Travis County Commssioners Court
March 16, 2004
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Item 6
Number 6 is to consider and take appropriate action on staff recommendations regarding a professional services contract for after school care. Morning.
>> morning.
>> morning. Stephen.
>> good morning. Debra britain, health and human services department. In August of last year, the Travis County after school network presented a proposal to the court, and at that time the court's direction was that they would like a proposal that would demonstrate leveraging of resources and also building on county and community supported strategies that are already in place. The proposal targeted the 78723 and 52 zip codes that included pierce and webb middle schools, and basically was focused on linking all of those programs that are already in place, such as employment, capital 4-h and those kind of programs, as well as wraparound systems of care and positive behavioral supports that exist currently at web and pierce. A September 10th 2003, the court directed the staff issue an rff for after school services based on the proposal submitted by tcan. The purchasing department did issue that rfs. A single proposal was received from the Austin independent school district. And it was evaluate bid three-youth professionals from Travis County juvenile probation office, from the office of children's services and Texas cooperative extension services. And basically the proposal was evaluated based on the quantity and quality of programs offered, individuals that are participating in the project, the price of students -- price per student provided, as well as how complete and accurate the proposal was. The proposal did meet those cite satisfactorily and on January 29th we did meet with aisd and the five other subcontractors that will be working as part of the proposals. Those other partners include communities and schools, at risk youth, the ywca, the boys and girls club of Austin and Travis County, and big brothers and big sisters. The after school services will be provided before school, after school, during summer breaks, holidays and on Saturdays. It will be primarily school-based except for those attending the boys and girls club. All transportation will be provided by aisd or through the shared resources of the other partners. The program goals include providing academic support, recreation and enrichment opportunities skill development, character and youth leadership development. Idance during times of change and transition and family support and community involvement. The scope of the services are to provide support for at least 750 youth between the aijdz of 10 and 14. That programming occur five days a week through the school year at a minimum of three hours per day. Programming on weekends, during school holidays at a minimum of four hours a day. And during the summer on Monday through Friday for at least eight weeks at a minimum of six hours per day. The outcome managers that will be tracked will include tracking increased school attendance. We anticipate an increase in positive attitudes and behaviors. There will be a decrease in drug and alcohol use, decrease in suspensions, decrease in engaging in sexual activity, decreasing criminal activity as well as victims of crime. What makes this approach different from other after school programs is that there will be an initial outreach of students to participate in the program so that all students who would wish to participate will have an opportunity to do so, but we'll also have referrals from teachers, counselors and other agencies, including the campus impact team. A communities and schools representative will actually serve on the campus impact team where they will meet on a weekly basis to identify students with academic, behavioral or social service issues. Students referred will meet with an after school representative and will undergo a thorough evaluation to determine what other factors may be involved or what other programs they might need to be channeled to. Each student will be tracked and the progress monitored and changes will be made as needed. All aspects of the program will be evaluated by an advisory council that the collaborative expects to form upon approval of the contract. We are recommending that we move forward with this pilot for after school services. The initial contract period would be April 1, 2004 through September 30th, 2004, in the amount of $200,000. The funds have been identified in the current hhs budget, and that's from our lapsed social services contract dollars. The rationale for this is that during the months of April and may it would be used for recruitment. We received feedback from all of the services providers in the collaborative that it will take about 60 days for them to be fully ramped up. The schools are prepared to begin as soon as possible, web and pierce, but to have all of the service components in place, to have 750 youth identified and evaluated will take about 60 days. So we would use the April and may to conduct that part of the program so that that would be underway and we'd be prepared for the summer months. If we're unable to begin on April 1st, it is recommended that we begin the program on August 19th or the first day of school. And that's for the full academic year, 2004-2005. Funding would again come from the social service contract dollars in the amount of approximately $48,414 for the month of August and September, and then the contract would include an option to extend contingent upon approval of funding in the fy '05 budget in the amount of $387,317, and that would be for the period October 1, 2004 through the end of September 30th, 2005. So that would also include next summer as well.
>> do we think that starting early would allow enough difference to do this?
>> the earlier we can start obviously the faster we will be able to make a difference, but if we begin now rather than later, I don't see a significant issue with that. Again, the only reason that we want to start now, this late in the academic year, is just so that we're prepared to recruit and evaluate kids before the summer. Because if we don't do it now, we just won't have access.
>> judge?
>> yes, sir.
>> when does the school year end specifically as far as aisd is concerned?
>> full academic -- the full academic year end in may.
>> when in may, middle of may, end of may in.
