August 21, 2024

by Michael R. Wickline | Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

The Arkansas Department of Military is implementing a reduction in force affecting 48 employees due to the closure and non-renewal of federal funding for the Arkansas Youth Challenge program, a legislative panel learned Wednesday.

The Department of Military submitted a list of 50 employees affected by the reduction in force, but it has notified the Office of Personnel Management that two employees have since left the department, state personnel director Kay Barnhill said in a letter dated Wednesday to the Legislative Council’s personnel subcommittee.

Barnhill said the effective date of the separation for 43 employees will be Sept. 30.

She said five case managers, who provide the required post-residential phase for recent graduates of the program, will continue through June 7, 2025. The National Guard Bureau, which funds the program, has agreed to keep the case managers on through this required time period, she said.

The state Department of Military has requested severance pay for the employees based on their years of service, and the estimated cost for the severance payments is $40,800, Barnhill said. The affected employees also have been placed on the Reduction In Workforce List and will receive special re-employment consideration as established in the state Office of Personnel Management Policy #64, she said.

“In accordance with the RIF policy #64, any employee with less than 1 year of service is ineligible for severance,” Barnhill wrote in her letter to the personnel subcommittee. The severance payments are $800, $1,200 and $1,600 based on a list of affected employees. The salaries of the affected employees ranges from $32,729 to $76,723 a year based on the list.

Then-Department of Military Secretary Jonathan M. Stubbs, who also served as adjutant general of the Arkansas National Guard, said in a letter dated July 12 to Barnhill that the “inability to recruit and retain essential staff led to the decision of the Department to close the Arkansas Youth Challenge program.”

“The Arkansas Youth Challenge program will continue to receive seventy-five percent federal funding through September 30, 2024, for an orderly shutdown,” said Stubbs, whom the U.S. Senate confirmed as director of the Army National Guard on July 31.

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders spokesman Sam Dubke said Wednesday night in a written statement, “Then-Adjutant General Jonathan Stubbs made a recommendation to the Governor to end the program, and she agreed with his recommendation.”

During the Legislative Council’s personnel subcommittee meeting Wednesday afternoon, Jeff Wood, the Department of Military’s chief of staff, said the department’s inability to recruit and retain staff to look after the children in the Arkansas Youth Challenge program led to the decision to shut down the program.

The shortage of staff led to disciplinary issues and other issues, he said.

But state Rep. Karolyn Brown, R-Sherwood, said, “I am just surprised.” She said she was under the impression the program was successful.

Brown said she hates to see the program shut down because the program also served children from outside Arkansas.

Wood acknowledged “it was a tough decision.” But he said department couldn’t guarantee the safety of the children due to the staffing shortage, so it was “the right decision.”

Sen. Linda Chesterfield, D-Little Rock, asked where the children will go after the program is shut down.

Wood said the program was a voluntary program for a certain category of youths and there is not anything else to serve these youths. The 36 graduates of the program from June will continue to get services through case managers for a year, he said.

He said the department has been successful in getting 27 youths into a similar program in Kentucky and eight youths into a similar program in Louisiana.

State Rep. Mark Berry, R-Ozark, who is a co-chairman of the personnel subcommittee, said Department of Military officials will make a presentation about the closure of the program before a legislative committee around Sept. 23 and answer lawmakers’ questions.

Read full article HERE.