This session will describe the experience of pilot testing an innovative model in Hennepin County. The program model, the necessary partnerships, and lessons learned will be described in detail. The approach was created to address a common need seen in many counties for options for people recovering from serious mental illness to maintain community stability. In Hennepin County, one of the highest-need populations consists of individuals with serious mental illness who repeatedly cycle in and out of detention, the emergency room, and hospitalization, never receiving the services they need to maintain stable community living. They are likely to have co-occurring substance use disorders, chronic physical health conditions, and issues with social determinants of health (homelessness, poor nutrition, isolation). Hennepin County is implementing an innovative Behavioral Health Center to address these issues. Through partnership and collaboration with Hennepin Healthcare, Minneapolis Police Department & community-based mental health organizations, the Center offers short term care coordination, traditional social services, and physical health care, under one roof. The Center is another option for residents with known or suspected serious mental illness who are picked up on low-level offenses or found to have urgent mental health needs.

This session will present information on the most common substances of abuse in Minnesota. After an overview of State wide prevalence of use, focus will be given to primary, secondary and combination of substance use in both geographic and demographic breakdowns. Finally, special attention will be paid to teasing out differences between intoxication and withdrawal symptoms of common substances and mental health/medical conditions, with specific attention to differential diagnosis.

What happens when a maltreatment investigation/assessment becomes an open case? Come learn about the child protection system in Minnesota, including: court involvement, case planning, engaging fathers, kinship searches, placement decisions, and permanency options. This session is intended as a basic overview for those that don’t work in child protection to better understand how the child protection system works in Minnesota.

Get your annual legal and ethical CE training in a dynamic, entertaining game show format! This program is designed to test your legal and ethical knowledge while having lots of fun! Management of some of the most perplexing legal and ethical quandaries will be explored. Topics include child abuse, confidentiality, duty to warn, elder abuse, HIPAA, noted legal cases, malpractice, and more. The material is applicable to all disciplines, practices, and states. For more information please visit: www.cliftonmitchell.com. This session will be held twice.

Human Resource management is complex and complicated just as people are. Too many times critical employee practices are not followed that not only create employer liability but can have an adverse effect on employee engagement and satisfaction. This presentation will provide a soup to nuts approach on the areas that all supervisors and managers need to understand. The topics covered will include interviewing, on boarding, having difficult conversations. coaching. performance improvement plans, progressive discipline, labor relations, ADA, FMLA, and the role between management and human resources. The goal of this session is to not replace an existing HR Department but to provide foundational information to program supervisors and managers and perhaps make them "a bit dangerous".

Criminal, credit, and rental history barriers make it hard for renters to find housing. It is common for people with these barriers to lose $100 or more, just on application fees! They are also often homeless, or in substandard housing. In the absence of “felony friendly” landlords, renters must take a new approach. This training maps out a process to follow that saves renters (and their case managers) time and money. It also helps them find a place to live faster! You will learn: The four main types of subsidized housing. What renters with barriers need to know before they start their housing search. When to pay an application fee (and when NOT to pay an application fee). What is most important to landlords. Tips for negotiating with landlords. Delivering your story – How to speak with landlords about background issues. We can no longer afford to have renters, and the agencies that help them, lose so much money and time while searching for a place to live. Get ready to learn tips you can use right away!

Adults with mental illness or substance use disorders smoke cigarettes more than adults without these disorders. While 15.5% of the general population smokes, it is over 40% among those with mental illness and over 63% among those with substance use disorders. While tobacco use has been accepted and supported within behavioral health realms, we now know that quitting smoking decreases anxiety, decreases depression, and gives those in SUD treatment a 25% greater chance of long-term recovery…wow. That is why major mental health organizations in Minnesota recently went tobacco-free and integrated tobacco treatment into their existing services to help them fulfill their missions. Hear from People Incorporated, Mental Health Resources and Avivo about how they made the decision to become tobacco-free, managed challenges along the way, and the benefits they are measuring. Hear stories from people they serve about the impact it has had on them. These organizations share a common geography and overlapping client population in the Twin Cities. While they could be competitors, they became collaborators, knowing they would be stronger together in tackling tobacco. Topics will include strategies to treat tobacco dependence within behavioral health settings, strategies to develop staff readiness to address tobacco, principles of collaboration, and how tobacco-free grounds and internal practices work together to support the mission of behavioral health organizations. Walk away with tools to help you develop delivery systems in your organization. Learn how to join a cohort to advance tobacco initiatives within your own organization.

How do you decide where to place a child who has needs to be placed into foster care? Making the decision to place a child in foster care is one of the most challenging tasks a social worker has to perform and requires the consideration of a number of factors. In this interactive workshop, we will be exploring how our personal and professional experiences shape our values and impact making placement decisions as individuals and as child welfare organizations. We will examine strategies for engaging and considering relative and kinship foster care placement options to maintain familial connections and achieve successful permanency outcomes for children in care. Lastly, we will discuss how child welfare best practice and policy guides the placement decision making process. This workshop is limited to 50 participants, but will be offered three times during the conference.

The process and transition of immigration can cause serious trauma, and it may become a risk factor for mental health concerns. Immigrants are alone in an unfamiliar place, often unable to speak the language. Immigration as trauma is a complete loss of identity and culture. Immigrants are new members of a different society and they are often without the proper tools or resources to help them cope and adapt in their new environment. This transition can leave scars in anyone and can leave a person with a loss on their identity. By helping immigrants heal and adapt, it helps build stronger families, children and relationships, and of course, helps build a stronger community. With the current immigration situation, ensuring a healthy, resilient individual leads to a healthy, resilient family, community, and society; ensuring the wellbeing of immigrant populations’ benefits all.

Code switching is an adaptive behavior that is often used by people of color to live and advance in White spaces. In a world where oppression and discrimination exist, code switching is seen both as a protective act and one that can negate racial identity. During this session, participants will learn about the concept of code switching and racial identity development, the social advantages and disadvantages (as seen by people of color), and examples evident in art forms such as music and poetry.

Minnesota public entities have been sued over website inaccessibility. There are at least three lawsuits in Minnesota and this is just the beginning. Other states have seen an exponential increase in these lawsuits. This panel will discuss the current legal and technical aspects of digital accessibility as well as its current application and impact. Access to the digital realm has become a basic right. It is the means by which people get information, shop for goods and services, search and apply for employment, and access government services. When barriers to this info exist, people with disabilities are denied participation in these vital areas.

Ever wondered why this conference has a fragrance-free request printed in the program? The disability Multiple Chemical Sensitivity (MCS) is on the rise and getting on the radar for workspaces committed to inclusion and access for all. Fragrance and chemical sensitivities exist across a wide spectrum--from a particular perfume causing a headache to sensitivities severe enough that finding housing, work, and transportation become close to impossible. Even seeking social services can prove difficult for people with MCS as public spaces and public servants may not be fragrance- and chemical-free enough to make access possible. National Story Slam Champion Nancy Donoval (presenter of last year's standing room only session "Me Too: A Survivor's Story of Trauma and Resilience") shares insights from her own journey living with MCS for the past 30 years. In this interactive workshop, participants will: explore the variety and scope of physical and cognitive symptoms experienced by people with MCS that are brought on by exposure to common, everyday chemicals; identify accommodations that may make spaces and staff environmentally safer for those with MCS; discuss potential obstacles to implementing those accommodations, and; brainstorm ways to overcome those obstacles.