Minutes of the Virtual Meeting with OFVP and Urbana-Champaign Cluster, December 22, 2022

Virtual meeting between IDHS-OFVP and Urbana-Champaign cluster

Thursday, December 22, 2022, 10:00-11:00 am

Recording

Attendees

1. Andrea Porter - Chief of Staff, Office of Representative Carroll Ammons; LAC member
2. Mayor Diane Marlin - Urbana Mayor; LAC member
3. Jennifer Ivory-Tatum - Superintendent, Urbana School District; LAC member
4. Stephanie Cockrell - The Well Experience
5. Julian Hernandez - The Center for Youth and Family Solutions
6. Pat Ege - Cunningham Children's Home, Inc.
7. Jeniece - Urbana Connections Center
8. Chris Patterson - IDHS-OFVP, Assistant Secretary
9. Dana Kelly - IDHS, Chief Policy Officer
10. Awisi Bustos - IDHS, Senior Policy Advisor

Minutes

1. Opening/RPSA Overview and Progress Update
   • Assistant Secretary Christopher Patterson thanked everybody for attending and mentioned that the meeting will be recorded and be available for sharing.
   • As for the Reimagined Public Safety Act or RPSA, Assistant Secretary said that it was passed last year thru the support of the legislators with special mention to Representative Carroll Ammon's work and making sure that the bill is passed. Thru RPSA, the State has made a historic commitment when Governor J. B. Pritzker dedicated $250 million to addressing firearm violence across the State. He added that a lot of that work has started in January and one of the important goals is to deepen relationships and programming in existing youth development. Assistant Secretary said however, that new strategies were also employed in funding and grant opportunities to address gun violence.
   • Out of the $250 million, a little over $65 million has been allocated for fiscal years 22, 23 and 24. A lot of work has been done in Chicago and across the State of Illinois and there's a $100 million budget committed to Greater Illinois including Champaign and Urbana. Assistant Secretary said that the Greater Illinois budget is more than enough for the 16 municipalities and so the OFVP is encouraging organizations to work together, spread the word and get everyone involved.
   • Assistant Secretary shared that to date, there were 19 applications received for the Greater Illinois Violence Prevention Services grant which will include street outreach, case management and victim service. He explained that the street outreach component is when an individual is taken with lived experience or oftentimes has either been getting involved in gun violence or with previous history and potentially be a participant in a re-entry program for folks with felony convictions. The violence prevention strategy extends into case management, the second component, where an assessment is done and the needs of an individual will be identified for the person to escape the life of violence. The third component is the victim service model which is for families who have lost loved ones from gun violence and supporting survivors of gun violence.
   • For Greater Illinois Youth Intervention Services grant, the OFVP received 28 applications across Greater Illinois. Early in the year, Assistant Secretary said they released a NOFO that was very similar to the Teen Reach program that is traditionally rolled out by IDHS. For the Youth Intervention released late in the year, it differs with Teen Reach in the sense that it is more flexible, but OFVP wants organizations to make sure that they are working with the right young people who are either at risk of being shot or shooting someone.
   • Finally, there were 18 applications received for the Trauma Informed Behavior Health Services NOFO. Assistant Secretary said that this NOFO is equally important as it addresses mental health issues that young people impacted by fire violence are suffering from.
   • In addition, Assistant Secretary said that those who have already applied for RPSA funding and those who have not but are interested, will get the opportunity to have a technical assistance and training entity attached to the programmatic components of their funding. He said that the OFVP wants to make sure that RPSA grantees who will have varying degrees of expertise, are fully supported in the work that they're doing. Likewise, they will have additional support from Ernst and Young, an accounting firm that has been contracted by IDHS to work with providers with regards to State requirements in relation to fiscal reporting.
2. Local Advisory Council Process
   • In accordance with RPSA, the OFVP convened 16 Local Advisory Councils (LACs) in the 16 Greater Illinois municipalities with more than 150 members across the State. All 16 LACs provided their inputs and recommendations unique to their respective communities on how to best allocate funds to reduce firearm violence. The OFVP summarized the recommendations into strategies which can be found in the IDHS website.
3. Recommendations - Primary Findings
   1. Support for comprehensive violence prevention services that includes street outreach, victim services, and case management;