>> it's usually the middle of may.
>> I'm kind of concerned about that, maybe not being enough time to get everything together as opposed to the August starting date where you may have a full month to get a lot of data. I'm trying to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of the August through September -- through December time line as ochsed to the short -- as opposed to the short time line of the April and may scenario. And I'm really looking at this because I do see a lot of young persons on the street not in school when they should be. I think this is something that's very appropriate for us to go in as far as trying to capture and ensure that our young folks do not end up down here as another cost to the taxpayers. But again, I think this after school program is a great idea; however, the starting time is I think really mg that I think we need -- something that I think we really need to wrestle with. And I think we need to talk with aisd because we're really talking about high risk children that are more likely prone to maybe drop out, even fall into the truancy courts. This is what we're trying to prevent from happening from the ages of to 14. So I'm kind of concerned about that. And both these schools are in precinct 1, webb and also the middle school. They're both in precinct 1, which I represent. So of course, I'm very concerned and the parents are very concerned about that, and I really am trying to get a grip on what we're trying to do here as far as the most appropriate, but not -- but ooms effective -- but also effective amount of carrying this program through, which I fully support. I'm n
T in opposition to anything on this. I'm just trying to get the most bang out of the buck and either come up with something that would let me see that this is the best we can do given the two options we have. So can you give me a little more meat on this as far as helping me make a decision or what's the best thing to do? Looking at a full year -- not a full year, but at least a half of year from August all the way to December, just a short span and then school it out for, what, about -- from April to may.
>> right.
>> can you expound on that to help me separate my best in dealing with aisd and listening to what they're saying also?
>> I would have to say that, you know, from a county's perspective, I think that our best approach would probably be to launch the program in August. Because that gives us a longer period of time, and a more consistent amount of time to actually be up and running in a regular school year. And then if we're successful in that full academic year, then we'll know also how well we'll do that following summer. Because if we start in April, then you're correct. We would only have about a month and a half, even though that would be sufficient for the school district, I think, to prepare, it would also be a very ambitious schedule to be able to get things done. And then they would move into the summer programming time. So it would be my recommendation, I think -- and aisd will probably concur. I don't see where it would cause a great deal of problem other than all of our own concerns about the longer we wait to implement an after school program, that means that there are a number of children that are still without those services, but in the long run, we can probably expect to serve them better and more consistently if we're able to have a longer period of time to implement the program.
>> anybody here from aisd? Any idea of how many students we may lose over the summer if the program commences in late August.
>> no. I don't have any idea of how many students would be lost. We have a pretty good idea of the number of student that are currently at risk of either failing or just having trouble in general. But -- and we can zoom too that if there aren't any programs in place that those same kids will still be -- have those same risk factors. But what we're trying to do is balance those needs against what we feel is the most practical and efficient use of our dollars in the time that we have to get things going. So it's making a choice.
>> i've got a long list of questions. When we last left this, this is my memory. My memory is we had talked about that there was somehow, i'll say, a baggage with this thing being associated with the schools that it needed to get out of the schools, and we found out that this is not a school-based program, and aisd before was not being talked about as a partner in this. And I thought we had given instructions that we would stay away from the general fund. And that is not the case. We are talking about general fund dollars and we're talking about general fund dollars in the middle of a budget year where this is not budgeted and it has a presumption that if we start in April that this be automatically given the clearance to go through the '05 budget process before we have addressed a single item on the general fund related to pay increases, health insurance, anything. This would be prerolled in there. So I have some huge issues with this being April because we were told it was going to be January, stay away from the general fund and we would try to use established partners in the community because there was this big thing associated with this being out of the schools. We wanted to get away from the schools. There's no pbo memo in terms of what other issues you might have going on in health and human services related to other potential needs for those one-time dollars. Again, one-time dollars we have now, we're talking about trying to load something in for the fall, which is ongoing dollars, a different source of money. There is no interlocal with aisd before us, which is my issue that I will be bringing up on number 7. We are way behind on our interlocals. We have a number of outstanding contracts according to a memo I just got from the auditors office, we're behind on interlocals we already have.
>> they don't know whether we want to proceed or not.
>> I understand that. I think it would have been premature for them to put an interlocal together.
