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NewsProgram for troubled foster youths in limboBy Candice Brooks HigginsStaff Writer Journal News Tuesday, March 27, 2007 HAMILTON — Funding for a local treatment foster care program for troubled teens has run out, but Butler County commissioners are considering saving the program as they are poised to take back greater control of the county Children Services Board. The Mainsail Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care program, operated by Butler Behavioral Health Services, needs at least a $100,000 commitment by Monday to buy time to help it become self-sufficient, Kimball Stricklin, Butler Behavioral's chief executive, told county commissioners Monday morning. If not, the program must be abandoned after 2 1/2 years and more than $300,000 in local investment, Stricklin said. Butler Behavioral has lost about $72,400 in its effort to keep the program alive after a grant from the Greater Cincinnati Health Foundation ran out last year. It could lose another $30,000 by June 30, Stricklin said. "We are nonprofit and we prove it every day. And these are numbers that we cannot sustain," Stricklin said. "We are financially out of time." The intensive program that currently serves six abused and neglected teens with mental health and delinquency issues did not receive the financial support hoped from the Children Services Board, Stricklin said. Also, the board was too slow in recruiting and approving foster parents, as well as referring children to the program, Kittie Weber, the program's manager, said If the pilot program found a temporary investor until it is self-sustainable, Butler Behavioral Clinical Director Bob Bushorn said it could serve up to 10 children at $109 a day — half the cost, or less than the likely alternative of residential treatment and with better outcomes. There's also interest to make Mainsail a model across Ohio, Stricklin said. "Let's not wait for another child to die. That was just a symptom, folks," Stricklin said, referring to the August death of foster child Marcus Fiesel in the custody of the county's Children Services Board. "It's going to take more than our moral support, it's going to take some dollars." The county commissioners have requested Butler County Job and Family Services Director Bruce Jewett find out if funding would be available to save the program. If the commissioners, as intended, disband the Children Services' volunteer governing board and merge the agency with the Job and Family Services in May, Jewett will oversee the agency's more than $24 million budget and answer directly to the commissioners. "You may go away, but the kids won't," Commission Vice President Michael Fox said. "The cost to the system will show up someplace." Contact this reporter at (513) 820-2175 or chiggins@coxohio.com. |
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