Children and Youth Services and placement, prevention and intervention services with Juvenile Probation with our fiscal outline. It is the request that we are making to the State for the money to do that. It includes those two years and it really connects what services the County is delivering to the federal and state mandates that have been audited. There is a timeline that shows when the plan has to be signed by the Commissioners and delivered to the Department of Public Welfare, which is August 15, 2005. One of the things that we are required to do in our Plan is identify what federal outcomes we are focusing on. We have done our own data primarily internally this year and identified what different outcomes the federal government says that we feel we could make some positive changes in. For Dauphin County we have identified stability in care, meaning children coming into care will have less than two placements while in care, re-entries meaning children who get reunified successfully with their families don't come back into care within 12 months and then adoption. The goal there is for children coming into our system, yet they cannot successfully and safely be reunited with their birth families that we find a more permanent place for them within 24 months of them coming into care. The most permanent place is adoption. The systemic factors are the same as they were last year. When the Feds come in and look at a County they look at how you are meeting all these different areas. I do want to focus in a little bit on licensing. They look at how we license foster care, our adoptive homes, and our kinship care. We just went through our State licensing for the Agency this past week. They pulled 30 of our resource kinship foster care home records and found zero sites in them, meaning 100% of what they saw was approved, which is really good. Where do we get our information for our Needs Based Plan - there is some information that comes from the State. Although our information is that the organization that the State contract is with is no longer being contracted with by the State. The information that we got from them was not very helpful. So, fortunately in Dauphin County we have a pretty comprehensive computer system and data base system and we used a majority of the data from our own systems. We have a variety of different groups, including our Citizens Advisory Board, our Juvenile Court Judges, hearing officers and meetings that we have, obviously with County Commissioners, to gather information throughout the year that goes into this Plan.

Some statistics for Pennsylvania, in 2003, we had 556 reports of suspected abuse/neglect. One hundred eight of them were substantiated. We had, according to the State figures, 6 substantiated re-abuse cases, meaning children came into our system and after they were in our system they were re-abused. Fortunately it is a small number so we could go back and look at each of the cases and what we found is how the State counts re-abuse is not how you or I would probably think of re-abuse. What happens in all of these cases, children came in under one type of abuse and when they were safe and in a caring home they disclosed additional abuses. So they may have come in for physical abuse, when they were with a kinship provider or foster home they then disclosed sexual abuse. That would have been renumbered and on the State numbers look like they were re-abused. All six of those cases were those incidences. We really see ourselves as having no re-abuse.

We look at many numbers when deciding what kind of services we are going to be providing. The first number in all of this is Dauphin County's statistics. The number in parenthesis is what the Federal statistics need to look like. So 0% of our children had a re-abuse. The Federal government says that it can't be higher than 6.1% so clearly we are well within that guideline. 17.54% of Children & Youth and almost 44.99% of Juvenile Probation children are re-entering care within 12 months. The Federal government says that shouldn't be higher than 8.6%. We believe that includes Schaffner Detention Center numbers. Children get placed at Schaffner are released within 48 hours, if they get replaced that is considered a re-entry. It is a good thing that they are being released by the Court so they are not sitting out at Schaffner, but if they get a placement that counts into our numbers. The same thing applies with shelter care. For children in care for less than 12 months and have less than two placements, the higher the number the better. That number has been going up for Dauphin County. We have almost 83% of our children, when they come into placement, have less than two placements and a little over 83% for Juvenile Probation. We are moving in the right direction. Almost 92% of Juvenile Probation children were reunified within 12 months. That is a very high number. Again, we think some of that is probably Schaffner related. What we see really happening in these numbers is our children are being reunified, but then some of them are coming back into care and we have to digest that and figure out why that is happening. Last year what we saw in our numbers was that it was primarily teenage females who were coming back into care. When we think about that we think teenage-hood is a challenging time any way, throw the complexity of being a female into that and these girls go away to placement and do well in placement, but then to come back home to some of the same situations and struggle with that, so they go back into placement. We are trying to put some additional services in for females. Then all the institution placements under 12 are Juvenile Probation kids. When they get to Juvenile Probation and are under 12 they have committed some pretty serious crimes.

