DeKalb County, Illinois

Minutes of the
Health & Human Services Committee

February 6, 2012

DRAFT

Minutes of the

Health & Human Services Committee

February 6, 2012

            The Health & Human Services Committee of the DeKalb County Board met on Monday, February 6, 2012, 6:30p.m. in the Administration Building’s Conference Room East.  Chairman Stoddard called the meeting to order.  Members present were Ms. Allen, Mr. Emerson, Ms. DeFauw, Mr. Metzger and Sr.  Mr. Tyson. 

APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES

            It was moved by Mr. Emerson, seconded by Mr. Tyson, and carried unanimously to approve the minutes from January 2012.

APPROVAL OF THE AGENDA

            It was moved by Mr. Tyson, seconded by Ms. DeFauw, and carried unanimously to approve the agenda.

COMMUNITY SERVICES DEPARTMENT UPDATE – MS. DONNA MOULTON

Ms. Moulton said that the senior services tax levy proposals will be received soon at her office.  Mr. Brett Brown, Executive Director of the Housing Authority has resigned.

Ms. Moulton passed out a copy of Community Services Department grants in 2009 when she first started in her position as Director of that department.  She then presented a copy of what her department will be doing for the FY2012 regarding the Community Services Block Grant Program. 

Ms. Moulton said that currently things have changed at the Community Services Department as they used to have 2 full-time case managers and that both have left.  She has replaced them with 4 part-time case managers, in order to save the costs of insurance coverage. 

The Community Services Department will now be doing tax preparations, with Jess Collins performing that duty.  He went through a training program for it.  People will be able to see Jess at the Community Outreach Building if they need their taxes done.  People can call the office and make an appointment to meet with Jess.

The Community Gardens program is in the planning stages with the County’s Facilities Management Office and the Health Department.  Both departments have approved a plot of land near the Health Department that will be used for this program.  The Community Services Department would like to get fresh foods to the food pantries across the County and possibly do some entrepreneurial things with kids, such as selling the produce at the Farmer’s Market.  Ms.  Moulton thinks that all DeKalb elementary schools will be on board to begin the Community Gardens project this Spring.

Through the FEMA Board, Ms. Moulton has been working with Joe Gastinger of the First Congregational Church and Chuck Walters from St. Vincent DePaul to determine how to reduce duplication for food pantries in certain geographic areas.  They are trying to look at how to distribute food as equitably as possible for all of the families.

The Community Services Department will be working with the Sycamore Community Schools, holding meetings after school to let people know what the Community Services Department does. 

The Department has opened an outreach office in Genoa now and will be meeting with clients in Somonauk once a month. 

Ms. Moulton approached the committee about a change in position for her assistant, Jess Collins.  The change would be from Office Coordinator to Community Services Block Grant Coordinator.  His duties would change under items # 8 and # 9 mentioned in her handout.  Mr. Collins would realize a 25% increase in his work duties by this change and a salary increase of about 10%.  Ms. Moulton also mentioned that Jess will be doing more scheduling, training, and supervising of department staff. 

Ms. Moulton’s office will be going through a Certification process as a requirement for the federal grant funding it receives.  There will be training and compliance criteria that it will need to meet for the accreditation, and Jess will be working on this. 

Ms.  Moulton asked the committee to read the materials pertaining to the position change.  She said that this change will incur no cost to the County as the position is funded by the federal grants that they receive. 

The committee took no action on this request this evening and will revisit it at their next meeting.  Ms. Moulton said that if the committee should approve this request next month she is asking that the position change would be retroactive to March 1, 2012.

ONE-TIME ALLOCATION PROPOSAL:

Chairman Stoddard reviewed the one-time allocation proposal from Family Service Agency (FSA) regarding chronic disease self-management workshop.  He mentioned that the committee had discussed this issue last month also, but there were some questions that needed to be answered first before the committee decided on funding the request.  Chairman Stoddard said that he received answers to the committee’s questions from last month.  He said that there would be 15 – 20 seniors in this workshop, training would start in February, and the workshops would run for 6 to 7 weeks.  There would be no continuing annual request for funding. 

Ms. Moulton said that she believes that FSA held their first meeting and only 3 people attended.  Also, their brochure does not mention that the workshop is for seniors only. 

Concern was raised by the committee that even though the program was worthwhile, without specifics on the percentage of senior participants, the Senior Tax Levy could not be used to support it.

After a brief discussion, it was moved by Ms. DeFauw, seconded by Mr. Tyson, to forward this one-time allocation request to the full board for approval.   There were 2 yes votes and 4 no votes, those being Mr. Emerson, Ms. Allen, Mr. Tyson and Mr. Metzger, Sr.  Motion failed.

ADJOURNMENT

            Moved by Mr. Metzger, Sr., and seconded by Mr. Tyson, and carried unanimously to adjourn the meeting.

                                                            Respectfully submitted,

                                                            ________________________________

                                                            Chairman Paul Stoddard

__________________________  

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