   2. The need for a flexible source of youth intervention funding that would target a broad age range of youth most at risk of being involved in community violence; and
   3. The need for additional trauma informed behavioral health supports that specifically target those individuals (primarily youth) most at risk of being involved in community violence
   4. Continued investment in traditional models of youth development that focus on engaging school involved youth and optimizing personal and educational outcomes
4. Recommendations - Other Findings
   1. Need for resources to address racism and historical disinvestment in communities of color, financial stability and mobility, and family violence.
   2. Need for technical assistance and capacity building resources that will allow small organizations to succeed in the violence prevention space.
   3. Support for community collaboration inclusive of schools, police, healthcare institutions, park districts, cultural partners, and non-profit advocates.
5. NOFO Service Offerings
   • Assistant Secretary said that most of the NOFOs have already ended but the OFVP made rolling NOFOs which means the OFVP will keep reopening the NOFOs until the funds are exhausted. He shared that this was because they found out that when there is no due date for the applications, many providers do not really apply and would stop on sending letters of intent. And so, the applications that have been received so far are being reviewed and graded and after the grants have been awarded, the NOFOs will be reopened in January 2023.
   • Meanwhile for the Youth Development programming, Assistant Secretary said that if an organization doesn't necessarily meet the Teen Reach model but they have a unique program, the OFVP is encouraging such organization to apply and spread the word to other similar organizations.
6. Other NOFO Opportunities
   • Another NOFO opportunity is the technical assistance training and capacity building. The OFVP wants to make sure that there's a relationship between the provider and the capability building organization that is supporting the provider so that the latter can identify what the former needs the most. Assistant Secretary said they will also be including the accounting component to make sure that organizations, particularly new organizations, who have never had State funding know how to fill out the reports, know the requirements for the fiscal and backoffice management.
   • The other NOFO is the Greater Illinois Violence Prevention Council Coordinator NOFO which will make the LACs permanent and will serve in a convening role to bring together community organizations, youth with lived experience, schools, police, healthcare institutions, park district and cultural partners, and other advocates to continue to identify the most effective solutions to address firearm violence on the local level.
   • Finally, IDHS has a lot of resources available to the people in the community but there is a disconnect in some areas between the resources and the people. IDHS wants to ensure that all municipalities are connected with these resources and so training and tools will be provided, some will be launched thru the LACs, to make sure people know how to access all IDHS resources.
7. Funding Strategy
   • There is a $100 million dollars available for Greater Illinois and OFVP's objectives were to get LAC inputs or recommendations, assess provider capacity and determine area need. Assistant Secretary said they don't want to make the assumption that every community needs the same thing and so the OFVP wanted the LAC to do the determination.
   • In terms of capacity, the first round of funding was utilized to assess capacity of service providers across Greater Illinois. Assistant Secretary said the OFVP is using a 2-pronged approach, at one end is to get qualified organizations to apply and start providing services right away and at the other end is reassessing in terms of budget that was outlined in the provider proposal to see if the services can be expanded to more customers. Likewise, the OFVP would like the LACs to revisit their community asset mapping to determine where the resources are and where the gaps. Assistant Secretary mentioned that IDHS is working with an accounting firm, Ernst and Young to provide technical assistance to providers. IDHS is also providing technical assistance and training and doing community organizing to help build capacity among providers.
8. Funding Approach
   • Assistant Secretary said that the first round of funding was made sure to be aligned with the LAC recommendations, and that it was open funding to assess capacity and be able to do capacity building in areas with high needs. The next round will ensure that funding is escalated in areas with high needs and that LAC funding recommendations are met. For example, Assistant Secretary said if a provider found out during the course of service that it needs to provide service to more customers, the OFVP would want to know it and would want the additional customers to be brought into the provider's programming, thus, OFVP will be working with the provider so that the latter will be able to do so.
