Mass Care Committee/Mental Health subcommittee

Start Date: 05/26/2020

Description:

Tuesday, May 26th ... Mass Care Committee of SWMT COAD meet every other week to update all members of latest status subcommittee work.
*** Feeding...Gallatin Valley Food Bank continues to offer pre-bagged food to 50-80 families/week. Salvation Army continues to supply daily sack lunches to community and homeless staying in hotel until end of May. S.A. is also partnering with LDS Church in distribuing personal hygiene products through mid-June.
***Sheltering...Amercian Red Cross update - Hotel where area homeless population has been staying is on a lease with an option to buy. HRCD is working to find a local area church in providing a few daytime hours for homeless to use for personal hygiene use (showering). The new Warming Center located on Wheat Drive is on schedule to open August 1. Salvation Army continues to seek bids for improvements to available space in their facililty should a need for sheltering in our community arise (funding is needed for further work).
***Child Care....for essential workers continues through mid-June. No new families are being added. Have 3 classrooms operating at this time for K-8.
For 0-6 age kiddos....Gallatin Co. is preparing expansion plans for child care in general, however most facilities are wanting to take it slow. Park County is having meetings M-W-F mornings as they continue to try and meet needs in that county.
***Mental Health, Emotional and Spiritual Care....M.H. continues to meet every week, Press Releases for May's Mental Health declaration have been released (3 or 4) and the last will be out soon. Bozeman School District is wrapping up their school year remotely (by June 10) and dedicating alot of time to possible Fall school scenarios involving the new year. MSU is running a short summer school program remotely.
***Spiritual Care...close to providing 3-4 Area Chaplains to respond to clients calling into Help Center for faith based concerns.
***HOPE AACR....HOPE Canine Teams are available for virtual visits (I gave this new experimental program the name, "HOPE For a Smile") to area meetings and/or summer programs.
CONCERNS within the County.....HELP CENTER stats...83% increase in substance abuse and addictions, 72% in loneliness, 29% in relationships, 18% in mental health, 22% increase in emotional health, 24% in suicidal ideation...attempts at suicide are steady (all stats are based on increases since this time last year).........YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK opening on Montana borders is scheduled for June 1. .....CHILD CARE this summer is exacerbated by liability concerns with COVID 19 presence.

Thursday, May 28th....Mental Health subcommittee meeting.......many of the above topics were discussed in more detail.

Agency: South West Montana COAD
Teams:

Suzy Saltiel during the Mental Health meeting


Region: