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GARLAND
POLICY REPORT
Work Session Item 3.d.
City Council Work Session Agenda
Meeting Date:
10/17/2022
Item Title:
Interlocal Agreement and Payment Authorization for Multi-Disciplinary Behavioral Health Response Team
Submitted By:
Mistie Gardner
Strategic Focus Areas
:
Safe Community
Customer-Focused City Services
ISSUE
Departments who interact with the public daily often find out about situations and special circumstances where residents need additional support or resources which are outside of the scope of service for that department. Providing social work services for residents through the Multi-Disciplinary Behavioral Health Response Team has helped the City of Garland fill this capability gap. With this program, staff are able to identify core issues causing a situation, identify support services and facilitate long term solutions to meet the needs of resident's who may not otherwise have access to these resources. Without this program, some of the identified needs could go unmet.
OPTIONS
Options for council include approving continuation of the
Multi-Disciplinary Behavioral Health Response Team
via Interlocal Agreement
with Dallas County Hospital District d/b/a Parkland Health & Hospital System ("Parkland") or termination of the existing agreement, which unfortunately would stop the program.
RECOMMENDATION
Garland Health Department staff recommends approval of the Interlocal Agreement Second Amendment
with
Dallas County Hospital District d/b/a Parkland Health & Hospital System ("Parkland") to continue the Multi-Disciplinary Behavioral Health Response Team, which provides social work services to benefit all garland residents.
BACKGROUND
Historically, Garland Fire Department had an Interlocal Agreement with Biotel as their Medical Control, which as a secondary resource provided some very limited social work services. However, when the Medical Control entity had to change, the Fire Department lost all access to the social work services. Garland Health Department worked with Garland Fire to establish a program with Biotel through interlocal agreement for the sole purpose of providing dedicated social work services to residents who could be referred by all departments, especially those who make frequent contact with citizens and through such contact identify unmet needs. In September 2021, this lead to the Garland Health Department entering into an Interlocal Agreement with Dallas County Hospital District d/b/a Parkland Health & Hospital System ("Parkland") for the purpose of providing social work services through the Multi-Disciplinary Behavioral Health Response Team. The team takes referrals from all departments for the purpose of finding long-term solutions to unique citizen needs. The goal is to work with residents who are typically under-served or who normally do not have access to programs and resources. The program has been incredibly successful in helping meet community needs identified by many departments; but to date the service is most often utilized by Fire/EMS, Police, Emergency Management and Code. If personnel from a Garland department identify a citizen who has a unique resource need outside of that department's scope, those cases can be referred to the social worker who will work directly with the resident to find resources, work through complicated systems like Medicare/Medicaid, obtain appropriate long-term placement for health issues, etc. The main focus of the program is to find and facilitate long-term solutions to unique needs in the community in order to provide the best possible outcome for residents.
CONSIDERATION
Approving the recommended action to execute the Interlocal Agreement Second Amendment will allow for the Multi-Disciplinary Behavioral Health Response Team to continue to serve Garland residents for the second year. The cost of the program is
$125, 832, paid in monthly increments throughout the program term of October 1, 2022, to September 30, 2023.
Attachments
2nd Amendment to Interlocal Agreement
Original Interlocal Agreement executed 2021
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