Hamilton County MCSA
Choices Mosaic + JFS + Juvenile Court + MHRSB + MRDD
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Hamilton County MCSA Choices Mosaic + JFS + Juvenile Court + MHRSB + MRDD
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Frequently Asked Questions about the Hamilton County MCSA & Choices Mosaic
Hamilton County’s four major child-serving agencies formed a partnership through the Family and Children First Council in the 1990s. Since 2002 this partnership has been operated by the MCSA (Multi County Systems Agency.)
The partnership is interested in better serving youth and their families who are involved with multiple systems (child welfare, juvenile court, mental health, alcohol or drug, and mental retardation & developmental disabilities.)
Without the partnership, these children would often wind up in residential institutions for long periods of time. This is very expensive, and often not in the best interest of the child, family or community. The MCSA facilitates pooled funding by the five partners to to serve this population of children.
Pooled funding and the use of a non-profit provider (Choices Mosaic) has two big advantages. First, it allows greater flexibility in the kinds of services that can be purchased. Second, it allows better coordinated and more intensive care management. This results in an increase in the number of children who are served in their community and a decrease in the amount of time youth spend outside their community. The reduced expense on residential treatment pays for more intensive services in the community, and the child and family are much better prepared to become independent of such intensive supports.
Choices was hired by the MCSA to provide and manage services for multi-system youth and families. The Choices role is to combine care management principles and innovative, non-traditional ways of delivering services.
Choices Mosaic offers:
experience serving highly troubled children who have contact with multiple systems (child welfare, mental health, juvenile court, etc.)
access to a wide array of services such as behavior management and mentoring
a case rate fee reimbursement structure
an information systems program capable of managing the complex database needs of this program
ability to access private grant dollars
proven success
By applying non-traditional services and service-delivery, Choices Mosaic has succeeded at reducing the length of time children stay in institutions. Since residential settings are by far the most expensive service, reducing length-of-stay helps to control costs. From a treatment standpoint, it is also best whenever possible for children to grow up in families or family-like settings, rather than in institutions.
What are “innovative and non-traditional” services and service delivery?
Much of Choices’ success comes from its commitment to “wraparound” planning. Wraparound is a way of breaking out of the traditional model of referring troubled children and families to therapists, institutional treatment, and residential centers where the services are rigidly defined and children are grouped together without regard to their individual needs. Those services are often included in wraparound planning, but true wraparound goes further.
Wraparound draws on all a family’s strengths and resources and goes outside traditional, formal boundaries for help. For example, a child who shuts down in his therapist’s office may find release for aggression in a karate class instead. A trusted teacher, family friend, or pastor can be called upon to mentor. Sometimes, this kind of help is less expensive than traditional alternatives.
Other examples of innovative services include Art Therapy, Behavior Management, or specialized training for parents and caregivers.
Choices begins the process with Child and Family Team meetings that involve all the key stakeholders in a child’s life and include parents (and the child if appropriate) in decision-making.
How do referrals to Choices Mosaic work?
Referrals are made by a worker with one of the four systems, Job and Family Services (child welfare), Juvenile Court (delinquency), Mental Health and Recovery Services Board (through contract providers), or Mental Retardation & Developmental Disabilities. There are some other service options in addition to Choices available for youth and families, and the worker and family will decide on the best option.
FAST is a program set up by the State of Ohio to fund non-traditional services for children. Funds are granted to the Mental Health and Recovery Services Board and are used to pay for their share of MCSA expenses. Because Choices Mosaic serves multi-system youth with non-traditional services the FAST funds are a good match. In state fiscal year 2007 (July 2006 to June 2007) Hamilton County received $244,551.
One area being enhanced by these FAST funds is parent advocacy. For additional information on advocacy visit NAMI Ohio (the grantee for advocacy funds) at http://www.namiohio.org/.