>> there is no interlocal. There is no memo from pbo. To me this ought to be something that we start in August because too many of the performance measures are specifically tied to what's going on in school. And if we have a lot of this occurring during months when there are no things related to attendance and how well they're doing in school, it ought not to be that way. We ought to have this thing going on to me in the fall and the spring, and a decision is made whether it continues on in the summer based on whether we are seeing the positive results that we want to see. I can get there in August, but to me it's lost its window of opportunity related to this year, especially since we were never talking about a program that was going to cost 400 how dollars a year. When the initial proposal was brought to us, it was like 700 something. In my memory it was brought down to essentially less than 400,000 because --
>> 330,000.
>> 330 is quite different from 400. It's grown in size. We're talking about potentially using sums from corporations as a pilot. Well, that didn't materialize. So I can get there in August, but I can't support April. The window's been lost.
>> why don't we ask aisd to let us know what difference an April 1 start has over starting in August. And I guess I'm really looking for adverse impact on kids. And if there really is not a significant difference, then it makes sense to start in August. But during the 14 or 15 years i've been associated with the county, we have talked about doing this. And in September basically we said give us an r.f.p., See what we get and let's think positively about getting it done. And we thought we had identified a source of funding, and we had, and that source of funding did not materialize. But steven has creatively found other funds that will enable us to get this started. So my own theory is if I rely on those who run the program to let us know what impact it will have on kids. And I think the decision ought to turn on that. If it doesn't make a great difference, then an August start is fine with me. But when we had this conversation in late July about the August start, then my guess is there won't be clear-cut support, there would be differences of opinion. I just think we ought to land on it one way or the other, vote it up or down. It will not be easy if we do it. But if it's important, we ought to do it. I did something pretty close to this back in August or September when we had the discussion.
>> I really concur with what your statements are this morning. I told you that I'm supporting it. I told you right off the top that I'm supporting it. But I also -- and I would generate this and I can get my staff to do this, is to get the numbers of what it costs us to house these young persons down here at gardner-betts. As I go through my community in precinct 1, I do see kids hanging out when they should be in school. And I do know that we have continued to try to have wraparound services when we've identified these persons, even with the programs and things that we try to put forth, we wanted social services to be available to the health and human services to ensure that there are wraparound services because there may be other identifying problems that children may have that really is not hitting the surface until you go to those homes and visit with them. You will see a whole lot of things that really will just blow your mind. But again, I think the need is definitely there. There's no doubt about it. How we get there is another vehicle that we'll have to ride, but I still would like to see, again -- and I think the judge is -- what is aisd saying? I know that we've done some things jointly together, but it is a cost savings for all of us because aisd, of course, is a big collector of our tax dollars here in Travis County also, at least from the school district. So again it is a savings I think across the board if we can demonstrate that and this would be just as a model. And this is all it is, a middle. And when you're looking at 750 children that can turn their lives around, that's very critical to me. So again, i'd like to see what really spins off of it and there might be a snowball effect or a domino effect on all of this. And of course, we'd be able to help the young persons continue their lives and not end up in a career path of coming to gardner-betts and then maybe on into something bigger later on in their lives. We're trying to prevent these things. So this may be one day of doing it. Thank you.
>> getting a pbo is a good idea, whatever the analysis is, let's bring that back, tell Commissioner Sonleitner about the specific issues that need to be addressed. The other thing is it would help to have in writing how we landed on aisd. We have five collaborating partners. We knew these would be at school. And I was open to who would do it as long as we had those involved in after school programs today and who possess a whole lot more expertise than we involved in the program. And so had that, so -- so we had that. Let's see the explanation in writing why aisd is taking the lead and not one of the other five collaborating partners. What I have in mind is a short paragraph. [ laughter ] a scripted paragraph, not a voluminous memo or document.
>> i'll just take the lead. They get the bulk of the funding, that is a question that I need to raise because when we were talking about before, we were talking about established partners out there, communities in schools, boys and girls club, that may be the 70,000-dollar difference between the 330,000-dollar proposal and the 400,000-dollar proposal is whether we were going to pay another government to do this. And that just raises huge issues for me that they would be getting more money than anyone else. And it's not for direct services. It's administrative.
>> judge?
>> yes, sir.