What we basically did in our Needs Based Plan, we didn't increase many services. We didn't add on a lot of things, because not knowing what the State budget would look like, having had the experience that we had this year and what happened to our budget, we thought now is not the time to be increasing significant services. We basically are saying to the State that we are going to continue doing what we are already doing. We are not going to do new programs. We tell them that we are going to continue implementing family group conferencing. We are trying to look at expanding into some of our school programs and obviously into the faith based community. We are going to continue with our system of care grant, continue trying to shift the number of children who are in right now provider foster homes and County licensed foster homes and resource homes and then continue implementing medical assistance; whatever medical assistance realignment looks like. The rules are continually changing on that. It says to the State that we are telling them that we have four vacancies. We have more than four vacancies, but we consider what is happening here at the local level turnover. When we have vacancies here in our caseworkers, we say it is turnover. We have money in our plan for these, but we haven't ask you to create these positions. Every year we sort of leave them in our Needs Based Plan so if half way through the year we discover we need some other kind of position, we don't have to go back to the State and ask them for money. We can change these, by just a letter being submitted to them and the Commissioners approving a different kind of position.

In 2005/2006, we did ask for additional caseworkers, a supervisor and a case aide specific to the decrease that we had in our family preservation and family reunification contract with Keystone. I know we talked about that when we went before you for the County budget.

Mr. Haste: These are positions that you are just going to put on the books, but you really aren't going to ask us to approve.

Ms. Moore: No, we already asked you to approve them and you already said okay in the County budget.

The unbalances for 2006/2007 is TANF again and MA realignment. What that is going to end up looking like—we just aren't getting good answers. In 2006/2007 what we are telling the State that we are going to do is work very hard to get parents and families more involved in the decisions that are being made, increase our use of kinship care, increase our foster care recruitment, specifically for those 16 and 17 year-old kids who are aging out of the system, increase our use of informal support, specifically working the faith community and doing mentorship and resource families and then increase resource family use, continue family group conferencing, continue our system of care, increase the use of SWAN services, which are the Statewide adoption network and then really focus on outcome evaluation and assessment, not only of ourselves but of our provider agency.

What I did not give you prior was the budget summary page. The first column talks about what our actual figures were for this past year, second is what the budget numbers are for this year that we were given by the State and the third is what we are building into our Needs Based Plan and Budget for 2006/07. When Sandy Pintarch creates the budget we try to make sure that we are pulling down as many State and Federal funds as possible to offset our County match. You can see our Act 148 request goes up and our Federal request goes up. Concerning the Federal request is TANF again. If you notice there are two line items for TANF and one is the transition fund. That goes from a little over $1 million to $720,000 and then the actual TANF line item stays the same. The problem with that is the program that we were given to do our Needs Based Plan Budget automatically populates that number. What we are basically being told by the State is those are the numbers you are going to get next year. I am a little apprehensive on whether or not those are the numbers that we are going to get, but at least that is what their State program is demonstrating. In our in-home line, we built in an increase for family group conferencing, our system of care expansion, picking up the family service system reform grant, which we are being told will no longer be available to counties, increasing adoption assistance, because we anticipate moving more children to adoption and a request in our administrative line item for money to help us with the continuum of care concept, if the Commissioners choose to pursue that $100,000 line item for 2006/07. In our community based programs, we increased group homes for dependent and delinquent youth, which is a positive move. We are going from institutions, which are more restrictive, to group home usage, in both agencies. There is an increase in shelter care cost considering the change for Schaffner bed space from detention to shelter. An increase in our kinship care and our independent living program and then in institutions we show a decrease use of detention, again because of the bed conversion to shelter and a stabilization; hopefully and eventually a decrease in the use of institutions.

The other thing that I probably should say is that county administrators are working on developing disclaimer language to go on the signature page of our Needs Based Plan and Budget this year. If the county sort of commits to here's the county match that we are willing to look at, we want to put a disclaimer in that so that if the Federal dollars shift significantly requiring a higher county match we have a way of saying we didn't commit to that higher County match. There are attorneys through CCAP that are working on that language.

Mr. Haste: So if I read this correctly, this $6.9 million is what you anticipate you are going to ask from the County as the County's commitment next year?

