Onondaga County’s probation department is planning a significant expansion of outreach and diversion services to help at-risk youth. County lawmakers are voting Tuesday to accept a $1 million state grant for everything from oversight programs and equipment to hiring and training staff. Probation Director Kristen Jackson told legislators last week much of their time is spent addressing school-based threats.
“We have a lot more cases than we thought we were going to have in the beginning," Jackson said. "So we're looking to fund the coordination of just the flow of these cases and there's a plethora of training that goes along with this.”
Jackson said they need someone to arrange meetings and training with school districts, and make sure they have the tools to make appropriate referrals. One of them might be to a new in-house mental health case manager or therapist within the probation department. Jackson said the county has plenty of mental health resources, but they’re not always accessible to youth when they need it.
“Sometimes we get to a point where we're making referrals and then the youth is put on a wait list and then they get lost," Jackson said. "So we would like to have somebody in our department to help do that warm handoff with the youth so that they've got somebody that they can lean on right away.”
Jackson said they’d also like to create a pilot outreach location in a neighborhood, perhaps with a local non-profit organization, where youth can meet with their probation officer while getting other interventions or services. She expects future costs of the program to be covered by the state, and that the county won’t be asked to fund it.
