Commissioners approved a plan on Tuesday to study grief’s impact on youngsters at the county’s juvenile services center.
Grayson County Juvenile Services Chief Probation Officer Greg Sumpter brought a number of items to the commissioners’ attention including the department’s chance to accept the Discretionary Aid Grant from the Texas Juvenile Justice Department for a partnership related to grief screening and teletherapy between Grayson County Juvenile Services and Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute.
“The Meadows Foundation through their mental health policies institute reached out to Grayson County to partner because of our reputation… cause of the county’s reputation as a regional leader working with youth in other counties. So, this is a pilot project and their description in terms of looking at grief and loss with young people and how that impacts their trajectory,” he explained.
The program will give GCJS the ability to screen all of the youth at come into the facility and then provide up to 20 individuals with some teletherapy that’s fairly intensive.
The grant will be fully funded by the TJJD and Sumpter said there is the possibility that it could be renewed up to six times.
Precinct 1 Commissioner Josh Marr made the motion to allow Judge Bruce Dawsey to sign on the bottom line accepting the grant and Precinct 4 Commissioner Matt Hardenburg seconded the motion. No one voted against it.
Sumpter, however, was not finished with the court.
He also asked them to approve renewal of or signing of contracts for serves at the county’s Juvenile Services facility for young people from Caldwell, Collin, Crane, DeWitt, Erath. Hildago, Kerr, Palo Pinto, Panola, and Tom Green counties.
“Most of them are renewals,” Sumpter said. “I think we are at about 71 now. We will probably have another ten or so that trickle in to use or residential services.”
Precinct 2 Commissioner Art Arthur moved that they accept the renewals and Hardenburg seconded. No one voted against the matter.
Sumpter said Grayson County does sometimes need to contract to use send its young charges to another facility and he asked them to approve a contract between CJS and Denton County Juvenile Services.
“We don’t do this often… we have our own facility. But there might be times based of age, based on mental health, based on other needs where the judge orders a youth to go to placement and they are not appropriate for our placement for whatever reason, so we contract with I’d say around a half a dozen outside facilities just in case we have those situations,” Sumpter said.
He added that they really do try to avoid sending local youth outside of the county because it can make it harder on families to stay in touch. Precinct 3 Commissioner Lindsay Wright moved that the county sign the contract with Denton County and Hardenburg seconded the motion. No one voted against it.
Lastly, Sumpter asked the court to approve an agreement between GCJS and Tickit Health for utilizing the software/technology related to administering the Child and Adult Hope Scale. Sumpter explained that they already use some of those tools, but the grant tied to this is about $2,500. It will last for two years and the federal funds they want to use with it will need to be used by Sept. 30th.
“This is the ability to digitize some public domain tools to measure hope in young people and in caregivers and families,” he said.
Marr moved to approve the matter and Hardenburg seconded. No one voted against it.
