Well, good morning. Welcome to the committee of the whole. Um, first item on the agenda is the introduction to DNR regional director. >> Good morning. My name is Clarissa Spicer. I'm the Northeast Regional Director of the
Minnesota DNR. I live and work in Grand Rapids and I've been in this position for about a year now. So, I thought it was high time I come and introduce myself to the Crowing County Board. Um, I represent several well I I work with several counties in northeastern Minnesota and Crowing is the farthest
southwest. So, it's great to be here and to meet you today. You might remember Shelley Patton. She is my predecessor. She retired last spring. Um, so anything that you used to go to her for, I'd invite you to come to me. Uh, my main job is really to be the connection point
for you between DNR's local staff here in the county and St. Paul and the region in Grand Rapids. So, anything you need, I'm happy to help with. Um, I'm simply here today just to introduce myself and to give you an overview of some of the work that DNR does here in Crowing County. In your packet, you'll
see this two-page handout. And the first page there is a map showing um the various types of lands that we administer on behalf of the state of Minnesota in Crowing County, including wildlife management areas, aquatic management areas, state forests, um
state natural and scientific areas, as well as a couple parks and and lots of trails in your county as well. The Minnesota Outdoor Recreation Industry Partnership estimates that 1,400 jobs and 4.78% of Crowing County's
GDP came from outdoor recreation in 2025. And that's amongst the highest in the state. There are four DNR offices and 120 DNR employees in Crowing County. And since it's spring fire season right now, I brought our wildland aviation
supervisor, Darren Newman, to tell you a little bit more about one of the most important work sites we have in Crowing County, the Brainer Tanker Base. That's where helicopters and airplanes used for wildfire suppression across the state are currently staged and ready for emergency response. Thank you. It's nice
to meet you. >> Thanks, Clarissa. like she said, uh Darren Newman, wildfire aviation supervisor with DNR. Um I began my career as a forester with DNR and and some family property that was near Garrison in Crowing County is probably the reason why I ended up here and and
get the chance to talk to you this morning. But um in regards to our Brainer air tanker base, it's one of three that we operate statewide. U they're at our regional airports in Hibbing and in Bumiji. We also operate smaller satellite bases for helicopters
and smaller hair tanker response. Warroad, Cambridge, and other places that that meet our needs. The things that really are important for us are our partnerships with those airports to get our our job done so we can respond quickly to wildfires and and help our
ground firefighters and the local responders um get things under control. Uh we lease ground at those airports. Um that uh like I mentioned that partnership is key. Um we've been leasing that sp that place at the Briner
airport since about 2003 when we were moved relocated for the uh construction of the crosswind runway at that airport. Um our aircraft and our firefighters respond all across Minnesota. there's a a map in your packet uh of all our
wildfires that we responded to last year. And then the ones that are um have an orange um diagram or sorry an orange triangle, those include the responses that actually came from the Brainer airport and you can see they're all over
the state and um the most significant ones I I have a little bit of a summary of of what responded from Brainard and elsewhere and what they did. Um, our current Brainer tanker base is basically two older mobile home type
structures in a row of sheds. Um, you may have been there and visited it. I I hope that if you haven't, you do sometime. Um, but what we've got in our our current planning is a bonding opportunity that's um actually in the governor's recommendation and in the
current house um bill. And that was initially for a $16 million project that includes both the operations and dispatch facility, uh the the apron or ramp where aircraft park, re refuel, reload, and then a consolidated hanger
for both DNR operations as well as state patrol. That's been trimmed back to $5 million in the current bonding uh capital request. that should allow us to replace our uh row of sheds and as well as the two mobile home units. Um it's
our current highest priority uh ask for our wildfire aviation program and um just an update, we're doing a similar project right now in Hibbing and it's due for completion at the end of this summer. And so we're following that
model where we've got uh leased property 40 years in duration and then making that important strategic capital investment. Just want to let you know that uh that's what we're up to right now and and we're working with um the airport commission to make sure that we
uh move forward in a in a positive way. >> Thanks, Mr. Newman. I sit on that airport commission and I appreciate the collaboration. I wish we could get the $16 million to give you a nice a more um appropriate building to operate out of
and that. But if there's anything that we can do to assist in the political world to move the bonding bill to something more appropriate, please let us know. Um I know the uh new airport director out there is excited about it.
The interim director was instrumental in pushing that a little further. So, anything we can do to assist, we will be happy to do. We would like to see that developed out there and give you a better presence on the airport. So, thank you very much.
>> You're welcome. And and the airport commission and both uh u Miss Roach, the airport manager, and and uh Commissioner Palmer have been exceptional partners and and I appreciate their their assistance so far. >> All right. Thank you. >> Yep. Thank you,
>> clerk. I have a question. >> Okay, >> Larissa, >> I I guess I don't know how to ask this question, but um I guess I look at our lakes or all lakes as kind of our reservoirs where in California they they
like to fill up their reservoirs after the winter snow and keep that water because water is pretty precious out there. And I feel like the same thing here. And for example, Gull Lake, there's a dam on the end of G Lake to
maintain the level of G Lake. And lower South Long Lake right now, as you know, it's it's dry out and lower South Long Long Lake is a lot lower than I've seen it in some springs.
And I I guess I wish I knew what year that that the dam was put in on Lower South Long Long Lake, but there is there's slots in the dam, that's to maintain the level of the lake. And if we don't hold that water back and we
just send it off, it's going to go down the Noi to the Mississippi and it's just it's gone. And then pretty soon if we don't get any rain, I mean these at least that lake is going to be so low it's going to be like a mud puddle and then the weeds get really bad.
Some people and I don't know who it was but a couple of years ago they they they took it upon themselves to put a board and I don't know if you know the history of this. They put a board in there and then whoever the hydraologist was, lady, she went down there and she ripped that
board out of there and she welded the slots closed. And so my question is is who do I talk to or how do I go about trying to I I guess I'd like to see it like a 6-in
board in there just to maintain a higher level in that lake. You know what? You know what I'm saying? I mean, it just it just makes to me it makes sense. Otherwise, it just you're just emptying out the lake. >> And then somebody will say, "Well, what about downstream?" Well, once you get to
that level, it's still going to be coming downstream, I think. But, uh, >> yeah, hydrarology is certainly very complicated and a really important part of our uh, natural heritage here. So, um, what I will do is I'll take your question back and find out who the
appropriate hydraologist is for exactly where you're talking about and I'll have them reach out to you so you can discuss the the nuances of that particular situation. I am familiar with it. Uh, Shelley filled me in on that a little bit about a year ago. So, um I don't have very many details to offer you right now, but I can certainly find the
right people who can who can help >> because I think that you know some smart people years ago apparently they wanted to maintain the level there otherwise they wouldn't have put in a dam. They wouldn't have put in those slots so that you can put boards in. And there's many
many we that there's the same thing. There's slots in there to maintain those levels. And now it's just it's just running the water just pouring out of there when we should be reserving that water. I think I mean if we don't want
to do that, it's the same thing with G Lake, then just remove the dam from G Lake. I don't think that would go over very well with a lot of the wealthy people that live on the lake. So yeah, if somebody could reach out to me, I guess I have a lot of constituents down there in southern Crowing County that
are they're quite concerned about the water levels. So >> Okay. Thank you. Appreciate. >> No problem, >> Madam Chair. Um Clarissa, on the uh Gull Lake, the white fish chain, those are considered reservoirs and they are controlled by the core. Correct.
>> Sets those levels. >> So So on those lakes, it isn't anything really. the DNR is involved in as far as setting levels. That would be the core sets those levels. >> I'll have to ask to make sure that sounds correct. >> But on on a lot of these other smaller lakes we have around, I don't know if
the core is involved in that or if it is the DNR is involved in setting those levels. So >> it is the DNR on South Long Lake. >> On South Long, it's a DNR. >> The hydraologist, she ripped that board out of there and welded. And it's a good thing I didn't know that they were down there. Otherwise, I would have It's
county property all the way around there. I probably would have said you're trespassing. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Huh? >> Commissioner Coring is back in the room. >> Are there any other questions I could answer? >> Oh, thank you.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. Next item is Crowing County React Program. good. >> Good morning, county commissioners and county administrator. Um, I'm here on behalf of the Crowing County Community
Corrections. I'm going to kind of start back. Um, >> Hi, Ann. >> Long time no see. >> Oh, I'm Ann Pickar. Sorry. Thank you. Um, so when you go to court, a lot of our clients get put on probation. part of their probation agreement is they
have to take drug testing at our request and they have to pay $25. It's at their own cost. Um the issue that we run into, especially with my case load, which is an all drug, so addiction case load, they're homeless, they don't have jobs,
they're trying to find somewhere to go, food, they don't have money for a UA. Um so they show up, they say, "I don't have any money. We say you have to pay or we're going to violate you." um or they don't show up at all because they're embarrassed that they don't have any money. So, I went to the Blade um the
grant application and I applied for a grant for $15,000 which we received which we are very thankful for. Um so, our program that we set up with probation is called REACT. So, it's responsibility, engagement, accountability, change, and trust. So,
working with our clients to one um actually I'm going to start back. So, what we did is we took $8,500 of that for drug testing. We took another $1,500 of that and put strictly to ETG, which is alcohol testing only.
Um $2,300 into gas cards so that people can get transportation to and from. Um and $100 for bus tokens, which some people that live in the city, it's cheaper to ride a bus. um and they can for six bucks get into drug testing. Um
so we are partnered with Holiday who supplies our gift cards um the city bus out of Brainard um and then Mid Minnesota Drug Testing who did vouchers for us. So we give our clients a voucher which then that money will come back out of our grant. Um
the reason this grant helps is one it decreases our violations so agents have less time in court. Um, it also allows our clients to trust us that we want what's in their best interest and um, we can make sure that they can
afford drug testing. Um, it also allows for quicker stabilization. Um, for example, I had a client and actually he talked at the grant presentation. I don't know if anybody was there, but he was sober for three years, relapsed. We caught it right away. We put him on drug
testing. He tested six weeks in a row and he's been sober since. So that drug testing allowed him to be accountable also to get back on track and he's sober and he's actually in college. Just got a CDL and will graduate from the heavy machinery
program at CLC next year. So he's doing great. So that stabilization piece is huge. Also, um it we've increased testing um which also helps with stabilization and also catching our clients right away when we see that they relapse so that we can get them into
services a lot quicker instead of just throwing them into jail. Um sorry, so sorry. Um the grant has also allowed for some financial barriers that were there to no longer be there. Um transportation and also incentives. We use it for
people, you know, there are some people that can afford drug testing. So, hey, you pay for three, we'll pay for the fourth one. So, it also is used as an incentive. Um, if you look at the chart up there, you'll see to date for drug testing, we've spent $2,625.
The alcohol ETG drug testing, $333. Bus tokens, we've used 28. And gas cards, we've used 180. So currently we're at 21% of our grant that we've used. Um the only challenge we run into
is the city bus or the people that are out rural way out in the county. The bus doesn't serve. So we have to find alternative routes which if they can find a ride to drug testing will provide a gas card for whoever drives them. So, this grant I can tell you just from my
experience and my clientele that I work with, this has reduced um violations. It's also increased accountability for our clients and it also has allowed us to assist them quicker when they've had relapses.
Yeah. So, any questions for me? >> And a question for you is is um now this is the blade that's that's the opioid dollars, correct? Correct. >> Yeah. So, I guess a question to you is I don't know, maybe I look at it different
than than the other commissioners, but I I look at these opioid dollars and and the lawsuit that that they should be sent spent on prevention and education of trying to get before even somebody even gets
addicted to anything or even tries anything. That's the way I look at it. But it seems like we're spending it all on on people that are addicted or have got some issues. And so how
what what what can we do to I mean do more prevention? I guess I'm that's what I I look at. I I just think I mean this is you're spending the money and it's it's it's going for good stuff, but how do we stop and educate somebody
from even even going down that path in their life, >> right? And that's where a lot of our clients, you know, treatment um it is proven that long-term stability and being sober comes from long-term sobriety, which drug testing and
accountability, that piece allows our clients to have that accountability, which keeps them sober for longer, which gives them more of a chance to be sober for the rest of their lives and also to keep our community safe. you know, when they're actively using, you know, if
they're sober in our community, that's what we want. >> Somehow, I just think that we got to drive it into people like kids at a young age. Like I there's a lot of kids that are vaping and I don't think we realize how much damage that's going to do to their body and their lungs and and
not only that, but then is is that a gateway to something else? And so know how do that's where I go back to the educ education education education of trying to keep people from going down this path of whether it's um you know
math or or cocaine. I don't think I don't know if people do that much anymore. In the 80s that was the big thing. But um I don't know. I guess I just look at wanting to spend that money more to educate educate educate. So
anyway, I you're doing you're doing the Lord's work. No doubt about it. But uh but I guess I look at spending that dollars because one day these opioid dollars are we're not going to have that pot of money to spend and then where are we going to come up with that? And then
it's probably going to have to be paid for by people's property taxes. And I always mention grandma Johnson or or whoever it is that's living on social security. And then we got to start charging them more to pay for these
things that I don't know why they're paying for it. So anyway, that's my statement. >> Christa has something to >> M >> Christa, can you come up to the mic, please? >> Good morning. I just wanted to add to
what um Ann said and in response to you, Commissioner, in that I completely agree. I, as you know, I'm a big proponent of education. And I believe getting in the schools to educate kids very young is essential. Um I would just add that um when someone is in recovery,
there's a lot of children in these homes of the people that we work with and what they're exposed to has a huge impact on their growth. And when we can get people sober and to stay sober, I believe that
is huge prevention with those kids um growing up. and um becoming you know going into out of home placement or the impact on those kids. So that piece I believe is um speaks to the prevention some
>> you're resonating with me right now because I think it gets to be generational. If you got that bad stuff happening kids do it then their kids do it. >> And so yeah. No, that that makes total sense. >> Thank you.
