Orcas School District to Oversee $42,750 in School-based Mental Health Funds

Following approval of a $42,750 annual grant by the County Council earlier this month, Orcas Island School District Superintendent Barbara Kline and other Orcas school staff met yesterday with Barbara La Brash and Wayne Totten, San Juan County Department of Health & Community Services staff, to define staffing and outcomes of that award.

The county [intlink id=”council-to-decide-upon-mental-health-tax-expenditures” type=”post”]”mental health tax”\[/intlink]funding charges the District to make available school-based mental health services to all school-aged Orcas children, from K-12, wherever they are enrolled in school.

Kline said that the school district plans to use the $42,750 to screen and identify individual mental health needs, refer students to mental health professionals, and track their results, primarily through data collection already in place with the state’s Readiness-to-Learn reporting system.

While district and county officials have yet to finalize the agreement, the funding period will begin September 1, 2009. The revenue comes from the one-tenth of one percent “Mental Health” county tax, which began collection on April 1, 2009. Orcas Island’s $42,750 amount is to be funded per year for the next two years; Lopez Island will receive $29,750 annually for the next two years; and San Juan Island is allotted $52,500 annually for the next two years.

The school-based mental health program is one part of the three-tiered approach to utilizing the mental health tax. The second round of funding will address community -based mental health services. The county’s Human Services Advisory Board will begin meeting soon to define community-based mental health services.

The third element stipulated in the adoption of the mental health tax is for a “therapeutic” Family Court, for which $50,000 will be set aside annually.