County Council Approvals Funds for Drug and Alcohol Recovery

The St. Louis County Council has authorized the acceptance of a grant that will fund an area drug and alcohol treatment program. It happened Tuesday in Clayton.

The ordinance introduced by Council Chairman Steve Stenger, District 6, would allow St. Louis County Executive Charlie Dooley to accept a grant of approximately $85,000 from the Missouri Department of Public Safety for the Choices Drug and Alcohol Treatment program.

The council gave final approval to the ordinance, 6-0. Dooley must sign it for it to go into effect.

In an interview after the measure passed, Stenger said the program provides a rehabilitative path for St. Louis County residents who get put on probation. He said the money would cover a period from July 1 to June 30, 2012.

“And what these funds are going to be used for is to support a full-time and a part-time case manager for the Choices Drug and Alcohol Treatment program,” Stenger said. “This program is a program that individuals on probation take part in to live away from drugs and alcohol and lead a productive life.”

“The idea behind that is to promote low recidivism rates and rehabilitation and getting people back into the community,” Stenger added.

In addition to the drug and alcohol treatment grant, the council also gave final approval to accepting up to $20,000 from the Office of State Courts Administrator for the ’s Domestic Violence Program. The measure passed 6-0.

Stenger says redistricting will be minor

Stenger told reporters after the meeting that he didn’t to produce radically different districts.

“The population shifts one way or the other have not been that great over the ... (last) 10 years,” Stenger said. “So I think the changes that will occur in the various districts will be relatively minor.”

Stenger’s comments seem to echo Allen Icet’s view of the process. The former Republican lawmaker from Wildwood said Monday he doesn’t expect “radical line shifts because of significant demographic shifts.”

Nine of the commission’s 14 members will have to vote for a map before Thanksgiving in order to prevent the matter from being settled by the courts. The commission is divided evenly between seven Democrats and seven Republicans.

Sam Page, a former Democratic lawmaker from Creve Coeur, said that while several districts will have to expand, he is optimistic the commission can produce a map.

Other business

• The council provided initial approval to an ordinance sponsored by District 5 Councilman Pat Dolan to transfer approximately 3,790 square feet of land to Richmond Heights. The swap is related to the , a project completed in 2009 that runs underneath Hanley Road and connects to Eager Road.

• Dolan introduced an ordinance to authorize the acceptance of a $140,000 grant from the 21st Circuit Court for St. Louis County to enhance an existing fire-alarm system in the .

• Another ordinance introduced by Stenger would authorize Dooley to accept two Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance grants worth a combined $274,865.54 from the Department of Public Safety. Those grants, according to the text of the ordinance, would be used “for the support of the Multi-Jurisdictional Drug Task Force to target, apprehend and prosecute mid- to upper-level persons involved in illicit drug trafficking and reduce illegal narcotic distribution.”

• Stenger introduced another ordinance that would authorize Dooley to accept more than $6.1 million in grants from the Department of Economic Development’s Division of Workforce Development. If the ordinance is approved, approximately $1.6 million would go to “increase employment, retention, earnings and occupational skill attainment in economically disadvantaged adults.” Roughly $2.7 million would go toward “employment and training opportunities for dislocated workers,” while approximately $1.9 million would be allocated to “increase focus on longer-term academic and occupational learning opportunities for disadvantaged youth.”