Ms. Pintarch: It is $7.7 million and the County's budget was $7.8 million next year. Our Needs Based Budget does not include any grants.

Mr. Haste: So out of the General Fund next year you are anticipating asking for what?

Ms. Pintarch: $7.7 million.

Ms. Moore: That is this year.

Ms. Pintarch: 2005/06 is that what you are talking about?

Mr. Haste: No, 2006/07.

Ms. Moore: $7.973 million. This year's County budget that was approved was $7.876 million. We are looking at approximately $90,000, if all the funding streams come in the way that the State is telling us they are going to come in. We are keeping a very close eye on what kind of placements we are using, what kind of services we are approving and really monitoring the decisions being made and working very closely with our Courts.

Mr. Hartwick: I was approached yesterday by an individual who is trying to represent supposedly three companies coming together to really start to re-engage the three counties in this continuum of care concept again. Evidently there is a partnership being formed between Abraxas, Northwestern and ARC. I heard this for the first time yesterday and they are trying to submit a proposal. You look as surprised as I was.

Ms. Moore: I'm hearing this for the first time right now.

Mr. Hartwick: Has there been any talk between the three counties where we are at in the process? I know we ran into some hurdles.

Ms. Moore: The last conversation that we had amongst the three counties actually with the four different providers who were interested were that the providers were not ready to move forward. With medical assistance realignment, the providers were not sure how that was going to impact their overall ability to do a continuum of care and how that would be funded. So, we were sort of waiting for the providers to get back together. It sounds like they have come together collectively and are going to be approaching us again. You do know that Lancaster County has some reservations about being involved in that at this point? So, we need to do some work with Lancaster.

Mr. Hartwick: That is because of the aggressive stance one of the providers took with one of the Commissioners and then they were turned off.

Ms. Moore: They were very turned off.

We did build $100,000 into our administrative request for 2006/2007 from the State to explore and have someone oversee the continuum of care, if that is a direction that you want us to continue looking at. I think quite honestly we need to know more about medical assistance realignment and we still don't have a bulletin that explains such.

Are there any questions? (There were none.)

PERSONNEL

Ms. Sinner: The first item in the Personnel Packet is the Salary Board requests. It is my original and an Addendum. Children and Youth is creating a temporary family program specialist I. This person will be in training to replace Kari Smith, who is resigning in December. When Kari resigns then the position will be eliminated and the person will move into that position. The Public Defender's Office is creating a full time assistant public defender.

Mr. Hartwick: Why do we need to create another full-time assistant public defender?

Ms. Sinner: I'm not sure.

Mr. Hartwick: Chad, do you have any information on that?

Mr. Saylor: No and in fact I thought he told me he had some vacancies.

Mr. Haste: He does.

Mr. Hartwick: I don't know why we need to create another position. I would pull that one from today's agenda.

Mr. DiFrancesco: That would have to be justified.

Mr. Hartwick: I didn't even sign off on that so I don't know where that is coming from.

Mr. Haste: Chances are he is confusing, he may be trying to fill a vacancy.

Ms. Sinner: That might be.

Mr. Haste: He does have vacancies.

Mr. Hartwick: I think he has three at least.

Ms. Sinner: I will check with him and if it is a vacancy put that through as an Addendum on August 3rd.

Mr. Saylor: It appears that he is seeking to create a new position citing caseload.

Mr. Haste: He needs to fill the ones that he has first.

Ms. Sinner: I just remembered, I do have an explanation from him. (Mr. Hartwick looked at the explanation.)

Mr. Hartwick: I would pull that from the agenda.

Ms. Sinner: The third Salary Board request is from Spring Creek. They are eliminating a housekeeping aide and creating two part-time custodians. These people will work a couple evenings a week and second shift on weekends.

In the Personnel Packet, there are several vacancies being requested to be filled. There is a part-time law clerk in the District Attorney's Office. EMA is requesting to fill their assistant manager of EMA training and an assistant manager of quality assurance. The Public Defender is requesting permission to fill their investigator vacancy. Spring Creek has several vacancies that they are requesting to fill. These are positions that when they laid people off because of seniority bumping rights some people then are moving into these other positions that have become vacant.

