As the Hamilton County school board prepares to consider new agreements with mental health providers next month, the previous long-standing provider is working to clarify its services and the reasoning behind school-based care.
Nashville-based Centerstone Community Mental Health Centers had provided school-based mental health counseling in Hamilton County Schools for more than a decade until an August board vote cut the service off immediately. An effort to bring back the center’s services failed at September’s school board meeting.
This school year, Centerstone was servicing around 1,000 students across 50 district schools with plans to expand into seven more schools, Regional Vice President Dan Mansfield said. The services came at no cost to the district and were largely paid for by TennCare and a state mental health grant for uninsured Tennesseans.
The center has continued to provide services to as many students as possible outside of school hours since the board’s vote, but it has not been able to reach all the families it had previously been serving, Mansfield said.
“We are hopeful for some resolution, but the sad truth is that over the past six weeks, there are dozens and dozens, if not hundreds, of families that are going without treatment to my knowledge,” he said in a video interview.