>> Thank you. Any further questions? >> Right. Thank you. Thank you. >> Thanks a homes. >> So, I'm Sheila Haver Camp and I apologize this morning because I went and lost my voice yesterday. Dang it.
And I was so looking forward to visiting with you today because I miss my 31 years of economic development and being before you often. So, I'm going to do my best, but I got a team with me. My daughter Megan, her husband Nate, um my
niece Michaela, her significant other Pat, and we have um DOC, Department of Corrections ISR agent Mitchell Swanson with us, and as well as obviously Department of Corrections. We work very, very closely with the uh community
corrections, I should say, Crowing County Community Corrections. And in fact, one of my team members was tapping me on the back saying, "Can I respond? Can I add to what Mr. Coring is is saying?" >> You didn't bring Joe ALONG THOUGH. >> I KNOW CUZ HE WOULD HAVE taken over. We
would have needed an hour. >> Oh, but you know, he is definitely a success story. My son Joe is. And I would tell you, Paul, I searched up and down trying to find ways to prevent my child from falling into that world of drugs and alcohol. And sometimes I was
told that children just make a choice. >> Yeah. >> At some point they look around them and they see the kids that are doing it, they see the kids that aren't. It's offered to them at home, which is not the case with me, but um they have to experiment and then you have to catch
them and get them back on track like Anna and Christa was were sharing. So don't ever stop I mean education and prevention but we also got to stop the train wreck right and it costs us so much more money if they get into the
prison systems or um you know for life or bury them young and then the kids are left with no one. So >> absolutely >> I would I would recommend you continue to support all the continuum of care for individuals. So, um I got into this work
obviously because of um my son and my brother, my niece, my nephew. I've lost um people from 29 years old to 33 to 35 to um uh just my nephew this past year
at 42 and it just it seems like it never ends. And so, like what can we really do to help people in addiction? So, I I don't want to get emotional because I do. I have a passion around this but nearly nine years ago um Burlington
Recovery Homes came to be. We have now served more than 775 people. Um we have nine homes and seven apartments and seven of those homes are in Crowings actually city limits of Brinard, one in um Morrison and one in Cass. So we're
expanding our footprint. We get asked by cities across the state regularly could you please come to our community? Um but we have to be slow, methodical and make sure we keep our um social enterprise mission of really caring for the people
we serve. This past year alone we see we serve 237 people of which 120 are still with us. So we have the current capacity to serve 120 people and um we have 11 team members. So, I'm very um
uh dig digilant diligent diligent. I'm sorry. Not only is my throat not working, but my head isn't working, but um to make sure that we really continue our our mission of caring for these individuals, really getting to know them and help them. Um, residents are
referred to us from a variety of sources, whether it be the pro probation officers here in Crowing, the Department of Corrections, which we have Mitchell, um, here with us, and and Mitchell is what they call an intense supervised release from prison. So, he's intensely
and his team overseeing individuals that are released from the prison system back into the community. And he was just sharing with us a little story before we started. They honestly don't know what they'd do without us. We have got this really strong relationship with the
Department of Corrections and making sure that we're an extra set of eyes as well as a place for these individuals to live instead of being on the streets homeless or going back to their old ways if they have nowhere else to go. That's where they find themselves.
Um, in addition, social workers, treatment centers, the homeless community, word of mouth, even judges um in the uh judicial system are referring men that they have to go to a sober home, a recovery residence in order for
them to be released. So, we're definitely making an impact. And our residents have been 18 years old to 72 years old with an average age currently of 42. They've had a fourth grade education to a doctorate degree. I am not kidding when I say we have had
individuals with a doctorate degree. Uh substance use disorder does not discriminate. It can touch anyone and everyone. In 2025, residents stayed an average of 10 months with us. We've had some residents stay as few as a day. Um
to one individual who's been with almost since the day we opened nine years ago, it's his family. It's his home. and he will probably be with us until he's gone that he feels safe and he can make good choices and he feels like he's got a home and a sense of family.
>> Sheila, can I ask a question right at that point because I actually just wrote that down >> because that that's a question that I think I asked Cara Terry or I asked somebody before. How long can somebody stay there? >> And >> yeah, I was going to get to that. In
fact, >> I'm going to get I'll go over there right now. I'll skip around because I did want to respond to that um dispatch article of February 4th where some of those questions were asked. So, I did um put some notes together. And first of all, I think it's important for you to
know that not just anyone is served by Burlington Recovery Homes. Most residents need what they call a professional statement of need. It's an it's a document that a medical doctor and or an LAC or other individuals with certain credentials can say this
individual that I've been working with needs your type of housing. And so um these documents last usually one year in length and then the individual has to be re-evaluated if they want to continue to receive rental assistance in our homes.
Um but state law which is the housing support rental assistance program that helps us mandates no minimum or maximum length of stay. These individuals can stay their whole life is it's a place of safety for them and they want their family to be considered their family.
But other individuals like I said our average length is 10 months. So obviously most people are on a trajectory where they want to feel safe and get their own home, reunite with family, find a significant other, and carry on with life like most of us do, right? But um
>> Sheila, is there requirements for somebody that's staying there that they have to at some point they have to be looking for a job or or trying to get self-sufficient rather than, you know, just be there forever? Um, you know, I
would say what we do, and I would love my team to come up here with me and help answer, but we we actually when they come in and we're doing what we call intake, we have a very >> a proc very um process that's a journey
that we've put together. Somebody says we're a welloiled machine, but we actually have a process that requires them to set out goals. But most most men when they first arrive, you know, it's they're scared. They have a lot of anxiety. They might have been in prison
for five years. Um they're first time they're trying to be sober in 10 years of their life. So they're they're just trying to feel safe and to make sure that the people they're going to be living with will accept them. Some of them have long lengthy criminal histories that are a bit scary. So um
once they settle in, most of them start by going to like a treat, you know, outpatient treatment, a therapist, get their medical, uh needs met so um they don't um struggle with mental health. Then they, you know, AA meetings in
church and when they start having enough confidence, they look for work. >> Most and I'm I'll tell you what, I'm up many of mornings driving people to work because most people don't have a car when they first arrive with us. And in fact, many of guys that leave us are still calling me because they've
reunited with a child and they finally got an apartment that we've helped them get into where your social workers have helped and we create a team, but I'm driving them to work every day so that they can keep their apartment. And I would just like to add that um that man who's been with us for seven years, he's
been a self-pay resident actually for many, many years. So, some of those longer residents we have are choosing to stay on self-pay rent um or they receive social security. So, they're paying us rent out of their social security. So, I feel like those numbers are a little
skewed and it can um be misleading really. >> It can be self-pay if you want to. >> And we lower our self-pay option. A lot of homes I don't think do that, but we lower it so it's >> And then where does the money come from? If it's not self-pay, is it is it like state dollars or federal dollars or
>> state dollars? It is state dollars. Okay. >> So, that's a state document that the doctors or LAC's fill out saying they need >> what's that acronym mean? LA LC. >> Oh, licensed drug counselor. Alcohol and drug counselor. >> Oh, I just love these questions. I could
spend hours talking about this. >> No, no, no. >> I just love >> Okay. Um, and we did a handout. I hope you got it and I hope you will take time and look at it. But one of the things I wanted you to know is that 70% of our
our residents have a mental health diagnosis into in addition to substance use disorder. So mental health is a huge component of what we're managing on a daily basis. 70% are on parole, probation, or supervised release. Um and
I acknowledge those in attendance. 50% have spent time in prison and some of them multiple times. So these are individuals that have had a challenge in their lives. Right. >> So Sheila, would this be considered like a halfway house because you It's not What's the difference between that and
>> somebody else? >> Um Halfway House has staff on site 24/7. >> Oh, okay. >> So we are on call 24/7. So there's no family vacations anymore. Somebody has to be in town. Um, so we are in the house usually daily, multiple hours a
day, just helping individuals on a case-to basis, getting to work, um, completing those next steps to get back on their feet. >> What if somebody's um, being really bad and they bring in drugs into that atmosphere? Or do they is it a
it just >> once and done and you're out of there or or is it just the the old thing of you stop doing that and >> No, >> I hope not. >> No, no, we are not about that at all. Um we part of us getting to know them so
well. Um sometimes we can see changes in their behavior and almost catch relapse before it happens. Start to see that mental health spiral and or catch it shortly after. We do a lot of random drug and alcohol testing. Some of the cool things about us working with probation and ISR is they'll tell us if they've had a relapse um and they catch
it before we do or vice versa. So, um we just really sit down with them. We write out a use agreement. What are the things you're going to do to get back on track? Is this just going to be a hiccup in the road or is it going to turn into full-blown use? What are what are we going to do here? Um so, we just use area resources to connect with some
interventions. Um uh whether that's outpatient treatment, we can hold their bed while they go to inpatient treatment and come right back. um church, AA, whatever it might be. >> Michaela and Pat, >> I mean, I don't really have much else to
add. I think it's important the fact that we can hold the resident's bed while they're in treatment because a lot of the times, you know, they go off to treatment, they're very afraid that, okay, what happens after, right? And so, they know that they get to come back to the same home that they're used to, the same like team of people around them to
support them. And that's very important. and I had a gentleman struggling just this last month. It was very close like communication with me and probation in Crowing County, but he was also being overseen by Wright County. And so just all three of us working of how are we really going to get him back on track and then I mean I leave my home at 6
p.m. to go to the sober residents, get his medications, bring it to the jail because these medications are so expensive the jail cannot like support that administration of them. And so I mean we're taking like we're trying to complete the full circle, right? So probation isn't going to go to the home and get the medications, but that's
something I can support them in. And then he got transferred from Crowing to Wright County and he came back home. And so I've been visiting with with him almost daily just to like keep him on track, helping him get set up with a peer recovery specialist who can really sit down and try to help him. And I mean
mental health was a huge piece in that, but just us supporting him like all the way through, right? So he doesn't get out of Wright County and he has no idea where to go because he's been transferred all over. And so we're just at home that provides that stabilization piece of it. >> I want to hear this guy.
>> Um my name is Patrick. Good morning. Uh just being born and raised in this area. I had uh 15 years of drug addiction right here in Brainer and caused quite a bit of havoc um with repeated recovery attempts that had failed over and over again. I would leave, go to treatment somewhere else, come back to town, not
have a place to really stabilize within my community. Um until I came to Burlington. I myself went through the Burlington houses and was able to just slow down and get my life back on track one piece at a time. Now I've been offered a career path and a work
opportunity with these guys and that's changing my life for the better. I have between me and her, we have seven kids who are also watching us work in this field. I believe that is prevention generationally. I come from a long line of addicts, you know, so
um this support of sober housing is a huge piece and I just want to say that your support of it is big. It is making an impact. No matter what anybody says, I'm standing right here to tell you for sure it is. So, thank you. >> Thank you guys. Um and also I do want to
apologize. We thought this was a half hour presentation. And of course, you can see we're passionate get a little off track, but I know um we want to talk about opioid dollars. So, is there anything else we can just give you about our homes? Okay. So, sorry for the long PowerPoint. I will >> Yep. One question for you. How long have
you guys been operating these houses? >> Uh nine years. My parents opened the first home nine years ago. >> Okay. And is it uh seven individual apartments or seven complexes? >> Seven just individual units. >> Okay. >> Uhhuh. that and most of the units are
filled by a couple because though we get to know the gentleman and we know their family and we know their desire to move into the next stage of life oftentimes they cannot get apartments because of their background checks. So we have started moving in that direction um of
trying to get you know either lease and then subleasase to the individuals so that they can have housing andor we've tried to buy a couple of small or apartment houses that we can help these guys because many of them just can't
can't get there and then they get discouraged and want to quit. It's like no we'll figure it out. Please don't stop. Are are these all around Crowing County? Just Brainard? >> The apartments are all located in Brainard. Yeah. And I think again, it's
part of that prevention piece. We are huge on family reunification. We do our best to help with that and we feel like we put opioid dollars to that. Um so, >> and and we we want to share we did receive a $20,000 grant from the opioid
dollars and the Blade uh committee. and we were, you know, Tammy Luick deserves a lot of credit and Cara Terry for um helping us start this first sober home and the model that we've got going and uh they supported us with that $20,000
opioid grant. And Megan was going to quickly share what we used the grant for versus like um how an and her team used the dollars. >> And just before you do that, clarification for Commissioner Lee, you have nine homes plus seven apartments. Is that correct?