>> I'm entertained by when you read some of the backup information, and gosh, there is an entire industry obviously out there that deal with these kind of issues. And my bigger concern with this is what are you really getting for the dollars that you're spending? I mean, program needs, administrators, parents, teachers around partners from each target school attended a retreat to examine all the available needs. Nowhere in there is there any elected people, which I think we ought to -- I mean, we ought to make the time to be part of these sort of conversations -- I mean, I certainly would. Because my biggest issue is do you spend $200,000, do you spend $330,000, do you spend $300 million? I mean, do you get something for -- do you really, truly get, you know, some bang for the buck? You know, I'm -- the more that I learn about all of this and the more I go to judge murr's courtroom and watch and see what's going on in this community, I will tell you that in my opinion we are nowhere near winning the war. I mean, we are so upside down on this subject matter, and we don't have enough dollars to take care of the issue, which is the reason why I would like to be part of the conversation that says let's look at something else. I mean, we just can't take the numbers that are coming at us. I mean, hey, we don't have an issue with -- we're not going to have -- we're not going to have enough children to effect or we're going to lose some because if you look at the chart, I mean, we're talking about 1350 kids out of webb, 2,000 kids out of pierce. I mean, we don't have any problem getting 750 if that's our number, whether we start tomorrow or whether we start in September. I mean, they're there. And these are ones that are percentage of non-criminal referrals, meaning that every one of those people are at risk. And it really sad ens me because let's face it, child abuse as far as I'm concerned is a lot more than what all of us think child abuse is. Child abuse is you being a parent and not keeping your child in school.
>>
>> [one moment, please, for change in captioners]
>>
>> ... That does not include the 50 to 75 in the intermediate sanctions facility as 90 day residents so this is an area that we are spending on deerly. And unfortunately what the stats show is that we have to intervene much earlier before intervention listen helpful and it's not that we cannot identify kids who need help. We can do that. But up to this point, I don't know that we have been -- we have had the willpower baseically to move and try to assist. It doesn't matter to me who does it, as long as we do a good job, spend the money wisely and we turn some of these young lives around. So I guess -- I think it's good to take another week. I think you know where we're coming from, right, in terms of questions.
>> right.
>> wherever we land, I want us to do it and do I want to vote on whether we do it for not. Obviously we don't spend next year's money until we go through that budget process, but if we give the word to prioritize after school programs we can do it. The decision is made by the five of us, mr. Gomez will be here, presumely.
>> one other place I would like a little more explanation. You look at, this is the chart rite after the mem me from dr. Williams in terms of what is the breakdown of what dollars, et cetera. Look at the very bottom it says number of youth served. There are 150 being proposed for aisd at a cost of almost $70,000. Next column over, 375 children can be seven-day forecast through the boys and girls club for less money. I would want to know why -- what -- what is it that aisd can offer that the boys and girls club can't. You go into the other categories there as well. I know cis is largely academic based so I understand that column. But boys and girls -- excuse me, big brothers big sisters, 50 people for $17,000, the next column over, the y, has 40 kids for $7,000. I understand we need to have a menu of options because not every kid is going to fit into the same category but I would have to wonder why 150 kids in aisd for 75,000. And why we can do more over at the boys and girls clubs for less money. If we talk about wanting to leverage the resources, we can get more kids into this program by utilizing the boys and girls club.
>> I think it will be helpful next week if we started by just running through how the program -- how integrated the program is. One of the reasons we had the second meeting with the agencies is because from a contract management standpoint, we wanted to ensure that there was significant integration of the programs and any individual that participated in a program had access to a variety of interventions and so I think that by maybe starting out and laying out how the different proponents of the after school proposal interact would be helpful for you. I also think that it would be helpful to talk about -- well, you've just essentially did a comparison of what it takes to incars rate kids versus keeping them in something like an after school program. But we cannot wait until your life because one of the things that debra said is there needed to be a 60 day rampup period in order for the entities to get ready, in order to fully operationalize this program. Even if you wanted to start it in August, and we would suggest August, we -- we need to have a decision as to whether or not you're interested in doing it.
>> let us know. No matter where we start, let's not finish without answering these questions. And the cost differential is there is a good question. We would have to have a representative from aisd in court next Tuesday. Let's think 7 days and not 7 months to wrap this up.
>> and if we can also have some things put down in terms of analyzed cost. This chart as well is simply for $200,000. That is for six months. This does not fully reflect what it would cost. Because these numbers all double. The cost per youth is not $276. It is double that. And so we reach -- we just need to see a clear presentation of what the situation is here as opposed to trying to make it fit within a certain budget parameter. Let's see what the analyzed looks like. Let's not be afraid of those numbers.
>> anybody else on this item today? If so, please come forward. Yes, sir.
>> mr. Defore.
>> anybody else, please come forward, we have two more chairs.
