Hubbard County has approved a purchase of service agreement with a Bemidji mental health program and Park Rapids and Nevis school districts for chemical dependency (CD) intervention services.
Stellher Human Services has provided children's mental health, day treatment and in-home services in the county in the past.
According to Daryl Bessler, director of Hubbard County Social Services, Stellher will be working with adolescents at the schools as soon as this fall.
"The idea is to do it on the school premises to make it more convenient for services," explained Bessler.
Stellher is currently in the process of licensing, which would be between the county and Minnesota Department of Health. Funding could likely come from a chemical dependency consolidated fund, said Bessler.
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Clients could be eligible for reimbursement for the services, or a sliding fee arrangement.
Laporte began the program last year, but could not use consolidated funds, said Bessler.
The districts have been requesting CD services because teens - and even younger - have been increasingly dealing with alcohol abuse.
"They've got kids 10 and under with chemical abuse issues," Bessler said. "This is getting to be a big problem."
According to social services supervisor Julie Terdan, in 2005, 35 juveniles came to the county for chemical dependency assessments, called Rule 25.
"Most are self-referred by parents, social workers or are court-ordered," she said. Terdan said that many juveniles who come through the Hubbard County court system on alcohol-related offenses do not undergo assessment.
"We do assessment on 10 percent (out of 400 requests) of the population," Terdan said, who added that social services encourages many to seek private vendors, like Pine Manor and Upper Mississippi Mental Health, for assessments. Social services currently has a waiting list.
The purpose of the assessments is to identify juveniles' problems earlier in life so they don't "get off track."
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Most come through the court system on minor consumption or driving under the influence charges. (Statistics identifying the total number of minors entering the court system on alcohol-related charges are not available.)
"We know there are underlying issues we need to solve," said Terdan.
"People tend to think it's all drugs, but it's not," she explained. "There's a lot of poly-substance (alcohol/marijuana, cocaine/marijuana, etc.) abuse in people overall."
Hubbard County provided 272 total CD assessments in 2005, Terdan said. In 2004, 31 of the 252 assessments were juveniles.
"It seems to be growing, a general trend," Terdan said of the increasing alcohol abuse. She also speculates the state's lowering of the allowable blood alcohol level from 0.1 to 0.08 in the past year as contributing to that increase.