>> Correct. So there are 16 total facilities. >> Yeah. >> And then the homes would have like possibly four bedrooms. So they'd have four people staying in No. How does that work? >> So we isn't that the way it works?
>> No. >> Well, we try to do nine bedrooms. >> No, you said homes. So I guess apartments are different. So apartments typically have just two people within an apartment, but the homes have anywhere between 9 to 13 men. We actually redesign the homes. Um they have combination of single and shared
bedrooms. >> One thing we always like to share is, you know, shared bedrooms do hold that extra piece of accountability. You're not able to go into your bedroom, lock the door, use an opioid, and pass away before anybody even knows that you're in there. And so there is a combination of both. Um
>> and we've had this happen. We've learned if you put them in their individual bedrooms and they're not strong yet, >> we have tragedy. And is there's nothing worse than having tragedy in these homes. It breaks you as team members and staff.
>> And the opioid crisis is real. I mean, it is very, very rare in our communities. >> We follow rental code to a tea. And our home with nine, I find it's almost too quiet. It sounds strange, but a lot of them are so busy. And that sense of family is what we're trying to create.
You walk into that home, I'm dying and I there's no no one in there sometimes because they're doing work or treatment, whatever. >> Well, and you I'm I'm assuming that you're if something if somebody's disruptive, they do you kick people out?
>> We do have to ask people to leave from time to time. Um but >> you know, the fun thing about creating all these partnerships is sometimes we're able to just say, "Hey, maybe you're better fit for this facility." And they do the same with us. Um we have connections a lot a lot of the other
sober homes, the homeless shelter if we have to go that route. >> Um but we try our best last resort. We give people a few chances and even between our own homes sometimes we just switch guy to a different setting see if that can help. So, I'm trying to be
being that this is my first day in person back. I'm trying to be kinder and gentler, but but you have had issues. You know, one of them is right next to where my brother has a forplex and a duplex and
the police are there a lot. >> Okay. So I guess that would that's one thing I would like to share is you know I had to use police intervention with a gentleman in one of the homes that I manage but it was not drugrelated. It was actually he was threatening to commit suicide and disappeared on me and
so I did I called the Brainer Police Department because that is my job is to keep them safe. And so just because you see police there it doesn't always mean that something like terrible is going on or that the public is in danger. You know, these people are very mentally fragile and so suicide, if they bring that up, it is our job to make sure
they're safe. And sometimes the police department is the only way that we can do that. >> Sure. >> And so, you know, the police force like around the homes is scary, right? If you don't know what's going on, but it's not always because someone is like unruly or they're using drugs in the home or, you know, sometimes we're just trying to keep people safe.
>> Yeah. just to let you know that, you know, that he's got like five different um people staying there and they're all over 80 years old. So, you just might want to keep in mind that they're scared, you know, I mean, at at times, you know, when they see the police and
all that activity. So, just just be mindful of of your neighbors. I think that's with anything when you're >> living next to your neighbor, try to try to be a good neighbor. So, >> I really do. We even like as soon as we um got one of our sober homes, the the
neighbor said, "Can you please at least put a fence in?" And that was financially very difficult, but we put it in like as soon as we could because we do want to be a good neighbor. I'm always give them my direct phone number. Call me anytime and I will try to address any concerns. >> That was my only mean thing for right
now. >> I mean, we worry about that, too, obviously. >> Yeah. Um, but when you know you have a like you sometimes have a scuffle like I got a phone call the other night. Oh my gosh, so and so just hit so and so. It's like okay I will call the police. They
can determine whether it was a real physical assault. >> Sure. >> If there is somebody that needs to be charged with an offense or if it's all just fine because we are legally responsible to make sure these people are as safe as possible. And um so we
have to they look at the police officers look at us as team members. They actually and and you know like DWI court and drug court they are making police car rounds to our houses doing random tests. So sometimes you're seeing the
police there and it's your DWI court system and your um drug court. So it doesn't always mean it's bad. So that's what I want you to know too. We look at them as our team >> to help us. Okay. >> Um, just a question. When you bring when
you are looking at putting a home in a neighborhood, do you have to go to the city then and get a cup or something to do that or can you just buy a home and turn it into a recovery home? >> That's Sheila. >> Well, I look at her when I was asking. >> John and I have worked together for many
years, but you know, no conditional use permit. Um and most uh city ordinances, you know, say you can have four people with um different last names living in one unit. Well, um uh sober homes or
recovery residences have found their way all the way to the Supreme Court. And according to federal fair housing law, you are not able to discriminate against individuals coming together and creating a sense of family in a sober environment. So, they have to legally
make reasonable accommodations for us. So, as we go through the process to get our permits, get our rental licenses, we're every time we buy a house, we're doing major construction because we take all of that unused space in these homes and convert it to bedrooms and bathrooms
and laundry rooms, etc. Every I mean, I wish every one of you would come to our homes because I have this standard. It's a home I'm willing to live in myself or I will not have anybody else live in it. And so, um, uh, I'm proud of them, right? But, uh,
they have to they have to help us make reasonable accommodations and we follow Minnesota building code as far as like a bedroom size, um, etc., etc. And you know, some some cities will have, you know, maybe a couple of higher standards
than Minnesota building code, but if they don't have any codes, we follow Minnesota building code and um get rental licenses and building permits, if that makes sense, John. But they we never follow conditional use permit. We've never been required to do that. >> That was one of the questions I was
going to ask because that is discrim. So wherever you have a home there, unless there's something unique about that neighborhood, you can have a home there. Correct. >> Correct. Yes. That's what I thought. >> And you know, we want to be good neighbors. Obviously, what's really interesting is the men end up being best
friends with the neighbors as time goes on. You know, we have one gentleman who the guys have learned, do not park your car in front of his house because he does not want that. So he puts a little note. you know, sometimes harsh, but
move your dang car. So, they Yes, sir. And they just do it, right? They don't want to. These guys are really trying to change their life. I think that's what you got to understand. These people are trying to recreate themselves and finally want a chance at living a a just
a normal life. Anybody >> contrast our neighbor in Pine River, he likes to plow for us, you know, clear our sidewalks for us. He just takes itself and he's an old guy who just kind of supports the cause. So, I Megan, do you want to quickly share what we did with the opioid dollars?
Those three area sections that we primarily did. >> Yeah, I'm sorry. I'll try to be um mindful of time here, but we were really blessed and thankful to receive the $20,000 opioid grant from the Blake Committee in Crowing County. Um so, we've witnessed firsthand in these um
homes how detrimental like sitting idle can be. They got to be working towards goals. So we really do focus on, you know, moving their lives forward in some way and healthy hobbies and coping mechanisms. And we took a training last week, six of us, and they just really hit home. These protective factors, you
see in these bubbles here, healthy coping skills, exercise, and pro-social involvement, our evidence-based protective factors against relapse and substance use disorder. So we really reassured that we have been putting opioid grant dollars to good use. and with the amount of clients we serve um
we can have a larger footprint as well. Um so we broke it down in this timeline here. Um so I'll focus on third and fourth quarter first off. Um so we did SAP staff training and I'll discuss that more later. Um we'll do a spring highway cleanup event. We will do a bowling
event and we'll um obtain more summer recreation equipment like kayaks and bikes and we will do a let's go fishing event um which has been fun. These opioid dollars have helped us create some more collaborations and partnerships in the community as well. Um, so you'll see behind those three
gentlemen is a fish house. So we were trying to find something where we could store, haul summer recreation equipment um, safely and accessible. And we've settled on a fish house for its dual functionality. And let me tell you, it
got lots of use this winter. It was amazing. Um, lots of big fish, even bigger than that one there. But um I'll just share a quick story of a resident who shared how much it meant to him. When I found out Burlington Recovery Homes had a fish house that we could go fishing in, it made me so happy. You cannot believe how much it lifted my
spirits. Myself and a couple guys from the house got a time and day set up to go. One of the staff, Pat, took us out to the house. He had holes drilled, minnows, and he for us when we got there. So, all we had to do was drop the lines down and fish. We had a great time. Caught lots of fish to top it off. And I'd like to thank Matt Pat for
making that happen. Keep up the good work. Thanks a bunch. And we just heard a lot of beautiful stories like that. I will add um lots of guys got to bring out their family which is huge. Again, that gener generational change, a safe spot for them to connect with their kids. Um we heard a lot of that, too.
So, um and we'll put some kayaks and bikes in there this summer and it'll be our way to bring um the guys kayaking or Yeah. biking. And here's our lock zone training event. So, education, education, education. Um,
we kind of got a lot of guys out. Um, had lots of good food and prizes if they attended the event. So, it was held in the transformed by love ministry space and Essentia Health's uh Jessica Schwarz, registered nurse came to present and she gave every one of the attendees Nlloxxone. That had a huge
effect in itself. And, um, a few weeks after the Nlloxxone training event, we did have a guy um, use it on another resident in the house. He thought he was experiencing opioid overdose. He actually was experiencing a medical emergency. But nonetheless, it he did everything appropriately, called 911
right away. And it really hit home that there is no negative effect if you give a lock zone and they're not experiencing overdose. So that was just huge in our homes. I think this will have a ripple effect in our community. And there's some of the food and prizes we had at
the event and holiday dinners. Um, I think most of us know the holidays can be particularly painful for those in substance use disorder. They could have lost family members. They might not be able to see their family members. So, again, we try to create that sense of family. So, we were able to um have the
largest turnout. We asked them to invite their friends and family and they cooked amazing food, send nothing but good things. BR uses um its own personal funds to give each resident a Christmas gift, all 120 of them, just to show that
love and caring around the holidays. Um do as many of those protective factors as we can in a in a hard time. And there's our fall highway cleanup event. Um so we really take pride in our community and want them to give back to
their community. That pro-social involvement is huge. So, we adopted a piece of highway along 210 and we had a fall highway cleanup event and we hope we will have one in the spring with lots of food and prizes to get them to come out and we heard nothing but good things. They loved feeling a part of
Brainer Lakes area and giving back and good deal. Um, so we did SAPS training. This was actually training recommended by the Blade Coalition who gives out the opioid dollars. So, it stands for it's it's a bit long-winded here. strategical prevention framework application of
prevention success training. So it's a 38 hour course from SAMA the US Department of Health that six of our team members did just last week and we took a lot home. I think it'll have effect more than just our homes. I think at the community at large we learned a lot about those protective factors, how
we can implement them more in our homes. um how to decrease risk factors and how to work on that prevention including generational prevention for the men who have kids in our homes. Some testimonies are unfortunately not going to work and for the sake of time I
won't go over them today. But if you're interested in listening to some of our um beautiful testimonies we have then you can go to our website there burlingtonreoveryhomes.com. And that's all we got for you today. And we just like to thank you guys so much for allowing us to speak with you today.
We'd be happy to talk, answer questions or concerns at any time. And as you can see, we're much more than just housing. We have a passion and we just take pride in our work in our community. And thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> One one final thought. I just want to say that I'm, you know, when you
mentioned kayaking, it made me think of me trying to hold the water in South Long Lake. So, I'm going to try to do that so that you guys can come down there and kayak >> full circle. I love it. Let's do that. Thank you guys. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you.
>> Appreciate your support. >> Absolutely. Thanks, >> team. >> Thanks, Sheila. >> Next. Rod claims and collection. She told me to go up here. >> Can't hear you, Rosemary.
>> Got this mic on. >> It's coming in front. >> They're coming. >> Oh, >> so they heard me. >> Good morning. >> Good morning, commissioners, administrator. How are you? >> Excellent. Uh my name is Jeff Moan and
uh I'm an operations manager with uh Crowing County obviously community services. Uh I am responsible for our fraudrevention investigators uh program at Crowing County. And today I brought along two of my uh wonderful
colleagues uh to help uh explain and present some of the details that we have. So, um, without further ado, um, our Crowing County Fraud Prevention and Investigations is the FBI program and
it's run through the state and it's a grant-f funded program. So, you'll hear me reference FBI. Um, and that's just our program. Um, our fraud prevention program FBI uh delivers a strong financial and program
integrity integrity outcomes for our taxpayers. The program identifies and stops ineligible payments. It recovers overpaid funds and ensures public assistance reaches those who truly
qualify. Our financial integrity system defined is our fraud or FBI program. This is a prevention and an investigation program.
We also have our claims and our overpayment program. Uh and that is again recovery and prevention. And then we have our estate recovery program. And our estate recovery is postservice recovery.
some key highlights. Um, and I'll hit a lot of 2025 key highlights. Uh, in 2025, Crowing County had 1.47 1.47 million in verified cost savings to
our county across 447 cases. 11. For every dollar that we spend on this program, we get $11.54 in return. That's our benefit. That's our cost savings for every dollar.