There are several new hires and personnel changes. The bulk of them are the Spring Creek transfers. I have the separations listed and I provided a list of items that need voted on today. I also have an Addendum which lists some vacancies. There is vacancy for a casework supervisor in Children and Youth and a PBX Operator for Spring Creek. That again is one of the positions that someone got bumped out of. The Personnel Change in the Addendum is a promotion of a Children and Youth casework supervisor to case manager.

The other items in the Packet are overtime reports and a request for an employee in the Register of Wills to participate in the educational incentive program. Do you have any questions?

Mr. DiFrancesco: So, again the votes that we are asking for today are just the Spring Creek transactions?

Ms. Sinner: I have them on a sheet.

Mr. Haste: There is one for Human Services also.

Mr. DiFrancesco: I thought they were all the Spring Creek transactions.

Mr. Haste: There is a casework supervisor in the middle.

Ms. Sinner: That is effective August 1, 2005. In the Separations, there is also a Human Services employee that was furloughed so I included her. In the vacancies, it is Items #5, 6, 7, and 8 and in the Addendum Item #2. In the Personnel Changes, they are Items #17 through #28 and in the Addendum it should be Item #3. It needs corrected from #2 to #3. The Employee Separations it is Items #39 through #60.

It was moved by Mr. Hartwick and seconded by Mr. DiFrancesco that the Board approve the following; motion carried.

1. Request to Post/Fill Vacancies - July 20, 2005
   1. Items #5, 6, 7, and 8 (Spring Creek vacancies)
2. Request to Post/Fill Vacancies - July 20, 2005 Addendum
   1. Item #2 (Spring Creek PBX Operator)
3. Personnel Changes - July 20, 2005
   1. Items #17 through and including #28 (Most transactions have an effective date of 7/18/05. One has an effective date of 8/1/05, which is before the next Legislative Meeting. All are Spring Creek employees. One employee is transferring from Spring Creek to Security - Roberto Dones)
4. Personnel Changes - July 20, 2005 Addendum
   1. Promotion of Jenna Shickley from Casework Supervisor to Case Manager 1. Please amend this Item number from 2 to 3. Her promotion is effective 8/1/05, which is before the next Legislative Meeting.
5. Employee Separations - July 20, 2005
   1. Requesting approval of one Human Services employee furlough, 20 Spring creek employee furloughs, and one Spring Creek rescission of job offer due to the layoffs. Please note - effective date of #57 should be changed from 7/17/05 to 7/18/05. Donella Forney worked July 18, 2005 in another department before deciding to accept the furlough and severance agreement. Requesting approval of Items #39 through and including #60.

DIRECTORS/GUESTS (continued)

1. Barry Wyrick, Administrator of MH/MR and Dan Eisenhower
   1. Discuss the expansion of Community Services for the closure of the State Hospital

Mr. Wyrick: It is at this time that we find ourselves moving from a process of planning for the closure of the State Hospital from the theoretical planning into the very concrete services. We are actually beginning the process of engaging providers to provide services, which we would then be recommending the move to contracting with those providers.

Mr. Hartwick: This was an informational session for the other two Commissioners. Chad, you will be able to provide a summary of the comments.

Mr. Saylor: Yes.

Mr. Wyrick: This is also another one of the difficult hurdles that we face in this process, because as we identify provider organizations those provider organizations will be looking to site treatment locations in the community. One of the things that we know about citing treatment locations is that we can expect/anticipate community reaction to that. It is one of the things that we knew going into this process would be an issue for us. What we are looking to find is facilities and site locations that best meet the needs of the program, address the concerns of the community and successfully allow individuals who have a serious mental illness to live successfully and comfortably in the community.

In planning for the closure of the Hospital, the movement of the individuals into the community, the expansion of the infrastructure, the Board of Commissioners previously approved our State budget submission and that included eight residential programs that are listed. I will not go through reading those.

Mr. Hartwick: I know Sandy and I discussed this, just briefly, could you go through quickly what each one of these is?

Mr. Wyrick: The Forensic Community Residential Rehabilitation Program is a 24 hour a day, 7 days a week staff supervised living arrangement that has a specialty in the treatment and rehabilitation of individuals who have a history of criminal involvement or arrest and incarceration.