>> I'm duce defore. I'm informed in the consortia that deals with community education for the Austin school district, we are very interested in this whole program and don't have anything going on in these middle schools is what it amounts to now, and my concern -- of course, if you want to start in August, we've got to start thinking about it now and putting it together right now. Aisd is working on their summer program. They've been working on summer programs for their after school and community education, at least, any way, so it takes time to put these things together, they know something is going to happen, they can get cracking and ready to go,whenever you want to start. The issue of course is we do different things with these kids. If you do an intense study on them. It costs you more money than if you're doing something less than having group activities, but the whole idea is to get a broad spectrum so we can reach out to whatever they need in that particular group. They're all in need, as Commissioner Davis says, it's just a question of what are you going to do with them, how can you -- the real problem with this bunch is how do you get them interested. Because these kids take off when they get off of school, middle school period. That's why it's essential to have these programs in here. We'll do whatever y'all need to do to do that, and whatever -- just make sure what do you want so we can give it to you and the school district will be glad to do that, I'm sure. I think they're the fiscal agent in this. We're trying to get it all together, everybody is working together and that's what we really want to do.
>> thank you.
>> my name is adrian Moore, I'm director of the council on at risk youths. One of the partners in the collaboration. The proposal, just a very brief comment on the proposal, it really represents, I think, one of the very finest in the way of collaboration. I've been in the youth service business over 30 years, for the past five, ten years collaboration has really been the buzz word in the -- in the industry, so I think the proposal really represents a very, very nice collaboration at its best with different agencies coming together, with different skill levels addressing some of the individual needs of these groups of youth and kids. Comment on why the school district I think is our collaboration met on a monthly basis pretty much over the past 6 months. Why the school district, why are we doing the programming there? Very simply, there's a physical plant there. And that's where kids convene. That's where kids are accustomed to going, there's space available for all of the different partners to be able to provide their service. So really the school district, it's a matter of convenience, the boys club girls club simply isn't large enough to accommodate all the different activities that are being proposed. The other question, why the isd as the -- as one of the principal partners? As we met, we needed a fiscal agent that would represent all of us to serve as the contractor with the county. The school district has the probably amongst all the other organizations are private nonprofit organizations, some of them relatively small like the council on at risk youth t school district simply had the best fiscal machinery to be able to operate the contract.
>> thank you.
>> thank you.
>> I'm anna land, I'm the chair of the Travis County after school network which represents youth providers that serve childrens in our school. I'm here to express my gratitude and your consideration of this proposal. I would like to say that kind of agree with adrian that considered an emerging model and what we're doing here in Travis County is highlighted in other cities as way to go. It's one of the most unusual and progressive collaborations that i've seen and i've travelled the country and looked at different programs including l.a.'s best, considered one of the most -- other collaborations in the country. I would like to say that I think this is a solid proposal that the committee here on Travis County has support.
>> thank you very much. Let me ask you this one question. Everyone, you had an opportunity to speak with the aisd officials on this particular offer.
>> yes.
>> everybody basically all in agreement with the ones that you have spoken to in your deliberation with them.
>> we -- they've been sitting around waiting for this thing to come off, that's what it amounts the to. I haven't talked to the staff but machinations putting together the proposal. We're ready to go. The aisd is ready to go. The community education part is ready to go to it.
>> has this been take on the school board?
>> it has not and what school board requires, as I understand it is, that the grant has to be approved here first, then it goes to the school board, and then the school board will approve it, and then the administration there lets the individual contracts, the five different nonprofits involved.
>> well management at aisd has been involved, though?
>> yes.
>> they're not in a position to read the school board and know that there won't by (b) any problem...
>> the school board has been notified that this item look coming forward.
>> spring break, are we going to be able to get the answers we need out of aisd this week? Spring break, they're shut down.
>> we have home phone numbers, don't we, steve?
>> yeah, we can contact -- I have to call john on something else.
>> judge...
>> if we must take another week, if you let us know by Thursday or Friday.
>> we need to take another week.
>> we will.
>> a pbo memo, please.
>> two weeks.
>> okay. Clarification on the pbo.
>> chairman and I will be gone two weeks.
>> try to do it next week, so if we can't next week, we have to do it two weeks.
>> what were you saying, steve?
>> clarification on the pbo memo, you want some verification that the money exists or...
>> and what other kinds of issues are out there in terms of one time use of monies in terms of other budgetary issues and challenges that you might have whether they support that decision or not because that takes away options to fix other problems.
>> well, it's -- it's --
>> that's another one of it's one of our priorities.
>> of course it is.
>> I can hardly wait for the next meeting but I must wait. Thank y'all very much.
>> thank you.
>> thank y'all.
>> appreciate you.
Last Modified: Wednesday, March 17, 2004 7:22 AM