In 2025, we had $265,000 in actual overpayment and claim assets recovered, which is actually exceeding the the dollar amount of new claims set up.
Um, currently there is $600,000 in total outstanding claims and overpayments. Um and starting in fiscal year 2026, estate recovery um
does a different reporting. So thus far in 2026, our estate recovery program, which is a post service recovery, has received uh approximately $955,000 in recovered assets.
This is revenue for for the county coming back to taxpayers as well as saving dollars that are that are going to where they need to go. Um just for scale program and t uh impact for Crowing County, um $625,000
average per month goes out to SNAP benefits and uh MIT benefits. There's $7.5 million annually that go out in assistance serving prop approximately 4,300 residents.
So even small improvements in this program integrity result in very meaningful uh financial impact to our taxpayers. Um like to introduce you to Alicia. Alicia is going to talk about uh some of our claims and overpayments.
So, for the year of 2025, um, our claims and overpayments that we established were $156,000 and the amount we were able to recover back that year was actually 265,000. So, Jeff did note that we do have about
$600,000 in past old claims. Um, for context, those claims don't go anywhere um, unless somebody has uh, death or uh, bankruptcy and only two types. Otherwise, they stay in the books and we
attempt to collect. So, that's also why that number is so large. Um, recovery finally exceeded. This is approximately 70% um reflecting our strong collection efforts that we put forth. Um so far for 2026 in the first
quarter um we have established $166,000 worth of claims. Um the amount received back so far to Crowman County was $90,000. um every the early year trend shows that there's
continued identification of overpayments with recovery expected to increase over time. That's our hope. Um and right now we have about 700 um outstanding claims or overpayments and I already covered what our current
balance is. So, >> Madam Chair, um, in those claims, when you do recover that, you know, some of that money has come out of Crowing County and gone to those people, but I'm sure some of that money also comes from other programs from the state. Do you do you just recover what comes into Crowing
or if you find a fraud issue, does there and you find, let's say it's I'm just going to throw out a number, $100,000 and $50,000 came from the taxpayers of Crowing County, this person, and 50,000 came from the state. Do you recover all 100,000 and the 50,000 goes back to the state or how does that work?
>> So, it works off a percentage base. So, the scenario you're giving because of fraud, um we're instructed by the state that we have to attempt to collect. Um and then the state reimbures us on a percentage based off of what we're able to collect.
um for fraud is a higher percent versus if there were um just plain client error where there was no fraud um or if there was an agency error. So we in the claims world do have to site agency overp
payments the way policy is set up. So in those numbers there are some of our own errors. Um we just get collect a smaller percent back for doing the work for the state. Let's use that same example of of $100,000. 50,000 was incurred by the
taxpayers of Crowing County. 50,000 was from the state. You end up going out there, going after the person, and you get $50,000 collected for that $100,000 debt. What can we expect in growing county to have come back to us?
>> So, the talk about a percentage and and a collection percentage is almost what it looks like. >> It is. And it is. And each county has a in a case if we get a fraud referral or fraud case that we work on uh and there is an overpayment that that comes back
to us and established and money comes back there's a county of financial responsibility. So if Crowing County is that established county of financial responsibility we're the ones that are issuing those benefits from Crowing County. So when we work on that case
those funds then come back to us. So then we receive, like Alicia was saying, a percentage uh of those dollars back. So we would get uh you know 20% would stay with us, the rest would go to the state. >> Okay. Okay.
Even though we incurred that expense and we're incurring the expense of you going after it. >> Correct. >> That's we get that that percentage back. >> Correct. Yes. Yes. >> I guess it's better than nothing, but it just seems like it's not as >> Yes. when you're doing all the leg work
and all the work to try to, you know, to collect money back for the state and you and we're incurring the cost of you guys doing that and thank you for what you're doing, but it just doesn't seem very equitable. >> Right. >> Madam Chair, just for clarification, the
the cost to Crowing County is their time to receive the claims or to go through the claim process. The benefits that were paid out are state or federal benefits. They're not coming out of county levy dollars that we are paying to those folks. Most cases, it is dollars that are coming from a state or
federal benefit. So, our cost is their cost to to go after the claim and that recovery. So, we're getting covered for that. That's why the the percentage is probably a little bit different when you look at that. >> So, it's the monies that's coming from the state through us, >> right? >> So, it's not directly our levy dollars
that are actually doing it, >> right? >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for that. >> So, Madam Chair, so I I just want to say I'm really glad you're here today because I h I have heard from a lot of my constituents as I'm just out and about talking and we get having
conversations and and with you you see the billions of dollars down in Minneapolis and St. Paul that have feeding our children, hospice places that are bogus, autism places that are
bogus, billions of dollars, and people are quite concerned about it. And they say, "Is there any fraud in Crowing County?" And I said, "Yes, absolutely. There's fraud in every 87 counties." And so I guess my question is is the county board
was made aware of, you know, at least one case quite a while ago and I'm just wondering where it's at. I don't maybe you can't talk about if it's still under investigation where somebody was hiding dollars and and I think it was in the neighborhood of like3 to $400,000
they've received in benefits. And if you think about that, that's just one person. >> You know, let's just say there's a hundred people like that in Crowing County out of 68,000 people that are fraudulently saying that they're not
making any money and their healthc care is paid and everything else. 100 people times $400,000. Now you're talking about some real money. And um people are quite concerned about that. But I don't know if you know which case I'm talking about, but if you I
don't know if you can talk about if it's still under investigation. I've been waiting to hear what the outcome of that is. >> Yeah. And and it is still under investigation and I'm happy to speak more detail um offline. >> Yeah. >> Um about that case and and we will touch
on a little bit of um of our work with um outside agencies like DHS and the um >> BCA as well. So um but you are you are exactly right um about that and and you know so much of
the uh this the state fraud that that you see is handled in a the investigations are hander handled at a state level. Uh from a county level we look at um primarily um our our SNAP and our MIP money. Um
there are we we find webs uh of of uh fraud that touch so many other different programs um that we have referred to uh to state agencies. Um, but you you are 100% correct. >> And then if I can just if you can just
comment on this and maybe this isn't uh you guys, maybe it's Cara Terry, but um where our staff is screening somebody in and something doesn't look right and we
reject it and they appeal it. And it seems like every single time that DHS is saying, "Nope, got to pay them." even though if it might be even shady. Am I am I stating that correctly? >> Yeah, it's from as far as
>> waiver. >> So, uh, Commissioner, Madame Chair, um I think that's more specific to the waiver programs when we deny um requested expenditures and the state says no, you they're going to get them. Um, we do
have, um, a great team of financial workers who works very closely with this team and if something smells a little fishy or seems off, they are reporting it to our collections team and the team is taking steps to deal with or investigate that further.
>> Right. But but even though when we're when we're saying no, something smells fishy, then DHS is literally, you know, overruling us >> on the waiverss specifically. Yeah. Um, in terms of the um, financial assistance programs that these guys are here to
speak about today, there are rules that we have to follow in terms of eligibility and if it appears that they are eligible, then we have to approve their cases. We can't say, "No, this seems a little off to us, um, we're not going to approve it today." If they provide all of the verifications and we
can say, "Yep, you've met all of the program requirements," then we approve the benefits. And then if the financial workers feel that something's off, they report that to this team and they're very aggressive in their um investigations. Um but around the
waiverss, yeah, we're overruled on We'll talk more about that when we present to you on LTSS stuff. So something to look forward to. >> Um and I'd like to introduce uh Michelle to present uh a little bit more about fraud. Hi, I'm Michelle Node and I'm
proud to say I'm the public assistance fraud investigator for Crowing County. Um, I'm presented to you regarding our cost savings and program effectiveness. And the definition of this is cost savings represent benefits that would have been issued if fraud in in
eligibility had not been identified and stopped. I'm proud to say for our fiscal year of 2025, we are 82% increase in our cost savings and overpayments. We did roughly over $1.4
million. $1.4 million since uh taking over the program here for the last two years. Uh we did over 447 cases. We are 5% of the statewide cost savings
while representing 1% of the population. A return on investment. Our state requires $3 per $1 invested. The state average is $5.60 per $1 invested. And I am proud to say we're at $11.54
$1 invested in this program. >> You like your job? >> Oh, I love my job 100%. I think it's a very important role we have within our community and and I and I take it seriously. I do very much so. Um for our
investigations, pipeline enforcement, fraud referral activity for 2026 and quarter 1 is 90 referrals uh 110 referrals unassigned. So we have uh a total of backlog of those are are outstanding cases. This reflects uh strongly on our detection efforts and
that's just a hit back with our financial workers. Crowing County financial workers are wonderful and if your income doesn't uh fit what you're applying for, they will rest assured provide me with a fraud referral to investigate that. Uh for criminal enforcement, I have three active criminal court cases. I'm proud to say I
have submitted to the Crowing County Sheriff's Office. They are wonderful to work with and have reviewed and sent that over to the prosecuting attorney's office for review. I have one additional case which is under investigation with the BCA. Um administrative disqualification hearings. I've increased that percentage
here in our county and I'm proud to say we have $32,000 worth of uh um administrative disqualification hearings. Those go from one year two year to permanently. We have seven ADH actions in 2026 that I've recorded. Doesn't mean that's our
total for this quarter. Our ADHD hearings determine whether an intentional program violation has occurred and outcomes may result in signed intentional program violations after presented to the clients. Clients are disqualified from benefits for again at least for one year to two years to
permanently. Um and then we have supports uh both cost savings and claims recovery. These actions are critical to enforce the tool that protects program integrity and deters fraud here in our county, which I will remain to deter fraud in Crowing
County. >> So like what you're saying, >> commissioners, this is not just a compliance function. It's a strategic investment in responsible government. This program protects taxpayer dollars.
It reduces waste in public systems. It ensures benefits reach eligible residents and it builds public trust in county administration. Growing county is already outperforming state benchmarks and demonstrating very
strong results. It's our vision uh that we want to evolve and uh reactive revolve from a reactive investigation model into a fully integrated financial integrity system. So, we want to get our our
connect our fraud prevention, our claims history, and our estate recovery, which are all minorly siloed. We want to put those together um and talk to each other to benefit what we have growing. Um
ultimately, this program is about public trust. Residents expect the county government will be careful stewards of public dollars. This FBI program is one of the clearest ways to demonstrate that expectation in
action by ensuring accountability, reducing waste, and reinforcing confidence in the systems that support our county. That is it. Any questions for us?
>> I will. Madam Chair, Madam Chair, >> these these uh fraud investigators sitting next to me, uh we did not bring the whole the whole team. Um but but uh our public assistance fraud investigators um I I couldn't be more proud of the work that they do. Um and
um the things that they that they find and dig into and it's just uh humbling every day to work with some wonderful people. So, we see we we're we're a little bit different um you know, in terms of our uh what we offer to the
county. Um we're we're not always looked at as uh as helpful. Um but really we we are we're helping the taxpayer overall. >> I'm sure uh this has been asked and answered
twice already, but I think it's very important for our constituents. So, I'm going to ask it again in a in a little bit different way just because I want it to be cemented. If someone comes in and applies for benefits at Growing County, those
benefits are coming from state or federal dollars, not county dollars. Correct. >> Correct. >> We are the funnel. Community services is the funnel that that those dollars go through to our constituents. Correct. >> Correct. And if there's fraud suspected,
it ends up on your desk, which appoint county employees are investigating that fraud and pursuing potential charges against those people who are fraudulently taking money from tax dollars. Correct. >> Correct.
