Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the School Prevention topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Commission uses BHSSA administrative funds for school suicide‑prevention training, SUD pilots and school behavioral health evaluation
Summary
The commission voted to encumber BHSSA administrative and evaluation funds to buy grant management software ($200,000), expand suicide‑prevention online training ($1.5M to CARS), pilot school substance‑use disorder prevention ($3.6M), and run a $9M RFP for school behavioral‑health performance management systems.
At its Jan. 22 meeting the Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission approved a package of BHSSA (Behavioral Health Student Services Act) administrative and evaluation expenditures to strengthen school‑based prevention and evaluation capacity.
The approved items are:
- $200,000 to procure grant‑management software to help the commission track its grants and reporting; staff said this will improve data collection across roughly 135 grant agreements. - A $1.5 million amendment to the commission’s existing technical assistance contract with the Center for Applied Research Solutions (CARS) to develop 3–6 free, trauma‑informed, culturally relevant online suicide‑prevention training modules for teachers, staff, parents and students; staff said the modules would be available at no cost and would launch with a project start date of May 1, 2026. - $3.6 million in administrative funds to expand substance‑use‑disorder prevention and early‑intervention pilots in schools, distributed via amendments to existing eligible BHSSA grantees; staff noted timing constraints required augmentation of current grantees rather than a competitive process to encumber funds by June 30, 2026. - A $9 million evaluation procurement to fund school behavioral‑health performance management systems, including pilots in up to six LEAs (three schools per LEA) to test metrics, resource mapping and continuous quality‑improvement tools; staff said the RFP would be released promptly to meet encumbrance deadlines.
Commissioners who asked about sustainability and the role of managed‑care and county billing were told that the actions are intended to support implementation of BHSSA and to drive data‑informed decisions in schools. The moves were approved on roll call.
