State officials on Friday announced the availability of $20 million in grants meant to fill gaps in services for people with mental illness, substance abuse disorders or developmental or intellectual disabilities.

The officials also announced four pilot programs designed to better serve children with behavior issues or who are experiencing a major transition, such as entering foster care or being discharged from a residential facility.

Funding for the grants and pilot programs will come from the $30 million in American Rescue Plan Act funding that the Legislative Council in February approved to go toward filling gaps in mental health and substance abuse services across the state.

“We’re very thankful and this would not be possible without the $30 million of ARPA funding. … This is the next step of getting that out the door and making some big changes here in Arkansas,” state Department of Human Services Secretary Kristi Putnam said Friday.

The grants the department announced Friday are:

■ $5 million to build or ren

ovate structures to function as 16-bed community reintegration facilities for children transitioning from psychiatric institutions to home environments. Arkansas currently has just one community reintegration facility, in Fort Smith, according to the grant description. The grant will be awarded to one bidder or split into two grants of up to $2.5 million each.

■ $2 million to convert or renovate existing hospital spaces into residential substance abuse treatment units for youth. Awardees will construct or renovate a psychiatric hospital wing to provide 30- to 60-day treatment programs for adolescents struggling with substance abuse disorders. Arkansas currently does not have residential substance abuse treatment facilities for children, according to the grant description. The grant will be awarded to a single bidder or split into two grants of up to $1 million each.

■ $4 million to build or renovate facilities to provide residential substance abuse treatment for adults. These facilities will provide 30- to 60-day treatment programs for adults struggling with substance abuse disorders. While Arkansas does have residential substance abuse treatment facilities for adults, they are primarily in Central and western Arkansas, according to the grant description. Facilities that currently provide treatment can also use the grant money to make building upgrades or expansions. The grant will be awarded to a single bidder or split into two grants of up to $2 million each.

■ $3 million to purchase, renovate, or build apartment complexes for supported housing for young adults in transition. According to the grant description, the housing is needed to provide transitional living arrangements for youth who age out of group homes or foster care or are discharged from the Division of Youth Services.

■ $3 million to purchase, renovate or build homes or apartment complexes for supported housing for adults. According to the grant description, the housing is needed for adults struggling with behavioral or substance abuse disorders who transition from secure therapeutic communities or other more restrictive settings and who may need help with employment, medication compliance and other issues.

■ $3 million to build 16-bed “therapeutic communities” to provide “step-down support” from psychiatric hospitals for adults with intellectual or developmental disabilities. According to the grant description, Arkansas currently does not have therapeutic community beds for people with intellectual or developmental disabilities and behavioral health needs. At least 200 Medicaid beneficiaries in the state have intellectual or developmental disabilities and behavioral health needs and are in need of care in a community-based setting. The grant will be awarded to a single bidder or split into two grants of up to $1.5 million each.

The department began accepting applications for the grants on Friday, and the application period will close June 3. Among other requirements, applicants must be enrolled as a Medicaid provider or “demonstrate a viable pathway” to enrolling within the grant period and demonstrate a commitment to serving Medicaid beneficiaries during the grant period and beyond.

Meanwhile, the pilot programs announced Friday are meant to address problems that may stem from factors such mental health or a lack of stable homes.

“In the state of Arkansas we serve over 400,000 children annually, and in the course of those services, we spend approximately $300 million on behavioral services alone, so this is our road map to a healthier Arkansas, but it’s also developing some programs to see what we can do by working with data and building some long lasting programs,” Janet Mann, DHS’ deputy secretary for programs and the state’s Medicaid director, said.

Three of the pilot programs are focused on prevention and will be administered by Partners for Inclusive Communities, an outreach program of the University of Arkansas’ College of Education and Health Professions that works with the intellectually and developmentally disabled.

One of those programs, Prevention, Stabilization, and Support Project for Young Children, will target children up to the sixth grade who are at risk of losing their placement at home or school as a result of their behavior.

Paula Stone, director of the DHS’ Office of Substance Abuse and Mental Health, said officials saw a rising need for mental health services for young children, which only got worse after the pandemic, “and what happens is we don’t have a specific crisis response or a way to go out and really find out what’s going on with that child.”

She said oftentimes these children will end up in psychiatric hospitals for behavioral issues and could end up going from one institutional setting to another.

“So really making sure that we have a crisis response team that can fully diagnose that child, because I think we all know sometimes it’s not a mental health diagnosis, sometimes it’s something else that’s going on in that child’s life,” Stone said.

The Family in Transitions Team pilot program, which Stone said was “very much a companion” of the Prevention, Stabilization, and Support Project for Young Children, will focus on children who are going through a major life transition, such as adoption or entering the foster care system.

“If you have a child that is going through a major transition in life, guess what? They start having behaviors. I can’t even imagine what it’d be like if someone moved me to a new home and I wasn’t prepared for that, and I’m not 5,” Stone said.

The third prevention program, the Comprehensive Screening and Assessment for Children program, is designed to work in tandem with the other programs. According to a “Road map” document released by DHS on serving certain populations at risk of poor health outcomes, the pilot will “increase the use of comprehensive children’s screenings, including for fetal alcohol spectrum (FASD) disorder and other prenatal drug exposure conditions, for our children displaying mental health needs and intellectual or developmental diagnosis.”

“We know that when we see these behaviors in children, it’s a symptom of something else,” Karan Burnette, director of Partners for Inclusive Communities, said. “We just want to know what that something else is, and, as early and accurately as we can, identify that.”

The final pilot program announced will involve the use of the Family Centered Treatment model, an “evidence based, intensive trauma treatment model of home-based family therapy,” a handout from the announcement says.

The pilot will be administered by the North Carolina-based Family Centered Treatment Foundation.

Tim Wood, CEO of the foundation, said the model is designed to treat behavioral issues by increasing family health and well-being through stabilization of family dynamics.

According to the Roadmap report, the pilot will serve 600 to 1,200 children, addressing “serious and chronic emotional or behavioral issues for youth who are unable to remain stable in the community without intensive interventions.”

The pilot programs are scheduled to run through March 2025, Melissa Weatherton, director of specialty Medicaid services at DHS, said.

“We would never want to set up a pilot that we don’t have the intention of permanently embedding,” Weatherton said. “Of course, we do want to make sure it works. We do want to see what we need to tweak.”

She added that after the end of March of next year, officials hope to continue the programs with money from DHS’ budget.

“Like Janet Mann said, we spend $300 million annually right now on behavioral health services for children on Medicaid, so we don’t feel like it’s a lack of money,” Weatherton said. “We just feel like maybe we’re just putting our money to services that aren’t working as well as others could.”