The Long Term Structured Residential Program is also 24 hours a day, 7 days a week supervised secure facility in the community. All of the treatment programming for the individuals in the LTSR are provided for within the facility, as opposed to in a Community Residential Rehab Program where those individuals may be involved in treatment programming at other locations throughout the community, outpatient services, day programs, vocational training and those other things. In the Long Term Structured Residential Program all of the treatment services are provided within the actual residential facility.

The Crisis Diversion Residential Program is staffed like a CRR except that it has a difference in the length of anticipated stay. There are two beds where we have an anticipated length of stay of five days and that really is to address individuals that are in crisis. We are able to stabilize them and move them back into other living arrangements. The diversion beds are a 45-day anticipated length of stay. That might be an individual where we have some uncertainty about the person's residential status. They are in a community hospital and we move them into this diversion program that gives us 45 days to plan and get the person to another type of arrangement, but we are able to move the person out of a community hospital bed.

The Maximum Care Community Residential Rehabilitation Program is again the 24 hour supervised staff setting, but that is just for the general population of individuals with serious mental illness. Again, those individuals in that program may be participating in a variety of other services in the community throughout the day and week.

The Specialized Mental Health Community Residence licensed as a personal care home. It meets all the licensure requirements of a personal care home, including the nursing requirements, medical requirements in a personal care home, but adds into that a specialty in mental health treatment as well. We actually have one operating right now in our County. They operate from mental health agencies as opposed to other types of arrangements with personal care homes. So, these are mental health provider organizations that operate these homes. These facilities are actually for individuals who have more complicated medical needs that would interfere with their ability to live independently.

The Specialized Traumatic Brain Injury Community Residence is specialized for individuals. We initially thought three, but we now believe it is going to be five individuals at the Harrisburg State Hospital who have traumatic brain injury that will be moving into this specialized arrangement.

The Integrated Recovery Residential Program is a model program. Again, it is a 24 hour a day supervised facility, but it has a very specialized recovery based program as a part of that. We currently have an individual from Dauphin County participating in that program in another county. We would like to replicate that program in our County.

Mr. Hartwick: When you say recovery, do you mean drug and alcohol?

Mr. Wyrick: The recovery principles, recovery movement talks about the ability of individuals with serious mental illness to fully recover from that illness and then fully participate in the community.

Finally, is the Mental Health-Drug and Alcohol Specialized Community Residential Rehabilitation Program. That is a dual mental health and drug and alcohol, in terms of the focus of the treatment. We have one of those programs currently in operation that we would like to replicate that and have another program.

Mr. Hartwick: You talked about community concern and reaction as we may move into other municipalities. I hope we are instructing that any of these providers consider Spring Creek as a potential location for locating these facilities with space available and it appears that it may be a facility that would be able to handle a lot of these specific needs and probably would have a whole lot less of an effect from the community standpoint on moving these locations into there. It also helps us by trying to fill up the location and the vacancies left by downsizing the facility. Have we been doing that?

Mr. Wyrick: We have been looking at the licensure requirements to see whether we are allowed to do that.

Mr. DiFrancesco: The other consideration is that we have to make very certain that in fact there was not a conflict of issues between the two facilities. I really would want to take a good solid look at that before we move in that direction just to make sure I know what types of individuals are going into that facility.

Mr. Hartwick: As I think about mitigating community concerns that is obviously one that would assist us to make sure that we don't deal with "not my backyard" stuff if it is located at Spring Creek.

Mr. Haste: How many of these eight that you have listed here exist now? How many are new?

Mr. Wyrick: These eight are all new. We have programs like them.

Mr. Haste: The spin-off of what the State is doing is they are putting the burden on us to go, I won't say disrupt, irritate communities with placing new facilities within those communities. I assume that in all these cases there is a zoning issue or some issue with the local municipality that we are going to have to be dealing with.

Mr. Wyrick: There likely will be issues with local municipalities, yes.

Mr. Haste: If I sit here and say that I'm not going to support any of that I am going to take the side of the local community, what does that do?

Mr. Wyrick: It makes locating these facilities much more difficult.

Mr. Haste: Because quite frankly that is probably where I am. I do not want to force something on a community. The State has put us in another very awkward position. I am not going to be the one who is going to carry the State's water and force something on the community. I think that is another bad spin-off of this bad decision by the State.

