|
|
Saturday, February 23, 2008
|
|
State backs off plan to put sex offenders in Walker homes after objections raised
Cass County Correspondent WALKER Ð Community response can make a difference.
The Minnesota Department of Human Services decided Friday against opening foster homes in Walker for the last five Ah-Gwah-Ching residents to be placed elsewhere.
"After clearly hearing that the Walker community would not support this development, a decision has been made that we will not move this development forward," Mike Tessner, CEO of State Operated Services, wrote in a memo to the staff of Ah-Gwah-Ching and their exclusive labor representatives.
Patrice Vick, communications director for Tessner, provided that memo by e-mail after Cass County received a similar e-mailed memo.
Tessner's memo to Ah-Gwah-Ching staff states officials "will be asked to start developing alternative appropriate placements for the five individuals who were to be moved into the Walker Community.
"I realize that this leaves a lot of unanswered questions regarding the future employment options of our employees and Human Resources will be working closely with the Exclusive Reps around this issue."
Walker area residents consider placing sex offenders in an unlocked foster care home in their community a whole lot more risky than housing them in the locked Ah-Gwah-Ching state facility. They don't want the foster homes.
They made this plain Thursday night in a meeting the Walker Area Committee to Protect Our Children called to get answers about two proposed foster care homes at Walker. The crowd overflowed the Walker Fire Hall and was moved to Walker-Hackensack-Akeley School auditorium five minutes before the meeting began.
|
Earlier in the multi-year Ah-Gwah-Ching downsizing and closing process group homes for what the community sees as less risky Ah-Gwah-Ching clients with behavioral problems went to Hubbard and Beltrami counties and not Walker.
|
Three Minnesota Department of Corrections officials, two Minnesota Department of Human Services officials, a representative from the governor's office and county officials spent over three hours answering questions.
Fewer than 20 residents remain at Ah-Gwah-Ching. Most of those will go to the state facility at St. Peter, where ground was broken Wednesday to add a building to house court-ordered placements involving behavioral problems. They will be moved temporarily to an existing area of the St. Peter facility by March.
This leaves five Ah-Gwah-Ching residents the department of human services planned to place in foster homes at Walker early in March.
Three of those clients have a record as sex offenders. One is a Level 1 sex offender. Two are Level 2. None are the highest risk Level 3, according to Sheriff Randy Fisher.
Department of Corrections official Harley Nelson said two of the five are on supervised release from prison. One is on probation and never was imprisoned. Two are voluntary placements at Ah-Gwah-Ching, Nelson said.
All are older, ages 65 to 77, mostly wheel chair-bound and have a variety of medical problems such as diabetes, Alzheimer's or other debilitating conditions, according to Roger Deneen, Minnesota State Community Operated Services director, who oversees the state's foster and group homes. These five clients cannot go down stairs or to the neighbors' without assistance, he said.
Earlier in the multi-year Ah-Gwah-Ching downsizing and closing process group homes for what the community sees as less risky Ah-Gwah-Ching clients with behavioral problems went to Hubbard and Beltrami counties and not Walker. Some in the audience wondered why the state waited to create Walker foster homes only for the last five residents.
Some Ah-Gwah-Ching clients did go to Still Haven Hus, a privately run facility in the Walker Industrial Park, but privately run homes generally do not pay as high a caregiver wage as state run homes.
Caught in the middle of this issue is a young Walker real estate agent, Israel Moe, who successfully found the state two houses near Walker to lease to the state for a year to house the last five Ah-Gwah-Ching clients. He signed the lease papers last week, only to find out this week that sex offenders would be among the residents.
Minnesota Department of Human Services negotiated the lease contracts. Data privacy laws bar that agency from discussing personal information about clients. Minnesota Department of Corrections, not involved in lease negotiations, began this week notifying law enforcement and others it is allowed to notify that sex offenders would be moving into the state's Walker foster homes. DOC usually makes their notifications after leases are set.
"We may need to change policies of notification in the future," said Harry Kennedy, state sex offender policy coordinator for Gov. Tim Pawlenty's office.
Moe said at Thursday's meeting he plans to consult an attorney now to see whether he can get out of his lease agreements without causing discrimination charges. Knowing sex offenders will be residents has changed his view of the agreements, he said.
Cass County Adult Human Services Supervisor Frank Schaap, who has worked with the state human services department to find placements and visit all homes where Ah-Gwah-Ching residents were placed, said he thinks the state foster and group homes are well run. They have 24-hour well-trained staff to monitor client residents, he said.
When asked, he said, he would not be concerned if a state operated home like these opened near where his grandchildren live. He expressed a lot more concern over sex offenders released to the community after serving their prison time, but who do not have 24-hour supervision.
Schaap said he told state human services officials Cass County supported placement of foster or group homes in the county because the county board had told him to help preserve as many higher-paying state caregiver jobs as possible when Ah-Gwah-Ching closed.
Commissioner Jim Dowson, who attended Thursday's meeting, made it plain, however, that he opposes placing sex offenders in the community, even if it would preserve state jobs. He said he was speaking for the entire county board.
"If all five commissioners agree, I won't support this," Schaap said after Dowson spoke Thursday. "They are my bosses."
Schaap asked Sheriff Fisher whether he has received many calls concerning problems with other group or foster homes in Cass County, some of which house former Brainerd state facility clients. Fisher said they do get calls for people walking away from those homes.
Fisher skirted directly answering questions about whether he thought these homes proposed for Walker would be a good idea or would be safe for the community.
Many people express concerns over future clients once the homes are established. While the current five clients may be older and have serious physical limitations, Walker residents are concerned more mobile sex offenders could become future clients.
DHS representatives Mike Tessner and Roger Deneen said they would take Walker residents' concerns into consideration when making their final decision on where to place the last five Ah-Gwah-Ching residents.
"What we're hearing tonight is making us rethink," Tessner said.
To Subscribe to the Brainerd Dispatch, Click Here.
|
|
|
Thinking about a New Job?
These employers want you!
|
Loading...
|
|
|
Today's Best Classifieds:
|
|
|
|
|
|
