MINOT – An organization that helps youth in Minot is having a few issues since it moved to a new property in the southwest section of the city, including maintaining staff.
After the county voted in June to help fund a new property for Youthworks, a service for troubled and neglected youth, to align with a new Department of Human Service rule, county commissioners had requested Youthworks give an update on its services every November, which it did Tuesday.
Emily Yanish, development director for Youthworks, said the new home, which has been working well for the separation of youth since Youthworks moved in September, has had its own share of issues, such as known electrical updates and unknown plumbing issues.
“We’ve had 13 youth placed in certified shelter care, and two youth placed in attendant care by law enforcement,” said Yanish. “Because of the separation of population, we’ve had to double staff just under 10% of the total time that youth have been with us.”
Yanish said one challenge is maintaining part-time staff, as well as what she foresees to be a future problem -- maintaining two schedules of staff.
“At this point we have the funding for a start-up through a grant from the Department of Health and Human Services, but that is only a one-year grant,” Yanish explained. “At this point we do not have other funds once that grant is expended to cover that expense. We do pay our staff a five dollar an hour stipend to keep their availability, and, like I said, we’ve needed to call in a secondary staff about 10% of the time.”
Commissioner Howard Anderson made a motion to have representation from Youthworks’ board of directors, the county commission, law enforcement, and the Human Service Zone meet sometime before July to further discuss the agreement between Youthworks and the county.