Mr. DiFrancesco: Again to echo that, this Board raised that as an issue when this whole discussion started way back when that the time would come when these homes would go into these local communities and granted every time they do that it creates a stir and we have to go through the zoning meetings to make sure every thing lines up.

Mr. Haste: If it is a community that wants to accept this, I'm not saying no to the community. But, if there is a issue with the community and the provider asks us for a letter of support, this is one Commissioner that will not sign that letter of support if, in fact, the community is opposed to it. I would hope that it is done in a way that the community understands it. Quite frankly, if it was in my community I would be open-minded about it. I'm not trying to push any panic button, but I am also thinking this is a cheap way for the State to get out of a problem and pass the buck again to the County to carry their water in what shouldn't be, but in often times is an unpleasant situation. I'm not carrying the State's water.

Mr. Hartwick: One other thing that I would say is that it is the provider's responsibility to gain the appropriate zoning and to obviously work with the local municipality. It is not the County's responsibility. I would agree with the Board members that is quite frankly why I had Barry come today, because as a result of starting to talk about some of these folks who are going to be moving into different locations the first reaction of some of the local municipalities are "this is not happening here" or "how dare you actually consider this site in a residential neighborhood". That is probably what we are going to hear from other municipal leaders around the County who share some of the concerns about where some of these places are going to be located. That is why I started out today mentioning Spring Creek as an obvious place where we are not going to deal with those major municipal concerns and it may be an easier transition. If we are talking about locating them in the municipalities, particularly when you talk about forensic beds for people with criminal history, folks are probably going to go "wow, that is going to be next to my kids" or "do you want that next to your children". How secure is that facility going to be? There are going to be a lot of questions from a local government standpoint that are going to be challenging to overcome for leaders and for the providers who, in fact, are going to try to locate those facilities in those locations. I wanted to bring this to the Board's attention and allow you to receive feedback early before these sites were selected and we are going to hear it on the back end.

Mr. DiFrancesco: One of the other issues that I want to raise, I think I read this in an email, there was a sense that certain communities did not welcome this type of facility or I think more appropriately said "that we have our full share of these facilities" were being protected, but the mere statement that certain people had voiced their opposition to these types of facilities showing up in their municipal boundaries. I want to make sure from a County's perspective we are not showing any favoritism towards protecting some jurisdictions to others. I know that there are certain community leaders who have been very vocal about not wanting to have more of these facilities in their area. This is open game. Basically bottom line is every community is open. We have to work with these communities through this challenging period of time. Nobody has any more favorable standing in terms of we won't put it there because this person is going to have a problem with it or not.

Mr. Hartwick: If I can just respond to that a little bit, I don't think the community should receive more favorable standing, but traditionally these facilities have been located in the City of Harrisburg, just because it happens to be the urban areas. The Mayor has made his position very clear with me and other folks that the City will not be the ground where all of these facilities are placed. Traditionally in the past the City has been the place where a majority of these sites have gone and I think the concern is that we don't want these things in residential communities, number one, and we have residential areas, particularly the forensic thing, in areas and the City won't be the only place that is considered through the process. He is probably echoing your comments from a different perspective.

Mr. DiFrancesco: Right.

Mr. Hartwick: Don't consider just the City as you try to place these locations and make sure the entire County is being considered in that process.

Mr. DiFrancesco: As an example, say a person has an aggressive behavior, fighting, and gets disorderly conduct and the person may have a track record where they go off meds and they do this and then go on meds and everything is fine. Say it is an 18 year-old who is out on their own. Where does a person like that end up in this system? They have actually violated laws.

Mr. Wyrick: Are you talking today or with a plan for expanded services in the community?

Mr. DiFrancesco: Either way. I'm assuming today they end up in the juvenile justice system.

Mr. Haste: If they get arrested.

Mr. Wyrick: Today they don't get any mental health treatment, because they are on a waiting list for it. They end up getting arrested and put in Prison. Most often they just don't get any mental health treatment and they continue to ride along doing whatever they are doing in the community.

Mr. DiFrancesco: So, now under the new system?