>> Okay. And then the last thing is I you I believe I heard you uh correctly in saying that if if it's a $100 that comes back uh Crowing County is actually retaining $20 of that 20% roughly. >> There's it's a it's a it's a percentage
based on the program. So, um the estate recovery percentages would be very different than um like a fraud overpayment or a client error overpayment. Uh we would take
>> anywhere from probably around 10 to 7% down to about 3%. um if it were our error. Uh one of the benefits uh is we're collecting on cases sometimes that the claims aren't even from our county um because those claims
will follow somebody who moves from place to place. So we're attempting to collect on whatever type of claims are open. Even if uh the claim started in Morrison County, they now moved to Crowing the program is open. We also
have to function with the program helping pay itself back. Um it's called recoupment and we would get because we're the one administering and we're attempting to recoup and stay up on that. Uh we're getting that percentage instead of the county that set up the
claim because we're currently now handling it and taking the basically those funds in. So depending on the program really depends on uh the percentage of retention funds that we get to keep. She had mentioned the state recovery. Um the state recovery has one
program that we can retain 50%. Um that was an old old uh old system from back in the 90s. Um so but typically it's around that 20 to 24% for a state recovery get down to 5 to 7 um depending
on the program. So perfect. Thank you. >> Just another question. So how many how many people how many staff people are working on fraud here in Crowing County? >> Right there. We have we have one
additional uh we were blessed to uh based on the work that we did I I presented uh last year. Based on the work we did, we were uh eligible for a larger grant funding from the state to um bring in another fraud investigator,
which is where Lysa came from. So, we have two fraud investigators, which brings us to one uh one employee who does the um claims and overpayments. So, everything that these two do is going to funnel down to that one person
um to complete those cases. So, and then we have one individual as well that does a state recovery. >> There's four in our >> Yeah. And then I would just say that it's it's sad though that the taxpayers I would assume that part of your wages and I'm looking at Cara that that they
part of your wages are paid for by people's property taxes or levy dollars. I would assume it's not all paid for by grants. And then when we always say, well, it's grant dollars. It's like this grant dollars is coming from Mars. No, it's people's people are having to pay
their taxes to hire fraud detectors to get the crooks. >> Yeah. So, the these two um sitting at the table uh who do our fraud investigations, they're covered by the grant, but you're right, Commissioner, it's a state grant, which means it's
taxes through the state. So, you're absolutely right. I know we always seem to think grants and it's like it's somewhere else or federal money. I don't know about anybody else, but I pay a lot of federal taxes. So
anyway, thank thanks for the job you guys do. I appreciate it. There's nothing I hate worse than somebody that's a a crook or a fraud or anything like that. I I I I'm like I said, I'm trying to be kinder and gentler or I won't be saying
what I think that should happen to them. But anyway, I'll leave it at that. Right. Right. >> I do have to say though, despite what we do with the amount of money that goes out to help those that are here, the percentage of people that are really doing the stuff that we're getting cases
on is a small percentage based upon our entire total population that is is receiving these funds. where I'm finding most of my public assistance where I'm finding where bigger cases are occurring is medical assistance fraud. And a lot of that has to do with a lot of
contractor type of positions here within our community. And a lot of those times I'm finding those clients that I do investigate are making a lot more money than the people that we always seem to suspect are the ones that are committing the fraud. Typically the frauds that I have where I think people have an idea
of the criminal side of things or those who do drugs. When I find income within those type of clients, I'm not finding income where they are going above the federal poverty guideline, I do hold those accountable. I do seek them to be disqualified, which I will continue to
do because that is my job because you are supposed to reporting your income correctly. But where I'm finding where the significant amount of fraud is is within our community of those who are making a lot more money than those and should not even be qualifying to receive those funds to begin with.
>> Right. One other program that I think I've always always even when I was in the state senate, the legislature, I was in on the health and human services committee for eight years, the PCA program. I I I believe that that there's
some good things happening there, but then I think on the other hand, I think there's people that are getting paid to supposedly take care of somebody and they're not really taking care of anybody. I think they're just they're just getting paid, you know, and so I'm
really suspect to that program, too. I just think I just think that it's too bad our society has to have people that are not of good moral clarity, I guess. So, thank you. >> Thank you.
>> Thank you. >> Very much sit here. Patrick, >> be able to see the screen, too. So, >> okay. Go like this. If you give us just one second to get set up, we just have to plug in the
computer so we can log into Teams to give you our presentation. All right. So, while you do that, Patrick, I'll kick us off. Is that okay? >> Perfect. >> All right. Cara Terry, director of community services. Uh good morning and thank you for the opportunity to present
or provide an overview of the work done through community services over the past year. Together, our divisions of adult services, children and family services, community wellness, which involves long-term care and public health, and community corrections form a system of
support that touches residents at every stage of life. Our team works every day to ensure that individuals in and families in Crowing County have access to the resources they need to be safe, healthy, and stable. Whether that support comes in the form of financial assistance, mental health care,
disability services, child protection, housing stability, family home visiting, public health prevention, or justice system supervision. We aim to meet people where they are and help them move forward toward better outcomes. In 2025,
we saw strong demand across all program areas. Families relied on public assistance to maintain stability. Our child protection and family services team worked to keep children safe and supported. Adults and older residents depended on case management, care
coordination, and protective services. And our public health and emergency preparedness efforts helped to strengthen communitywide resilience. Throughout the year, our teams adapted to significant legislative changes, rising service needs, and complex
individual situations, always with a focus on serving well, delivering value, and driving meaningful results. What stands out most to me over this past year is the dedication of staff across all divisions and the way they collaborate with one another, with our
partners, and with the community. So today we'll walk through the key complete the key works completed in each division and highlight the impact that these services had on the people of Crowing County. This is our first attempt at an online report for you. Our goal is to further revise this
information and publish an online dashboard to share our work with the public. If after this presentation you have any ideas on how we can improve this report andor tell our story in general, please let us know. I want to give a special shout out to Patrick Lake
and Gina Hire who created this report. Uh they've done a great job. So I'm going to kick us off with a fiscal overview and then we'll turn it over to Tammy Luick who'll give an adult services um presentation. So first of all um and April is here for any questions that you might have. You
can see our accounting department and the information provided. Um we broke down uh where our expenditures go. As you can see, social services takes up the biggest chunk of the pie. And then expenditures um by category, if you can
scroll down, um personnel services um is the biggest chunk of our of our pot of money. I won't spend a lot of time here unless you want us to because you hear a lot about the budget in different um environments, but uh we certainly have a
significant uh budget. If you want to scroll down, fraud prevention and recovery. Uh, you heard about this already, so I will not spend a lot of time here. The one thing I will note, um, I hope you guys know how good of work our team is doing. Um, and because
you authorized that additional person, how much better we're doing in terms of um, fraud prevention and recovery. other counties and even the state are calling us, not us, not me, our fraud prevention team, asking for assistance or their
insight in how they can do their jobs better and or to help support other counties. To which of course we have to say, we'll do as much as we can to support or provide information, but our staff are busy enough. We can't take on work for state agencies or other counties, but here's what we do to make
a really big impact in the county. So, thank you for supporting that team and all of the work that they do because they're doing really great stuff. >> This is kind of exhausting to cuz I know Commissioner Lubkkey goes to a lot of AMC meetings and those other commissioners think that they're the
trailblazers, but actually Crowing County is the trailblazer of a lot of things. They >> we're we're we're way ahead of them. Commissioner Lubkkey >> in certain areas. I would have to agree. >> Oh, yes. in every area >> and this area specifically. Right.
>> This area specifically. >> So now I will turn it over to Tammy Luke who will present on the adult services area. >> Morning Madam Chair, fellow commissioners. Tammy Luick, adult services manager. And I think just because this is our first
time doing this, we're trying to figure out how to I think try to keep it somewhat of a recap. and I'm hoping that you'll be able to take some time afterwards to be able to go in and look at things that you want to look at more closely. Adult Services Division provides a wide range of programs supporting adults with mental health
needs, uh, substance use disorders, disability services, housing instability, safety concerns, financial and health care. Um, the division emphasizes treatment support, community stability, safety, and access to essential barriers. The first um area of
programming is our financial units that are under my um preview, I guess, or um proof. I can't say that word very well this morning. I'm going to change it under my umbrella. Uh so we have supervisor Andrea Gutner and Supervisor Tammy Mulroy uh that supervises our Mets
team. So there are healthc care programs, our long-term care income maintenance program, and our adult income maintenance program. I did um cases from 24 and 25 just for a reflection for you. Um not a lot of
change um from 24 to 25 in these areas. Um all right, we'll scroll down. Crowing County Disability Team. Um our comprehensive re-entry social workers over in the jail and adult foster care are under the supervision of Trish Xstead. Um, our disability team includes
all of our under 65 waiver programs and um, the adult foster care. We we have the oversight over 70 adult foster care homes. You can see again just the cases, little bit of increase, not much from um, year-over-year for disability. We saw a large increase um, of the
screenings we've been doing over in the jail. And I think some of that was staffing turnover. We had some staff. Um we I think in 24 there were some staffing and I think that we had a solid team in uh 25. Uh one of the things that you talked about earlier was the
integrity of these programs. I think this is an area um Commissioner Coring you brought up around PCA now been renamed CFSS. Um and I know you're happy to hear that right. Don't ask me what it stands for. No teasing. Uh so I just
want to just touch on that we also are very concerned about the integrity of these programs. Uh these programs serve people with disabilities, vulnerable u individuals and it's important to us to have these programs have integrity as well. Our case managers um many times
are the first reporters of things that we see that are um that just maybe don't um appear right or maybe where we do question maybe whether or not an individual is actually providing that care. we are able to make those reports um in to um the attorney general's
office um and for investigation or to be at least investigated or looked at. So I just wanted to me make mention of that. Uh I think the I think you know with our Can you go back up? Sorry. Oh, um with the jail programming, um that's the work
we've been doing in the jail to provide um mental health services, screening and um services while individuals are in custody as well as upon discharge and um we work on their mental health supports while they're in um in custody. Tammy, before you go too much further on these
cases, are these cases like if it's somebody that's u management of income or what one of those cases you had foster care, are they, you know, do they reup every year? Do you look at that case or is that case, you know, stay in year after year or do that case go for and then that case goes down and another
case comes up? >> So, in the waiver programs, um, we do have some up and down. It doesn't it's not fluctuating, um, you know, like big fluctuation. Sometimes it's people that are moving into our community and their waiver will follow them from the community they've been in. Um and
sometimes individuals leave our community. Sometimes we have people that pass away in those programs as well. So those are some of those fluctuations. Um this is the area that men choices assessments look at eligibility for the for that disability waiver programs for um disability services as well as
elderly waiver which Gina will talk about. Uh I think when you talk about our foster care homes, most of our homes typically are um available each year. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> We have a little bit of I think we've had just a little bit of growth in that area. I think we went up two homes from
the previous year. >> Thank you. >> Uh here I want to share um one of our CRE uh success stories. So at 23, she had been arrested eight times in 17 months, caught in a cycle of untreated mental health needs, substance use, and
housing instability. Each time she returned to the jail, the CRE team met her with um daily check-ins and steady support. Over time, she began engaging in treatment. She completed multiple inpatient programs, trying new medications with the team's
encouragement. As her progress grew, it became clear she needed more than outpatient care to stay stable. The CRE team advocated for her and secured placement in an adult foster care home with 24-hour support. With the structure and the continued engagement, she has stabilized and remains active in
treatment and has had no further contact with law enforcement nor incarcerations. All right. Adult mental health. Um so the this area of um mental health, substance use and housing is supervised by Rachel Zita Shabband. Um she
supervises the adult mental health um case management that also includes our civil commitments and um the substance use disorder which is our Suds work. They do um work around treatment coordination, direct access, referrals to treatment and um the staff we have in
this area also participate in DWI, drug court and our ATI programming. Um the CD team also does um over does oversight for our civil commitments that include dual diagnosis like mental health and CD and then our CD commitments. And then
our housing team, you can see there 418 clients. this past year. We have two staff that um dedicate time in this area. They support individuals that are unhoused, experiencing unstable housing, and transitioning from treatment programs back into community. They also
work very closely um with our shelter staff over at the emergency shelter through bridge on 7th and um and then the open arms um drop-in center. They have started a new program called um pathways and pathways is some of the um
it's the idea of putting a goal plan in front of individuals that are unhoused at our shelter and then working towards um housing and housing stability. The Crowing County Men Choices Adult Protection and um coordinated community response. We have lots of acronyms. I
think I must have chased Commissioner Coring out at the door uh with them and teasing men choices. Um this is supervised by Morgan Altos. Men choices is the face-to-face assessments for disability and long-term support needs. This is how individuals
get on um disability wavered programming as well as our elderly waiver programs. Um they have to go through this assessment. Uh this last year we did um 1,184 assessments. you see a little bit of a downtick from last year and you all are fully aware because we were here just
last week talking about the weight list for men choices assessments. Um and the reason we had a somewhat of a downtick was our staffing turnover in this area and some of our medical leaves. Adult protection here um reports stayed about the same
and um but we did screen in um more. There's actually an error up there. 485 screened in for investigation from in 24. That's um incorrect. I think it was like around 154. So we did or 50 something like that. Um apologize for that. We we had caught it
and it didn't get corrected on this one. But um 294 were screened in for investigation in 25. And that um that's been a little bit of a change with what the state is requiring us to screen in. They are looking for a 30% screenin rate. And that's the idea of that
sometimes when we get those calls, they want us to go lay eyes on these individuals. Sometimes um these reports come in, we maybe can't determine whether or not this person is a vulnerable adult and we're going to go out and we're going to check. So um we hit this last year I think 36% for our
screen in. So we are going and actually checking on the some of these individuals in a I think in a um more concerted way than maybe we had been prior. if we couldn't really determine through a report whether or not somebody was a vulnerable adult, um we typically in the past had just screen those out
and then maybe you'd get another call and then maybe that's when we'd screen it in, but um or sometimes we didn't get another call. So, uh we work pretty closely with law enforcement in this in this program area. Um we do some of our investigations together because um we have the civil side and law enforcement
has the criminal side. Coordinated community um response is also in this area. This is our law enforcement social workers that work alongside law enforcement. Um here too you see a little bit of an increase. Um 850 calls in 2024 and 940 calls um in
2025. Uh that's a really large number. Um this is the calls that we respond to as well as the ones we follow up on. We're not 247 team. So, um, when we see ICRs the next day, we are following up on any of the, um, calls that have been
considered a mental health situation or something where we know that our social service programs potentially could be assisting or helping in the situation of these individuals, right? All right. And there you see our team and um and their calls over and you
can see we've had some growth obviously in this area and that's really deepening our roles and just expanding our impact and really hoping to create community safety. >> All right. And then the last can I just ask one question on the on the CCR team?
