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Warsaw Police Department was notified Aug. 14 a grant application it submitted to pay for the CARES (Community Assistance Resources Emergency Services) Program for the next five years and to expand it out into Kosciusko County was selected for funding.
On Friday, Aug. 21, WPD Capt. Joel Beam requested permission from the Warsaw Board of Public Works and Safety to accept the funds.
He reminded the board that back in June, he requested permission to apply for a $3 million grant through the Make Indiana Healthy Again initiative, in cooperation with the Rural Health Transformation Program.
“Now, this last week we received notification that the grant has been selected for funding. This first year is $685,947. It’s a 100% reimbursable grant, and I would like to thank Lisa Harman, Tanya Jackson and Mikaela Bixler for their hard work in applying for this CARES grant. This grant will cover CARES for the next five years and expand it into the county,” Beam said.
Bixler is the CARES coordinator, Jackson is a CARES resource navigator and Harman is the president and CEO at Live Well Kosciusko.
Harman told the board, “I’m very excited about the funding. This was one of several grants that I helped write, so we’ll be seeing some information about Live Well and then also about the Clubhouse, and so I’m just so, so happy that being able to represent Warsaw and Kosciusko County, we were able to bring some of those dollars back here.”
She said one of the reasons they founded Live Well Kosciusko 10 years ago in September was to be able to represent and bring resources back to this county.
“So I’m super, super excited about this. We really truly believe in the CARES program, and we’re so happy that they funded it fully,” Harman said.
Councilwoman Diane Quance asked if the funds awarded includes the expansion of CARES into the county, and Harman said it did.
“So we’ll have county CARES officers as well as well as city of Warsaw. Awesome,” Quance said.
“Now the real work begins!” Harman stated.
Board member George Clemens gave kudos to everyone involved. “It’s always easier to approve to accept a grant than to spend the taxpayer money,” he said.
Quance agreed, and said it’s an exciting grant as well.
A motion to accept the grant was approved 2-0 by the board, with Warsaw Mayor Jeff Grose absent.
After the meeting, Beam said the grant is providing $685,947 for the first year and he did not know yet how much will be given in the other years, but they said the grant application was funded.
The first year of the grant will include $352,733.33 for personnel; $123,456.67, personnel fringe; $10,682, travel; $60,000, equipment; $43,200, supplies; and $95,875 for other.
“It will cover salaries. It can buy a vehicle with it. It will cover training. It will also include a new location for CARES to be out of, so they can all work out of one office because we don’t have the room to add four more people at the PD, so it wil include funds for leasing a place that they can work out of as well. It includes their salaries and benefits,” Beam said.
They are still working out the details with Sheriff Jim Smith of how the county will be involved.
“They’ll keep doing what they’re doing, and right now they’re working under the umbrella of the police department. They’re significantly safer. We know where they’re at all the time, and the girls are helping lots of people, dozens a month,” Beam stated.
The CARES program has been grant-supported since its inception five years ago. Last year, funds from the national opioid settlements were used to support CARES.
Beam said Harman helped them apply for the Make Indiana Healthy Again grant.
“She actually notified us of the grant, and then she also helped Mikaela and Tanya type everything up,” he said.
The grant starts Sept. 1.
“It was a short notification that we had to apply, and then it was a turnaround of a month, which is unusual for government work. It usually takes a lot longer than that, so only having a few weeks that we had to wait was nice,” Beam stated.
When Conley and Bixler learned the grant was accepted, he said they were very happy.
“Because right now they had to look for that grant every year to make sure they were employed, so for five years they don’t have to worry about it. I mean, that’s got to be a nice relief,” he said.
The mission of the CARES Program is to prevent crises and deflect community members from the criminal justice system, emergency medical care or other 911 services by assisting with connection to community resources, according to the website. CARES aims to reduce unnecessary emergency service utilization and improve public health outcomes by providing non-emergency outreach, case coordination, and referrals to appropriate medical, behavioral health and social services.
To learn more about CARES, visit the website at https://caresresources.com/.