Mr. Wyrick: Under the new system the waiting list for services will be much, much smaller. When we identify a need, rather than saying I'm able to get you into treatment within three months, we can say that we can get you into treatment within 3 days. Maybe we have an opportunity to reach that young person. No promises, because that person needs to make the decision whether they want to get better or not. We would be better equipped to serve them than we are today.

Mr. DiFrancesco: I guess the point of that in my mind, what I'm trying to get at, is that person is already living in the community. They are already affecting their neighbors through their actions.

Mr. Wyrick: Yes.

Mr. Haste: But, we are going to take them out of that community and give them to a new community. "Heh guess what, we have a present for you!"

Mr. DiFrancesco: The bottom line of a public policy is always who's right and who deserves the greater consideration. I think far too often the trend has been not just in this particular discussion, but in a lot of ways America has made that one individual's rights more important than the rights of everyone surrounding that individual. That is what I'm trying to balance right now and that is to try to get a real good feel about what we are talking about and not blow it bigger than it has to be and not make it more dramatic than it has to be, but truly understand what it is that we are dealing with so that when we go out and do that public presentation, when those local officials pick up the phone and say "what are you doing to us", we can respond with good solid information. They still may disagree at the end of the day. They may not want this in their community. The neighbors may never get comfortable with it, but at least we have their respect and we have the responsibility and burden on us to help them understand exactly what this issue is so it doesn't become more dramatic than it has to be. I definitely agree with the Chairman I would love to see the municipal meeting where the Secretary of Public Welfare shows up and tries to convince them. Quite honestly, I am a little bit skeptical that the high level policy makers really truly take the time to look at the practical side of their philosophies and say how is this truly going to impact the community. I would be more apt to say, "this is what we are doing so deal with it" and that is a sad statement because those high end policy makers need to understand what is happening at the local level and what they are doing to these other communities. Basically, whose rights, I don't want to say they are necessarily stepping on, but they may be infringing on.

Mr. Hartwick: I think you guys are heading down the right path when you were talking about what happens to this 18 year-old person instead of a three month waiting list you have a three day waiting list. The fact remains that a lot of these people are in the community now. All of them are in the community now. A lot of these folks already have identified issues and there is not the level of care or support for them to be able to stabilize them within the community. The infrastructure just doesn't exist. This is in fact an opportunity to get some of these folks into treatment. The part that really scares me is the forensic part. The philosophy for the other parts is one that I agree with. The problems I see with criminal issues and not being in a secured facility is one that I have to figure out a way to get over and I don't know if I will.

Mr. Haste: Why does it have to be a non-secure? Why can't we make it secure?

Mr. Wyrick: I'm already proposing a secured facility and that is the LTSR, which means that it is available for individuals with a criminal history. That was approved. The State had previously said that there will be no more LTSR in the State, but in spite of that statement they have approved this for the closure. I went back and said that I wanted to add 16 more LTSR beds because that is the only level of care in the community that can be secured. It will be very difficult to justify continuing the incarceration of individuals who do not need to be incarcerated, who present no risk to the community.

Mr. Haste: I don't want to belabor this, but this again comes to the point where, here it is the State telling us how many beds we should have for this type of program when not one of those State people have walked into the Prison, have dealt with any of these people and really know the true numbers. They sit and look at some statistic, only of the people that have been fortunate enough to be caught, and I say that the people that got caught probably don't think it is fortunate, but in many ways it is. They are telling us, the County, to run this program for us, but you know what we are still smarter than you and we are going to make the determination of what you need. That is what is wrong with this system. If they want us to run it, tell them to give us the dollars and programs and we will make that determination. They decided that they know better. That is what is wrong with the system.

Mr. Wyrick: I can come back and present the results of our proposal review, but I really do need to move forward with the organizations that we would be recommending to receive these services. I do need a go ahead to be able to pursue with those organizations these services.

Mr. Haste: I'm proud of the fact that you are an advocate. All I am saying is that I'm not in that same boat. I'm a advocate in a different manner and I support what you are doing. I'm not going to help what I think is a broken system.

Mr. Hartwick: What you are asking of us today is to gain tentative approval for the people that you expect to contract with.

Mr. Wyrick: The provider organizations. Through the review process, we have identified those that we would recommend to the Commissioners that we go forward with a contract for these services. I do need the approval to go ahead with those organizations for these services. That is what the remainder of my presentation is.