Are they working throughout the county or is it mostly concentrated in one particular area? I know that one time there was some discussion about, you know, looking at further outreach throughout the community. >> Yeah. And I think that would maybe be a good chart to include in the future.
Primarily our um our calls come from um Crowing County Sheriff's Office, Brainer, and Baxter. Um, we do serve all jurisdictions and um, just sometimes I think the time to get up there sometimes can be a little challenging if we're doing a co-response, but we definitely
go with um, law enforcement in those other jurisdictions and do knock and talks, which means that we'll maybe if there's been a call out to that home a couple of times or maybe even one time, but um, Chief Davis and Peekquat has seen something that they're like, can you come out and help us? We will go out
with them and um, meet with the individual. So, we do we definitely are doing that and if we are able to, we'll even do a co-response with them if um if we're if we're in that area. So, >> and we're still talking with our um community partners up in the northern um
end of the county. So, that is a continued discussion on how we can better support them as well. >> Thank you. >> And then just just ending with um something we're quite proud of. Um this is the work that many of you were or you were fully aware of. Um, in December of
2025, we received a um emergency um protective service report from um from the I think here from DHS. I had to remember which department it was. Um and this was regarding one of our assisted living that was um going to be receiving
a revoked license. Uh this was an emergency respon response that was activated um to address unsafe deteriorating conditions at an assisted living here locally. We had 42 vulnerable residents that required immediate protection, stabilization, and coordinated um transition planning. Um
not only did our human service, social service side, public health, state regulators, and community partners um came together to really ensure safety, continuity of care, we also had a co outbreak while we were there. Um so I just I think highlight this this idea of
serve well. We had rapid deployment of county and public health staff. We had daily on-site presence to safeguard our residents safety, their dignity and their essential cares. And we had an immediate response to the CO 19 um that was that was going on in that building.
Delivering value, we activated other multi- agencies in our community, not only at the community level, but also at the county and state level. Public health secured and distributed PPE that the facility did not have on-site and um assisted with technical
guidance for the staff that were there. Our adult services led individ individualized transition planning to ensure each resident um's medical, social, and housing needs were addressed. Uh there were individuals there, some had case management with our agency, but some lived there um
privately on private pay. And um we we assigned um each of our staff to everyone that was living there so that they we were able to look at that how we were going to transition each of them and worked with their families. Drive results. All 42 residents were safely transitioned to appropriate settings
within 7 weeks. We had no additional health and safety incidents occurred during our intervention and we did um we did an excellent job managing the CO 19 exposure risk there. The impact was that we protected vulnerable adults during a period of
significant instability. We strengthened cross agency partnerships and operational readiness and we delivered measurable outcomes under pressure reinforcing the value of coordinated community and public health systems. Any questions in my areas of adult services? >> Madam chair on that one. Um, and I did
see I don't remember the exact amount, but there was an invoice I think you put together with all your expenses and everything that you incurred, which I thought when I looked at it, the number didn't look like it was enough considering what the effort you guys did and and the people that weren't being
taken care of at the county because you were there taking care of what had to be done. Um, have we been paid for that? >> No, not yet. our county attorney is working with their attorney. Um, so more
to come. They've been sent a certified copy uh of the invoice. Um, so >> the original invoice was sent out the beginning of March. I believe we have not received payment on that yet. So last Friday, we sent them a certified
mail copy of the invoice as well >> because that was I I won't say above and beyond the call of duty because you guys do that on a regular basis, but it it really made me feel good about being a county commissioner when I knew the staff was out there taking care of the
vulnerables in a say in an area where somebody wasn't doing it that was actually licensed by the state to do that. So thank you for that service. >> Yeah. And I I I would be remiss if I didn't mention Gina Hire played a instrumental role in this. So got I'm
the one delivering and Patrick as well, but I'm the one delivering that that report because it was definitely a collaborative effort between all of our teams. But um anyway, want to give her credit for that as well. >> Madam Chair, I just want to compliment the team on stepping up and Gina and and
the group for doing what you're doing. Can you just elaborate a little bit on the great relationship you have with DHS now that they have a better understanding Yeah, I would say that um they are very aware of the concerns that we have in this area around um
just their oversight um being at the facility um checking on things. We currently have another facility that we've had some things going on and we're like where are you? Who's assigned to this particular facility? Um so we are asking those questions for sure and
really um we know who to call now I guess. Uh and then the other thing that I would just say uh was thinking through it uh with the department of health and they have definitely been reaching back out to us as well. Um we've even said about some things that they could have done in advance of this that we could
have assisted and helped them with. These are providers and facilities that we have relationships with and was there some things that we could have been doing more proactively if we would have had some awareness around um the concerns that were um being sent to the department of health on this. We also
asked just on a a side note that uh they let us know what happens with the facility if they are going to reopen because they do maintain their lensure or if they're going to sell it. So we've asked them to keep us updated on on
what's going on there so we can both mentally and physically prepare. I I'll just say that uh as long as I'm in this seat, if you need any additional help with communication down there, let me know. I'm more than happy to step up. >> Thank you.
>> I can say different things than you folks can say. >> That's for sure. >> Thank you, Tammy. All right. Children and family services and Cara Griffin. Good morning. Cara Griffin, the manager for the children and family services
division. Um, we will start with our public assistance programs that that group is super uh supervised by by Sarah Musk. And um, so as you can see, our family team case load has kind of leveled out.
We had an increase of families that were eligible for the programs due to COVID. So, there were higher income guidelines. They we also had a higher unemployment rate. So, we're back to our precoid numbers for our case load. This team is
responsible for our MIP, our child care assistance, uh medical assistance, and cash. So, and food stamps. So, that's what that chart right there um reflects. The next table is our self-support index. Again, we're back to in the
middle there. You'll see the 73% back in 2019 to 2020. That number is showing we're going back to our precoid numbers of 73% that is reflecting that individuals that are either receiving
MIP cash assistance or leave and are working 30 hours or more. So, we're tracking those families for three years to ensure they receive their cash benefits and now do they have sustainability within our community and
are not coming maybe back on assistance. So, again, that's a positive reflection of the impact that our public assistance is having for Crowing County families. Um, we can scroll down our child care case load. Again, we would like to see
those numbers higher. Child care means that the family is working or going to school full-time. There has been some stringent requirements that the state of Minnesota has put on providers as well as this program. We are pleased to say
that the legislation is looking at um having a more realistic approach to the requirements for our providers in our community as well as the families that would benefit from child care assistance. Um, we work very closely with our providers to make sure that the
families are getting their paperwork in timely so that we can have reimbursement go out back out to those providers in a timely manner um so those kids can continue to receive care. Uh, next we'll go to child support. Uh, Karen Holt is a supervisor for this uh,
team. again um 70 the last 5 years that 75% is our goal for collections in 2025. We hit that the entire year. We're on track to hit that for 2026. Um, an area that influences this number is making
sure that we are taking action on court orders and ensuring that the amount that somebody is ordered to pay reflects what their current wage or salary um or their ability to earn is properly uh recorded.
So, for example, if you have a child support order that is ordering you to pay an amount that you're not able to pay, then that number is going to be lower and it doesn't fare as well maybe for the family. Um, wherever whatever primary home those kids are in, uh, it
prevents that parent from being able to budget. So, um, the team is doing is doing good work there. The next table, I think this is interesting. When you look at here in Crowing County, the green um bar or series shows current uh Crowing
County. The orange bar is the state of Minnesota. So here in Crowing County, we have a lower percentage of cases that we're collecting child support on that are receiving public assistance. So it's currently back in 2025, it was around
that 5% of the family. So 95% of our child support cases are families that are not receiving public assistance. So we're collecting funds um hopefully to keep them off of public assistance and not needing that uh based on getting child support into the home.
Okay, we can go back now to now we're moving into our family social services area. So that would be the child protection, children's mental health, child welfare, adoption, licensing. Um, a highlight of our team every year is the radioathon. It's it's a 24h hour. We
have auction items. Um, the Hubard broadcasting radio station strongly supports this. A number of you have um went on air and um participated in interviews which we greatly appreciate our community support and our elected
officials showing up and supporting that. So, it was a great year. Over 110,000 was raised last year. The first area for family social services would be our intake, child protection, and assessment. Margaret Wisco is the supervisor in this area.
Our uh child protection reports continue to be around 1,600 reports on any given year. We're already into the second quarter, the fourth month of the year, and we're on track uh to continue to receive about 1,600 child protection reports. Um and then the
orange uh graph is the child welfare or children's mental health. So those would be requests or um reports that are more suited based on the child's behaviors or the child's um mental health needs for children's mental health and child
welfare would be those services that are not at the child protection threshold. for assessments and investigations in 2025, we went down a little lower. It's good to see that number while our reports continue to be at that $1600 or
1,600 um reports, our actual ones that are screened in is slowly um trending down. We believe that is due to our prevention and preservation efforts. So for every single child protection report that we receive, even if it doesn't meet
the threshold for a child protection response, we are having some type of response as an agency. That might mean sending a social worker out to do a knock and talk and say, "We got this report. There's some concerns. We want to preserve your family. We want your
your family to be healthier. What can we do to support you?" It might be a children's mental health worker reaching out and seeing if it's getting services in the home. Um POP um or a community provider. We have a lot of community resources that can help to stabilize our
families. Um then so our child welfare pop case openings that's that first the top chart there on the screen. We did have some instability in our staffing during the 2022, 23 and then 24 um years
and we had a lot of turnover in our intake and assessment team and we had to shift staff from children's mental health, from child welfare, from peace because we have to meet timelines and keep the kids safe. So if we get a report, we're not able to maybe put it
on a wait list. We have to get out there and have a response. So we did shift staff to cover the child protection needs. Our POP outcomes, the green one shows for 2024 that 22% of the families that
we opened. POP uh stands for parent support outreach program. So that's one of those non-child protection response. You're maybe at risk or you even had involvement. And now we're still working to reserve um and prevent out of home
placement or child protection. So 22% of those families had some type of child protection report screened in prior to us opening. We track families to see were our PAOP efforts making a difference. Are they coming back into
our system? And in 2024, you'll see that 12% had a report came back in within 12 month months of us closing. Um, so that's telling us that we are making a difference in those families. When you
think of these are families that are at risk for child protection or had been involved. Those are just additional services and programs that the team so uses to support um the families. Next, we have ongoing child protection. Stacy Brown is
the supervisor for this area. While we noticed we had a a lower amount of assessments and investigations, you'll see that while we had a lower amount of investigations, we had more egregious families that we were working with. So, we had an increase of ongoing child
protection cases opened. We went from 24 to 42. So more of the families that we had screened in for an assessment or investigation resulted in us needing to file a CHIPS petition, a child in need of protective services with the court
and have county attorney involvement, parent attorneys assigned with or without out of home placement. Our out of home placement budget um has been remaining pretty steady with um we had less unduplicated number of kids in
care. So 144 kids in care during the year of 2025. We averaged about 76 kids in care each month. You may recall back seven eight years ago when our out of home placement budget was very high uh
$5 million I believe. Uh we had we were close to that um 200 mark. So, uh, the number of kids each month and in 2026, we're now sitting at around 80 kids in care. So, we would still consider that that to be stable.
Uh, foster, here's my plug. We're always looking for foster homes here in Crowing County. So, whether that's being fully licensed and providing shelter or a permanency home or a short-term home, or you don't have to be fully licensed, you can provide respit. And that's for kids
that are at risk for out of home placement or in need of out of home placement um and to support other f uh foster homes. So if anyone is interested at all in becoming a family foster home uh please reach out to community services
and C. So children's mental health is supervised by Pat Sherba. He's actually retiring in May. um we will be looking to replace um his position and uh the we were able to get those numbers up.
There's definitely a high demand for children's mental health case management and we increased um from 40 to 50 last year and we are on track to open even more cases u based on first quarter in 2026.
