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Health and Human Services Agency (HHSA) recommending the Board authorize the Purchasing Agent to issue a Purchase Order (PO) to Tulare County Office of Education in the amount of $13,926.57 to pay for two retroactive invoices for the purchase of Friday Night Live and Club Live branded materials and operational binders for local school sites that were shipped and utilized by HHSA staff prior to the issuance of a PO due to an oversight in the purchase request finalization.
FUNDING: Federal Substance Use Prevention and Treatment Block Grant - American Rescue Plan Act Prevention funds.
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DISCUSSION / BACKGROUND:
The California Friday Night Live (FNL) Partnership program, which also includes the Club Live (CL) program, has been provided in El Dorado County (County) schools since early on in the program's inception, beginning in the late 1980s. HHSA’s Behavioral Health Division Substance Use Disorder (SUD) program serves as the lead division overseeing this program in the County. Within the County, there are 11 active school site chapters (five FNL, four CL, and two FNL Mentoring chapters) that engage over 300 students. The FNL chapter supports youth students in high school whereas the CL chapter supports youth students in middle school. The primary focuses of the FNL program are to: a) form youth-adult partnerships with young people; b) provide programs rich in opportunities that offer support to youth, which enables them to be less likely to engage in problematic behaviors; and c) deliver youth-focused programs which lead to youth having a higher probability to achieve in school, attend higher education levels, or secure a full-time job.
The FNL Partnership program is approved, endorsed, and funded by the California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) as a part of the County’s SABG prevention set-aside and Coronavirus Relief Supplemental Appropriation Act (CRRSAA) and ARPA grants. Within the State of California, Tulare County is in charge of creating all FNL program-related training brochures, binders and marketing materials and makes them available for purchase by participating counties. HHSA purchases FNL program training and marketing materials from Tulare County and utilizes such materials to provide outreach on the SUD prevention services available to youth through the FNL program and to help support student engagement and retention in the program as well as provide opportunities for youth to initiate alcohol, tobacco, and other drug prevention activities in their school and community.
The County FNL program works closely with local law enforcement to deliver “Minor Decoy Operations for Alcohol and Tobacco” and “Every 15 Minutes Driving Under the Influence (DUI)” prevention programs; Public Health Tobacco Use Prevention programs (TUPP); Alcohol and tobacco merchant education and public speaking events; County Board of Supervisors (Board) and City Council education about prevention policies (such as tobacco retailer zoning restrictions and Tobacco Retail Licensing); as well as other youth-centric programs offered by El Dorado County Office of Education (EDCOE) (such as Tobacco Use Prevention Education (TUPE), Social Emotional Learning (SEL) initiatives, and Mental Health Peer Advocate programs).
In September 2022, HHSA SUDS program staff created four individual requests for purchases from Tulare County for FNL materials, each purchase processed separately. Under guidance that this may constitute as splitting a purchase, which is not allowable under County Board of Supervisor’s Purchasing Policy C-17, Section 2.2, Purchasing requested SUDS staff combine all their purchase requests into a single PO. While this PO was being processed, purchasing staff requested a quote from Tulare County to include pricing for all of the materials HHSA intended to purchase for use by the County FNL program. Not realizing the quote and a County PO was needed to be issued prior to delivery of the goods, former HHSA staff requested that Tulare County ship two different orders of FNL marketing materials to HHSA. Consequently, Tulare County delivered the two shipments retroactively and submitted their invoices for payments under invoice numbers 230978 and 240346. It was later identified that the County’s purchasing process was not followed when Tulare County inquired into their invoice payment status, and it was discovered that the goods had already been received prior to the issuance and approval of a PO. Current staff has since been educated about what is required to make County purchases to ensure that this does not happen in the future.
This retroactive PO request is being made in order to ensure that Tulare County receives payment for the FNL program marketing materials provided previously to HHSA. HHSA is recommending the Board authorize the issuance of a retroactive PO to ensure that HHSA can pay Tulare County for outstanding invoices, Number 230978 (dated November 16, 2022) and Number 240346 (dated August 29, 2023), for purchased FNL and CL branded materials and operational binders for school sites. HHSA ordered the branded materials with the intent that they would be sent to different County school sites that were participating in FNL and CL programming in association with County Youth SUD Prevention programs. The purchase of these type of materials was written into an HHSA funding application, which was approved by DHCS, and subsequently awarded to the County for SABG, ARPA, and CRRSAA funding. The marketing/operational binders are fully funded by SABG Prevention or Discretionary funds allocated to the County.
ALTERNATIVES:
Should the Board decline to approve this recommendation, these invoices will remain unpaid, and vendor may not allow County to purchase materials for the continued implementation of this FNL program in El Dorado County.
PRIOR BOARD ACTION:
N/A
OTHER DEPARTMENT / AGENCY INVOLVEMENT:
N/A
CAO RECOMMENDATION:
Approve as recommended.
FINANCIAL IMPACT:
There is no Net County Cost associated with this Agenda item. Sufficient appropriations within the program budget for these purchases.
CLERK OF THE BOARD FOLLOW UP ACTIONS
N/A
STRATEGIC PLAN COMPONENT:
N/A
CONTACT
Olivia Byron Cooper, MPH, Director, Health and Human Services Agency