Community Relations Commission

1 Minutes of a Meeting of the 2 Northbrook Cares Subcommittee of the 3 Community Relations Commission 4 Northbrook, IL 5 Thursday, August 4, 2016, 7:00pm 6 7 Present: Chair Bruce Doughty, Subcommittee Members Elliot Bruckman, Sharon 8 Latek and Alice Lonoff 9 10 Absent: Subcommittee Member Safa Hamed 11 12 Others: Village Staff Liaison Erik Jensen, Director of Counseling Services Nancy 13 Vaccaro and LEAD Executive Director Andy Duran 14 15 Welcome 16 Chairman Doughty called the meeting to order at 7:03 p.m. in the Shermer Study at Village Hall. 17 18 Approval of the Tuesday, February 23 Northbrook Cares Subcommittee Minutes for 19 Submission to the Full Community Relations Commission 20 Due to time constraints, the Subcommittee discussed tabling the minutes to a future meeting. A 21 motion was made by Member Latek and seconded by Member Bruckman to table the minutes 22 at this time. On a voice vote, all aye. 23 24 Project Updates: 25 1. Website 26 27 Staff Liaison Jensen overviewed the status of the website project and stated that an optional 28 bid for the Northbrook Cares website was included with a larger bid for the Village’s website. 29 30 Chair Doughty asked when bids would be due. 31 32 Liaison Jensen said that they would be due later in August. 33 34 Presentation by Andy Duran of LEAD on the Text-A-Tip Program 35 Mr. Andy Duran, Executive Director of Linking Efforts Against Drugs (LEAD), introduced himself 36 and gave a short presentation on the Text-A-Tip Program. 37 38 Mr. Duran overviewed the basics of the program, how individual texts can be handled, the 39 technology used to maintain anonymity and how referrals can be done. 40 41 Chair Doughty asked about the program’s clinicians and their experience. 42 43 Mr. Duran explained that all clinicians are certified counselors and are adolescent-focused. 44 45 Chair Doughty asked how a referral may be handled. 46 47 Mr. Duran explained that LEAD maintains contracts with external partners who could can 48 conduct intake and provide services above and beyond what Text-A-Tip can. 49 50 Member Lonoff asked how many clinicians are on-call in the northern suburbs. 51  52 Mr. Duran stated between four and five. 53 54 Member Lonoff asked if that number was sufficient. 55 56 Mr. Duran explained that need is forecasted using an algorithm and that historically no more 57 than two or three conversations are happening at any given time. 58 59 Chair Doughty asked about how anonymity is maintained. 60 61 Mr. Duran explained the technology and the methods clinicians may use to assist individuals. 62 63 Chair Doughty asked about liability. 64 65 Mr. Duran explained the fail safes and backups that have been implemented in the system to 66 ensure continuous service. 67 68 Member Bruckman asked how long implementation can take. 69 70 Mr. Duran explained the typical timelines for an implementation. 71 72 Mr. Duran passed out his business cards and thanked the Subcommittee for their time and 73 asked that any additional questions be sent to him. The Subcommittee thanked Mr. Duran for 74 the presentation. 75 76 Mr. Duran exited at 7:40pm. 77 78 Chair Doughty asked the Subcommittee members about their thoughts. 79 80 A brief conversation occurred on the presentation and a positive consensus was reached by the 81 group. 82 83 Chair Doughty stated that in order to bring other agencies in to partner and provide the service, 84 some research would need to be completed. 85 86 Ms. Vaccaro suggested that the group create a list of questions that could be used for 87 references. The Subcommittee agreed. 88 89 Ultimately, it was decided that Ms. Vaccaro and Liaison Jensen would reach out to neighboring 90 municipalities and school districts for more information. 91 92 Member Latek stated she thought that the schools would be supportive of the project. 93 94 Planning: 95 1. Website 96 97 The group agreed to continue discussion of the website after the bid documents were 98 received. 99 100 2. Social Service/School District/Houses of Worship Exchange Group 101 The Subcommittee discussed the possibility of holding a breakfast in the future to update 102 the groups. 2 103 104 3. Teen Group 105 106 Chair Doughty stated he thought it would be appropriate to begin involving the teen group in 107 the website project once things began progressing. 108 109 The Subcommittee held a brief conversation on publicity and outreach and felt that once the 110 website and Text-A-Tip were further along, they could begin both. 111 112 4. Additional Ideas 113 114 Member Lonoff asked if publicity and outreach should begin at the high schools and move 115 down. 116 117 Chair Doughty stated he would like to see how interested the middle schools were in 118 participating in some of these projects. 119 120 Next Meeting 121 The next meeting will be Wednesday, September 14, 2016 at 7pm in the Terrace Room at 122 Village Hall. 123 124 Adjournment 125 A motion was made by Member Latek and seconded by Member Lonoff to adjourn. On a voice 126 vote, all aye. The meeting closed at 8:05pm. 127 128 Respectfully submitted, 129 130 131 132 Erik Jensen 133 Staff Liaison 3