And um there's I thought there was one more thing around the children's men halls but I cannot recall. So questions for me >> just not a big question but any idea on what you think the upturn is that you're
seeing for the first quarter >> for children's mental health? Um you you know I think kids in our community uh they reflect what's happening right in as a society and with with parents and instability. Um it could be our outreach
efforts because we have seen an an uptick in residential placements for kids. Part of part of a trend that I noticed was it seemed as though parents were reaching out when they were at exhaustion and so saying I need a mental health children's mental health case
manager to support my family my child my kid needs to be placed in residential or even our mental health providers reaching out at time of this kid needs a 35day eval or residential. So, our efforts have been to as soon as that kid
is on our radar, whether through law enforcement or school, that we're aggressively reaching out and saying, "What can we do to help you?" Because there are community based services that we need to exhaust. According to Minnesota statute, we are required to
exhaust community-based services before we look at residential placement. We know that uh residential placement is actually not the answer. it we do not have as good of outcomes. Kids that are placed in residential have an 80 to 90%
recidivism, meaning that they're going to need another placement versus if we can keep them in the community, um a much higher likelihood of being successful. >> Yeah, thank you. >> All right, community corrections is next
with Christa Jones. Thank you, Griffin. gonna take this off here. Just don't tell my doctor. >> Nobody will know. Nobody will know. >> Good morning, commissioners. Madam Chair, Christa Jones, community corrections manager. Um, I just want to
start by saying, as you know, corrections is undergoing significant reform across the state of Minnesota, both in the prison systems and in community supervision. With increased funding came significant change in expectations from the state as well as
accountability for agencies to show that we are implementing evidence-based practices with fidelity. In order to do this, manageable case loads are essential. In the last few years, we've made great progress in reducing case loads. Thanks
to all of you for investing in the department and to our work with our stakeholders, the bench, the county attorney's office on how we manage cases. We are in a much better place. In this report, you'll see the different case loads and the average case load
size for each. When we presented on case load sizes, I think it was in August, um we were able to show the reduction in case load since 2023 to you all. Um on the first slide here um you can
see some data on client contacts and our drug tests for 2025. Um ensuring contact standards are met according to risk level is important and as you can see there are a lot of contacts. Um for the total contacts we
included field visits, office visits, phone contact which includes texting, um email. The collateral contacts doesn't just involve clients, but it also involves all of those contacts made to family members, to service providers, to
other case workers. Um and then our total drug tests um completed in 2025. Um although all of that is super important like meeting our contact standards is very
important. Um what is more important is what is actually happening in those contacts because as research shows that is what has the greatest impact on creating behavior change for people long term. Um that's why we've included some
information in this report on how we do the work. Um and also kind of explaining in detail which area of supervision and what they do including the average case load size for that area and then some
slides on how we do the work. Um knowing that this is also going to go out to the public. I think it's important to provide that level of detail as well. Um it's complicated work. It's hard to wrap your mind around everything that agents are doing these days. We wear a lot of
different hats. Much different than when I began 30 years ago. I can tell you that. Um, a couple of slides here are on um the RNR model, which is risk, needs, and responsivity. That is really kind of at the core of the work that we do now in
corrections. And then the pyramid there really shows um how we do the work as well. first assessing those risk and needs. Um once the criminogenic needs are identified, um it's really about enhancing that motivation with the
clients using motivational interviewing, building that effective alliance. Um and it's just imperative in our work with them. Having the time to do that with manageable case loads um has made it much um easier to do that work.
um manageable case loads really do make all the difference. Uh there's also a lot of information in the report about various cognitive programming that we do. Um as you can see all of these different areas, our traditional case loads, sex
specific supervision, the average case loads underneath there. I'm not going to read through. I hope you guys can take the time to go into more detail. Our domestic violence supervision is an area we've really focused on these last few years to enhance that. Um, and as you
know, our our average case load sizes have dropped significantly in spite of during COVID, we saw a big increase in our domestic violence population. We continue to see um that influx. just even in looking at um jail
arraignments every day, you can see how many of them are actually domestic violence related cases. We we continue to see that area. So, I'm I'm happy that we chose that area to be an area where we really are working on enhancing that
supervision. Um and um we're able to pull some of that programming because we had to. There was no provider in the area that um provided men's non-violence groups and they are statutoily required
for us to provide that to clients under that supervision. So we now have the duth model and family peace initiative that agents are facilitating groups for. Um, as I have reported previously, our ability to expand in
that area has just increased um due to agents having the the capacity to do that. Now, um, two years ago, like I said, we had two cognitive programming groups that we were doing. Today, we have eight um, in a lot of different
areas. these two with regard to our domestic violence population. We have moving on for our gender responsive case load. We have driving with care. Um we have our um moral recognation therapy groups that agents do. Um our
alternatives to incarceration program really does a lot um with moral recognation therapy and those those groups. Um, actually I can say this because because Patrick wouldn't mind, but the young man who was here from
Burlington Recovery Homes is actually one of our ATI graduates in that program. Um, wish he was still here to speak to his experience because um, he would have a lot to say about that. Pat was on probation for a long time, so um,
the difference in how probation is working. Um, a lot of our clients could tell you firsthand the impact that that has had on them in their recovery. Um, yeah,
our transfer out supervision, um, as you know, we did, um, have the, uh, opportunity to, um, reclassify that to an agent position. that is a a case load that I know I shared previously is a
real monster. Um the amount of cases that we get um that we're transferring and moving between counties, moving between states. Um they have a lot of timelines associated with them. Um and it's a large number of cases. So that
case load is in a much better place. Um we have somebody in there now who's just a rock star. Um super organized. um has really done a lot with that case load and we are meeting our timelines um with uh interstate compact. Um they're very
happy about that as well. They get a little orary when you're not. So that has been a huge improvement for us. Um I'll talk about the numbers with adult investigations when we get um further along. We have those numbers. That's our
PSIs, our worksheets, our minads, all of that work that is um ordered by the courts. Um our probation service center supervision is our essentially our telephone reporting system. Um currently that's at 315
clients. We have one agent and one case aid who manages that. That is more of our lower level um offenses. Um and those clients that can be reduced down because they're doing well in some of the higher level supervision case loads,
we have to um reassess their risk with the validated tools that we use. And when they um are starting to score lower on those risk assessments and demonstrating um that they're doing well on probation, we take some cases and
reduce them down to that um probation service center supervision as well. That gives the agents who are supervising those higher risk individuals additional time to be able to spend with that clientele. Um our juvenile supervision um average
case load is around 40. That has been an area these last two areas juvenile supervision and and supervised release are two areas that we are seeing an increase in. Um the uh juvenile supervision we use um
decision points a lot as part of our COG teaching and programming with those clients. Um the complexity of those cases I think is something that has all really um we all share that um concern.
the um the mental health with some of the kids in the younger ages that we're seeing um is a real challenge and um those services in the community that were able to get in there early like um
Cara talked about is just essential to trying to stabilize that family and get them get them some support in there. um our supervised release population. That has been an area that has been increasing. Um
the Minnesota Rehabilitation and Reinvestment Act that was passed by the legislature, um we know is going to have further impact on that area. Um they're going to be getting out sooner and they're coming to us to supervise. So,
um, that's an area that we've been working on really kind of beefing up, getting some cross trainining, some other agents trained. Supervised release is very different than probation. Um, so getting agents cross-trained in that so
we have the capacity um, if and when we see that influx even more um, is preparing us for that. And we'll shift services. We'll we'll shift other resources if we need to um from other areas.
Um our domestic violence pre-trial is actually kind of folded in now with our domestic violence supervision. We used to have one agent assigned to that. Um it um made a lot more sense to have all
four of those domestic violence agents taking a piece of that. Um, so all of those agents now are trained in the process to supervise those domestic violence. Those are the highest risk domestic violence cases um that we have.
When they when they come into jail, those agents go in, they do an assessment and if they meet a certain score, um we've worked with the bench and the county attorney's office to provide that supervision because we know during that time is really the highest risk to those victims of domestic
violence. So, one, keeping victims safer, ensuring that they're appearing in court when they're supposed to be, and also um connecting them to services. So, those that want help, connecting them to services sooner rather than waiting until court is resolved,
sometimes a year later, um helps our community and our victims be safer. The cognitive programming I talked a lot about already. I can't stress enough how important this is. Um, and the fact that
agents now have more time to do that with our clients, to run those groups, to do the one-to-one interventions to truly target those need areas. We do the risk assessment. We identify their risk.
We know what their criminogenic needs are based on those assessments and we're able to then target those um criminogenetic needs with specific interventions that we know have been proven to work and having the time to do
that with them is really important. Um agents are doing more carry guides, thinking reports, um roleplaying with with clients, um teaching them skills that they they never learned how to do.
Um so it's really exciting time. Um it's also exhausting. It's hard work. You think with lower case loads it would be less but it's really intensive hard work. We also know that we're also now working with higher we're focusing on
the medium and high-risisk folks now um which can be both rewarding and exhausting. Um the last few slides here um top one there our supervision and case activity.
Um I did both 2024 and 2025. Um I think it's important to show that activity as well. Files opened and files closed. Like there's a lot going on. A point in time number doesn't always tell that story, right? Um, there's a lot of
files closed and opened, meaning that there's a lot more work that goes into those new files, going over the probation conditions and and getting those um, people stable, there's a lot of work that goes into that. um our supervised release, you can see with our
juvenile files open and closed and our supervised release um is creeping up a bit and we really aren't even into full swing at all with MR and those releases coming out of prison. Um
the next section, court and intervention activity. Um this is our adult part of it is the uh our intake and investigations unit. Um PSI's completed the um
minats or Minnesota pre-trial assessments that we are required to do for the courts now and our sentencing guidelines worksheets. Um historically we've we have a lot of those. There's a lot of work that goes into those reports. They are statutoily
required. They have timelines attached to them to make sure that we're getting them into the court on time. Um, and our um, PSI writer does a phenomenal job at meeting those timelines and and providing the information to the court
so they can make the best decision for that person before them. Um the last slide I think is the most exciting for me um because I think it really speaks to um what we've been doing in corrections
and um being able to have more manageable case loads. Um this is what it should be showing, right? Um the ability to have contact with with victims. That is an area that I can tell you a few years ago there was
very little contact with victims. Um agents just didn't have the time. It's really important to have the contact with those victims to give them resources um so that they can get the help they need as well as most of the
time there's kids in those homes to be able to keep those kids safe and give them the best chance. Um and also um the last four areas there it really speaks to when we're able to have the
time to do the interventions that we know work to spend that time with the clients. Um it shows in not only our reduction of violations there as you can see in 2024
um violations for new felony offenses um has decreased. Our um client violation rate and case violation rates um have decreased and cases with no formal
violations at all has increased. That speaks volumes in our work and I truly believe it's because we have the time to do the interventions that are needed to spend the time building those relationships with clients to teach them
the skills that they need to make the changes that they need long term versus just putting them into custody um reacting constantly reacting to the behavior. um it makes a difference for those that um truly want to make that
change. And although um you know we hope that we are we are gathering data on our um CO groups that we're doing so that as we get more people um completing those programs, we'll have some more data to
provide you um as well on that as our um groups have increased. Um, I don't know if you looked at the M4R as well, but our recidivism rates also got better. Um, I do have those there if you're interested, but I know you get those, I believe, as well. So,
lot of information, but any questions for me? >> No question, Madame Chair or Christa, but I I do have a comment. I And I'm trying to figure out how to put the comment together. I I I'm not I'm the
kind of guy that I don't uh I don't run around here patting everybody on the back. I have a very high threshold. I I think people are expected to do their job here because they're paid. I think they're paid pretty well. We treat them really well. So, I have a high threshold before I
give somebody a huge pat on the back. And I got to tell you, I'm giving you a huge pat on the back today. And and I'm a big fan of yours. There was a time when I was not a big fan of yours and uh that poor little gavel sitting back here
has got a chunk of wood missing out of it because I was hitting it so hard on the table when we when the county board and the county board most of our decisions are are kind of mundane. They're not really controversial. But we
made a controversial decision to not have community corrections where we were in with a Morrison and Crowing and we decided and that didn't go over well and it didn't go over well with you at the time >> and um but now that I look back and I
think you'll probably agree that that that was the right decision to that we made at the time and I was I don't know if I was angry with you but I wasn't happy with you but as time has went by I
am so impressed with your knowledge in this field and the the great job that you've done. I'm just um I'm like I said I don't give pats on the back and Rosemary doesn't either too much but um but I'm giving you that today. You you do an excellent excellent job for the
citizens of Crowing County and so God bless you for doing the great work for the people of Crowing County. Appreciate you. >> Thank you commissioner. That means a lot. I care deeply about the work and our community and as I think a lot of people in this field do. It's difficult
work but that means a lot to me. >> I often wished Commissioner Titi was still on the board sort of maybe in a weird way but that he would see that we're actually doing evidence-based practice and the results reflect that. So sorry Commissioner Barrows I cut you.
>> That's fine. So Christa, I do give out a lot of compliments and I would second what Commissioner Coring has said. I appreciate everything that your team does. With more of these individuals coming out of DOC, more case loads, I'm assuming, and you
can correct me if I'm wrong, and I think you will, there's going to be a significant investment of funds from DOC to help with supervision in the local counties. Correct? >> No. No. That's what I thought. Sorry to disagree with you, but
>> no, not at this point. That's not what we're seeing, which is why we're trying to to prepare for that as best we can, and we will shift resources as we need to. That is a population that needs to be supervised. We are very fortunate to have agents like Bob Tes and the skill
set that he has um to do that work. Um, and we will continue to invest in our staff so that they're able to manage the work the best we can. >> I'll just say publicly that that when they
reduce the number that they have in the prisons and the ones that they oversee when they're on release and that my tax dollars aren't being decreased because of DEOC putting it on the county. my taxes are actually going up
because the county has to account for that. I just want that known to the public that we've already paid that bill or we're in a always in the course of paying that bill to the state. Then they get to decide how much we get back to do their job.