9. Spread the Word
   • Assistant Secretary that OFVP is asking everybody to spread the word with other providers in the community that is doing youth intervention, youth development or violence prevention particularly to those organizations that are a little skittish around getting State funding. He said he understands that the process for some can be intimidating but the OFVP is working to address those challenges and have set up technical assistance and training to ensure that those applying have the support they need. He mentioned a new provider that has been funded through RPSA and is now in its third round of funding. The OFVP wants to do the same in Champaign-Urbana but the office needs the support of the LAC members and community officials. He added that the Governor previously said he doesn't want only the large organizations to get the opportunity but also the small organizations.
10. Next Steps
    • As previously mentioned, the OFVP is asking everybody to spread the word about the RPSA funding particularly to those organizations who are working out of their own pockets and who don't feel like any help is on the way, let community members know that there is a big opportunity for Champaign and Urbana to get involved in violence prevention fight. The OFVP also asks for the LAC to wrap up your capacity building efforts, revise and complete the community asset mapping; to identify and encourage larger organizations in some cases where it's appropriate to be the fiscal agent for smaller organizations. Finally, Assistant Secretary said that the LAC is encouraged to keep the line of communication open amongst themselves and also with the OFVP. He mentioned his personal invitation that he can be invited to come out to the community and talk with providers and give them the support that they need.
11. Question and Answer
    • Mayor Diane Marlin mentioned that the Urbana School District applied for the Youth Intervention Services grant but they were notified that they are not a finalist. She asked who in the Urbana Champaign cluster received funds in the first round.
    • Assistant Secretary said he does not know the specifics but he can find out. He added that the OFVP is making sure that providers are informed why they were not selected so that they will have the chance to resubmit their application since the NOFOs will be reopened. He asked Ms. Awisi Bustos to reach out to the Violence Prevention Bureau and follow up about the Urbana School District denial and make sure that the organization knows exactly why they were denied. With regards to the second question, the list of current RPSA grantees can be found at the IDHS website.
    • Ms. Jennifer Ivory-Tatum of the Urbana School district mentioned that she is sure that their application was completely filled out and then they received the denial letter on December 15th.
    • Mr. Julian Hernandez of The Center for Youth and Family Solutions mentioned that although he is not sure if his organization applied, they would like to collaborate with another provider in Champaign who is applying.
    • Assistant Secretary thanked Mr. Hernandez and reinforced his statement by saying that it's what OFVP wants and encourages for providers to collaborate with one another if there is an opportunity. Although the NOFOs are competitive, there are more than enough funds to support the goal and all the work that is happening. He added that he can meet with Mr. Hernandez's organization to encourage them to apply if they have not yet done so.
    • Ms. Stephanie Cockrell of The Well Experience asked if them being a current RPSA grantee affects their chances of applying. They want to provide more mental health services for the youth and for youth employment services.
    • Assistant Secretary said it doesn't. He encouraged Ms. Cockrell to apply for all the funding opportunities that make sense for their organization. If they want to help more families, that is exactly the point that OFVP wants to support. If they need to geographically extend their services and programming, the OFVP will support it as well.
    • Ms. Ivory-Tatum asked if the Youth Development/Teen Reach NOFO also a rolling application process? Ms. Bustos said yes.
    • Ms. Bustos highlighted Assistant Secretary's statement about the NOFOs as ongoing effort. She said the NOFOs will be reissued and reopened soon after the reviews are done. OFVP will be announcing the results in the next coming weeks and will be in communication with all the providers who applied.
12. As there were no more questions, Assistant Secretary thanked everyone for their participation and their commitment to their communities and wished everyone a happy new year. He reiterated that he is open for any invitation to come out to Champaign or Urbana for any violence prevention event or meeting as the OFVP deeply wants to partner with the municipalities. He adjourned the meeting at 10:48am.