Keenyn Wald had not prepared for this.
When Wald, the Lowndes County administrator for Community Counseling Services, appeared at Lowndes County Board of Supervisors on Monday, the plan was to simply update the supervisors on the work CCS does in the community as part of national Mental Health Awareness Month.
Wald noted that it had been a challenging year for CCS since he last appeared before the board. Demand for services skyrocketed while CCS’s ability to perform those services fell because of the restrictions and limitations imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
CCS is a 501(c)3 public nonprofit agency providing a range of mental health services. It is partially funded by the Mississippi State Department of Mental Health and governments in the seven counties it serves — Lowndes, Oktibbeha, Clay, Noxubee, Choctaw, Webster and Winston — but about 79 percent of its revenue comes from fees for services.
Lowndes County provides $8,500 per month to CCS. Contributions from the seven counties account for just more than 1 percent of its annual $20 million budget.
As supervisors asked Wald about CCS, including the agency’s 2019 takeover of Recovery House, a residential women’s drug/alcohol treatment center in south Lowndes County, District 1 Supervisor Harry Sanders speculated that funds from the American Recovery Act might be directed to CCS. Lowndes County will receive $11.5 million in Recovery Act funds.
At the time, the suggestion seemed almost like an aside as local governments await instructions on how the money could be spent.
By Wednesday, however, the prospects of CCS being eligible for those funds had brightened.
“What has happened is that the Department of Transportation has issued a document about how the funds can be used,” County Administrator Jay Fisher said. “It’s a 150-page document, but what I can tell you is based on what I’m seeing there is a wide latitude in it for community support for anything affected by COVID-19.”
Wald said that’s a qualification CCS can easily meet.
“The truth of it is everybody has been affected by COVID,” Wald said. “Finding people who are ‘affected’ is not difficult at all. I want people to be able to get the services they deserve. COVID has increased the need for our services and has challenged people’s ability to get those services. Those funds could be a great opportunity for us in so many areas.”
During Monday’s meeting, Wald was encouraged to start putting together a plan in the event the supervisors agree to provide the CCS with Recovery Act funds.
“At this point, I don’t know exactly what I would do,” Wald said.
Among the possibilities, Wald said, are expanding alcohol and drug treatment to include women as well as children affected by addicted parents, increasing the number of residential beds at its two facilities — The Pines and Cady Hill Recovery Center and Recovery House — and even “pop-up” clinics that could go into neighborhoods to provide mental health care.
Fisher said it’s probably too early to commit to any plan.
“We won’t get the final instructions until July,” he said. “But based on what we know right now, I think there is sufficient wiggle room for the county to provide funds for Community Counseling if the supervisors choose to do that. What I can say with confidence right now is, based on what I’m seeing in this document, it’s not the non-starter we thought it might be.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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