Except they always have the ability to say it's not their job any longer. >> I'll get off my political >> I should probably have you autograph this right here. You can see where it's missing here. Mysterious. It flew off. >> Any other questions?
>> Thank you. >> Thank you, Commissioner. >> Thank you so much. All right, Gina. >> Good morning, Madam Chair, commissioners. I'm Gina Hire. I'm the public health manager at Crowing County and I also manage the long-term care
waiver cases. Um, public health has the job to prevent, promote, and protect uh the citizens of Crowing County. Um, we currently have 16 staff, full-time staff on the public health team and including our supervisor
Bethany Imran. You see her name up there under the family home visiting followalong and car seat programs. Um, before I go into these programs, I just want to touch on the fact that our programming here in Crowing County related to public health revolves around
Minnesota State Statute 145A, which has put specific requirements on us as a health department that we much must meet their mandates each year. Those requirements are assuring an adequate public health infrastructure in Crowing County. Um preparing to respond to disasters and assist with community
recovery, preventing the spread of infectious disease, protecting against environmental health hazards, promoting health behavior and healthy communities, as well as assuring the quality and accessibility of health services for our residents.
Um I'm going to go into family home visiting first. Uh we have public health nurses that work in our family home visiting program. Our public health nurses in 2025 completed uh 1,38 family home visit visits which um was a
small uptick from the year of 2024. Our followalong program is a program that integrates nicely with family um home visiting and the wick programming. uh followalong program allows us to um um
sorry it's integrated along with family case management and we are um completing developmental assessments with children in the homes and obviously that can lead to different referrals make sure kids stay on track for their development um through infancy and childhood and in
2023 we brought back uh the car seat program and in 2025 we were able to assist um 26 residents in in Crowing County with getting appropriate car seats installed in their cars. This is paid for through Bluec Cross Blue Shield
and UKare. They actually pay us to um install the car seats and they pay us for the time that we spend doing that and the education that uh needs to be provided to our car seat installers. Um that's a little bit about our family case management program. And then we can
go under here. As I mentioned, a mandate of um what we need to do for public health in Minnesota is emergency preparedness and being prepared for incidents even similar to the one that we had at the assisted living last year. We did do an afteraction report uh
following that inst instance. And um we're going to use the information we gathered in that to assist um ourselves as well as other communities if they ever uh are to face a similar situation in Minnesota at an assisted living. Um
we feel that what we learned through that process uh should be shared. So we do have plans of u doing that throughout this year. uh speaking specifically on emergency preparedness. Bethany Immigrant is a supervisor in that area. Um and um you can see here we did
respond to the tornadoes in 2025. We did door-to-door visits uh following the June tornado. Um checking on residents safety, assuring they had um basic needs were being met, they had power, making sure they had water, um making sure um their needs were being met. They were,
the community was very gracious with us um and thankful for um us walking through their torn up yards in some cases and um assessing the structures uh their homes and such uh in assistance
with the Red Cross. Um I feel that we we have a very positive um relationship with emergency manager director Clayton um and Jacqueline works very closely with him. She's our public health uh emergency preparedness coordinator and
actually they received um recognition last year from the American Red Cross um as the disaster cycle services partner of the year in this area. So we're very proud of Jacqueline and Clayton for that. Um Jacqueline works hard to asssure that not only the public health
staff but community services staff as a whole are ready to respond in the case of an emergency. And the way that we do that is um we complete what's called the NIMS training. It's incident command structure training uh 100 and 200 and we had over 150 of our community services
staff who completed that last year. Um it just gets us more prepared to respond because we don't know what the next emergency or disaster is going to be. Is it going to be an assisted living? Is it going to be a tornado? Is it going to be COVID? Um so we're trying to prepare in the best way possible and get our staff
ready to go. Um, I think you already saw the same little flower there that says sustainability and cultural competence. Uh, that was shared by Burlington Homes. Um, and this is our CUP program which is cannabis and substance use prevention
program. This was new in 2024. Um because we are so lucky to have uh Blade Activity, Briner Lakes Area Drug Education in Crowing County, we were able to focus our cannabis funding sources um towards pregnant and
parenting moms and um assuring that in helping them work through substance use um tore decrease use while pregnant or obviously cease use while pregnant if possible. Um Briana Lernno um is heading
this um division as far as the work going forward. Uh she's been instrumental in getting it pushed forward and she's collaborating with not only local prenatal clinics but also with child protection, adult mental health. They they all weave together
with public health. public health kind of um although we're siloed out here as our own um entity, we do collaborate and work with all the other divisions um throughout community services. Um okay. And then WICK, most of us are familiar
with WICK. Our WICK uh programs been operating very well for the last few years for sure. In 2025, we served an average of 524 clients each or I'm sorry, family appointments each month and had an average of 1,179
active participants. Um, Wick benefits in Crowing County average about 80,000 uh each month for voucher redemption and that's going back into the community. So, all the our clients in Wick are getting their Wick vouchers and then they're spending them
many of them locally. So, they're going back into the community, which is something that we wanted to highlight here. Um, for every dollar spent and in invested in a wick, it saves um an average of $248 on medical education and productivity costs. Uh the picture to
the right there is some of my um public health team uh nurses and health educators up there, case uh case aids. And with we coordinated with UKare this year and provided a free educational event where we invited local um providers that would come in contact
with our pregnant and parenting moms to meet them and have created that linkage with them and also celebrate um their babies whether they were pregnant or recently um delivered and that was funded through UKARE. Child and teen
checkups is another um area for public health. child and teen checkups. Part of this is assuring that uh wellchild visits are being maintained as well as vision hearing screenings and as I talked about earlier, we'd also touch on the developmental screenings.
Um and then I'm going to switch over a little bit here into the elder waiver world and this is long-term care case management and care coordination and this is managed by Hannah Jude. She's the supervisor in that area. Um, the population for over 65 in Crowing County
continues to grow. I've brought this to you, I think, every year. By 2040, Crowing County 65 population is projected to reach uh 33.8% well above the statewide uh average of 24.2. So, Crowing County
definitely has an aging population. Um although we provide we do a great job providing um care coordination and managed care um to the residents in Crowing County who are over age 65. You
can see how many of them we serve. We work with Blue Cross Blue Shield, UKare and Medicica are the managed care programs that we work with. And every year we receive very thorough audits by all three. Last uh in 2025, we received
100% compliance on both UKare Blue Cross and then the DHS lead agency review that was completed here. I'm very proud of that team and uh my supervisor there, Hannah Jude, for the work they do. There's a picture there. We get involved in a lot of other activities throughout the county that deal with aging. Uh
we're active in the aging coalition and as you can see here, the Alzheimer's walk. Uh if you have any questions, please interrupt me. I know there's we've been talking at you for a long time. So, um, foundations of public health work.
Um, through this funding, um, we have started Brainard for all ages. We're trying to make Brainard an age friendly community and we did get that designation in 2025. Um, we're coordinating with the city of Brainard um to make this happen. We completed over 300 surveys in the
community and held four f focus groups to help us determine what areas we need to focus on in the next year um to make Brainard more livable for all ages. Those included housing, transportation, communication, and outdoor spaces.
It's a little bit about Brainer for all ages. Our goal with this, it's a five-year program, and our goal is to uh we were starting it in Briner, but we would like to see it expand through all of Crowing County. I just have to find my uh significant partners in each of the other a um other townships and
cities and bring that forward. Environmental health. >> Sorry, that real quick. >> It's okay. Uh environmental health, I'm sure you're all familiar with Taylor. He comes to board um frequently with environmental health issues and he's
also coordinating the works of the work of Brainer for all ages at this point. Uh other duties as assigned. So, thank you Taylor for that. He's doing a lovely job. Environmental health. Um we had over 90 uh environmental health referrals in
2025 resulting in 125 public health nuisance site visits. Um and Taylor is working really hard to increase awareness and provide education to the community surrounding everything from safe drinking water, radon to vectorbor
diseases with ticks, mosquitoes, etc. Um, and then we can move into Oh, I did want to highlight one other thing. Um, sorry, with environmental health. Um, as you know, we've done a lot of collaborative work with land services
and the county attorney and, um, we were invited, Taylor and Bethany and Stephanie Shook, um, presented at, uh, the local public health association at the state level for the work that they've done to streamline that process for public health newses. nuisance
nuisances and land nuisance um coordinated efforts and they shared what we do in our rural community and now they've been asked to do it again. So what we're doing here in Crowing County um is lighting it up even at the state level. They're recognizing what we're
doing um with the environmental uh public nuisances in Crowing County ship and this is managed by our coordinator Kelly Johnson. It's a statewide health improvement partnership. This is a lot of really fun things we get to do in the community that support
public health and community health efforts. I wanted to highlight um the middle section there that says food drive. Um last year in November, I think we all remember we were looking at potential cuts to SNAP and Wick at that
time, right before Christmas and um right before the holiday season. We convened as a team. Kelly is part of um the food coalition in Crowing County and she worked with them along with us and other partners, Essentia and CRMC to do
a food drive where we raised over um $15,000 and and uh 3,500 pounds of food last year. We're going to make this an annual occurrence now because um we saw the impact that it made and we were able to assist all of the different food banks in Crowing County. Kelly works
very closely with them and um creating the super super shelves and some of the other efforts that she does um through our China each year a community health needs assessment that we complete with Essentia Health uh we recognized
through the survey that we complete. We then bring all that information together and see what the top three things are that we need to work on for um what we saw the last time we completed the survey was um nutrition was big, mental health, and
then physical activity. Those three things. So, a lot of what you'll see that ship and then crowing energize focuses on are those three initiatives and how to push that info into the community and support the efforts and promote the efforts that we know that are working. We do use a lot of
evidence-based classes. Classes such as meta balance um which is for falls prevention uh NDPP um national diabetes prevention program. You can see up here in 2025 um with make it okay we reached
over 197 crowing residents um with the stop the stigma campaign. Also the crowing energized steps challenge. This one of course is uh we're we're talking about physical activity here. We had 311 Crowing County residents participate in the challenge. And then below that, you
can see the 5K for mental health, stop the stigma. So, we're touching on both there, both uh physical health and mental health. Um, and then a fun one that I think is really fun is the Crowing County's one vegetable, one community. Uh, the vegetable last year
was the cucumber. This year were the carrot. But with this program, we went into the 12 schools in Crowing County into the first grades. and we bring a book about whatever vegetable we're talking about and um we discuss the importance of fruits and vegetables and
the kids really get a kick out of it because we dress like veggies and we sing they love it. I'm not so proud of being a tomato but I will be a tomato and um that's part of the crowing energized initiative there. And then we
have Blade but I'm going to let Cara speak on behalf of Blade >> before we jump into that. Any questions for Gina around public health or waivers? >> No questions, but just a comment, Gina, when you and Taylor and whoever else
goes and and um edimocates some of these other counties on the great work that we're doing here. I think you you need to tell them too, and this is this is me, that I I think part of the recipe, too, is not only the the strong staff
work, but you have to have a county board that's a strong county board because you're making some the county board is making some tough decisions. You're you're really reaching into somebody's really into their personal life. You know, when I think about the
200 rats, you know, I you know, >> why do we have to talk about that? >> Yeah. Well, I don't know. It's It's >> We could talk about cats. >> Well, cats. Okay. All right. Let's talk about cats, but but I'm saying that we're reaching into to somebody. I know
I went out to a place and there's just a lot of stuff around there that they they they'd probably deem that it's important to their life, but it's really a public health nuisance. And a a a weak county board could say, "No, I don't I don't want to do that." So, I I just think it
takes a strong county board to want to pursue some of these things that are really they're really tough situations. >> Yes. And I know uh the collaboration and what you've brought forward and your support for that is mentioned in there um when they are presenting. Stephanie
definitely brings that forward. >> Yeah. >> Thank you, Gina. Thank you. >> So, tie it all back together, we're back around to Blade. Uh you did see presentations from a couple of our blade grant recipients today. Um they kicked us off and you will be seeing a few more
of those presentations come before you uh as well here at the upcoming cows. Um the you may remember the restructure that we did of our um blade work into the four task groups. Uh and then we are
partnering with um know the truth who are doing um trainings and discussions within the school. I presented to you at the board meeting on all of the prevention items that we have going on um related to the events that we're attending, the training that we're providing uh and the work that we're
continuing to do in the schools. So I can answer any questions that you might have. This wraps up our 45hour presentation to my which I apologize. Um, but I think you can hear the passion and the dedication and the knowledge around these um program areas and the
the folks who are leading them. They're doing really great work and we're con constantly looking for ways to improve our practice. And to that note, if you have any recommendations on how we can improve this um before we get it ready for prime time, we'd appreciate that as well.
>> Questions? Okay, we're we're adjourned.