Mr. Hartwick: From my perspective we are faced with the closure of the State Hospital. Can you just briefly explain the process that it took for you guys to come to the selection of these individual providers?

Mr. Haste: We don't need that. You did an RFP and you had a Committee that selected those. I am familiar with the process.

Mr. Hartwick: Are we ready to move forward?

Mr. Haste: The floor is open for a motion.

Mr. Hartwick: Do you need a motion in this case?

Mr. Wyrick: By whatever means you can give me the authority to go ahead and proceed with them. If a motion is what is needed to get approval that would be fine.

Mr. Hartwick: This is a motion to start to engage with these providers.

Mr. Wyrick: With these recommended providers to develop these services which we will eventually bring back for a contract to be approved by the Board of Commissioners.

It was moved by Mr. Hartwick and seconded by Mr. DiFrancesco that the Board authorize Barry Wyrick, Director of MH/MR, to proceed with the providers, that were recommended by the Committee, to develop the needed services.

Discussion:

Mr. DiFrancesco: Just for clarity. This has been very confusing because we have come at this from so many different ways. This is the program that was negotiated with the closing. What we have been talking about all along is the additional resources that are needed in the community. That is what this is. I just wanted to be very clear on that.

Mr. Wyrick: Yes.

Question: Mr. Haste - Nay; Mr. DiFrancesco - Aye; and Mr. Hartwick - Aye; motion carried.

Mr. Haste: I still support what you are doing, even though it doesn't appear that way.

Mr. DiFrancesco: I think it is important though when these providers go out to the local communities, in terms of doing their zoning and so forth, that they go not in a very defensive way, but in a way that they fully understand that this could present some controversy in some cases and that they are there to answer the questions and hope those elected leaders understand exactly what it is that they are dealing with to try to take the drama out of it and try to make it real. This is what we are talking about. In a lot of these cases, I'm looking at #6 - Specialized Traumatic Brain Injury, I'm assuming that there won't be a lot of controversy surrounding that particular one.

Mr. Wyrick: I would hope not.

Mr. DiFrancesco: With a lot of these there are not going to be any. The Forensic one is going to create a stir.

Mr. Wyrick: Most of our provider organizations have been for many years working with local municipalities about citing facilities.

Mr. Hartwick: We wish them luck.

Mr. Haste: When I was here for the my first tour of duty with the County, I was involved with some of those and they weren't very pleasant. Some did go smooth. More times than not they were not very pleasant.

PURCHASE ORDERS

Mr. Baratucci: You should have your packet from yesterday. There are two items on here that are showing over budget. Both have been corrected already. The one on Page 5 is for the Deed's Office and that has to do with what Jim was talking about earlier. Right now he pays someone to do a lot of that work that he will be hoping to take in-house with the new program. He is going to reduce his request down to the budgeted amount of $30,000. It is an estimated amount of what he might need for the rest of the year. He is going to try to live within that. Page 8 is a budget adjustment that Carolyn has already done to accommodate the new printer that is needed for the Courts. Both of those budget issues that are on here are already corrected. I do suspect since there is two weeks prior to the next approval meeting that there may be a few added. If they come up we will follow the same process and have the people contact their oversight to ask that they be added. If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer them otherwise you can review it between now and the approval meeting. (There were none.)

TRAINING PACKET

Mr. Haste: We have the training packet before us and I don't believe there are any items that need to be dealt with at this time.

ITEMS FOR DISCUSSION/VOTE

Mr. Haste: Do we have an item for a vote?

Mr. Saylor: No, it is just on there for your information. It will be voted on in two weeks.

SOLICITOR'S REPORT - WILLIAM TULLY, ESQ.

Mr. Tully: Nothing to add.

CHIEF CLERK'S REPORT - CHAD SAYLOR

Mr. Saylor: Nothing to add.

COMMISSIONERS' COMMENTS

Mr. Haste: Are there any other comments by the Board of Commissioners? (There were none.)

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Mr. Haste: Public participation. (There was none.)

ADJOURNMENT

There being no further business, it was moved by Mr. Hartwick and seconded by Mr. DiFrancesco, that the Board adjourn.