Supervisor boards to discuss mental-health reorganization

By STEPH TAHTINEN

Mt. Pleasant News

The CPCs (central point of coordination) have done the leg work; now it?s time for the boards of supervisors to join the conversation.

During the Henry County board of supervisors meeting on Thursday morning, Henry County CPC Sarah Kaufman announced that a meeting between the boards of supervisors will be held at 10 a.m. on Oct. 17 at the Heatilator Performing Arts Center in Mt. Pleasant.

This meeting will be open to the public, although Kaufman said that it might not be useful to the public at this point.

?It?s just a conversation between boards of supervisors to allow them to begin to wrap their minds around regionalization,? explained Kaufman.

Mental health redesign has been the topic of conversation at the state legislature for the past few years, and now in an attempt to equalize services across the state, counties are mandated to form regions for mental health services.

Henry County has been talking with seven surrounding counties ? Des Moines, Lee, Van Buren, Louisa, Washington, Jefferson and Keokuk counties.

So far the county?s CPCs have been holding most of the discussions, comparing funding, services offered, census figures and clients and developing tentative plans for how the region would look.

However, it is ultimately the responsibility of the boards of supervisors to form the region ? especially as due to state legislation the position of CPC will no longer exist effective July 1, 2013.

One aspect of the region that is still up in the air is how many counties will be involved in the region. What had been plans for an eight-county region including Henry, may now turn into plans for a seven-county region.

Jefferson County has indicated that it is not currently planning to be in the region, though Supervisor Chairman Kent White said that looking at the numbers Jefferson may need to be in it anyway. It is also possible that the state may force Jefferson County to join the region in the future.

Either way, it was discussed Thursday morning, it may be more difficult if the seven counties move forward with their plans only to have another county thrown into the mix at a later date.

However, Kaufman noted, just because the state may say that another county needs to join the region, that doesn?t necessarily mean that the region needs to accept another county into its region.

?DHS has the ability to assign orphaned or abandoned counties,? said Kaufman. ?It doesn?t say you need to accept them.?

In other business, Kaufman and the supervisors discussed the vacancy in the court advocate position, which will need to be filled quickly due to the legal requirements of the job.

The court advocate serves four counties ? Henry, Des Moines, Lee and Louisa ? and the four counties have been in discussion about filling the vacancy and there has been debate whether the position should be a county employee or a contract employee.

The court advocate is appointed by the court, though the county pays for the position.