Blue Ribbon Policy Council for Early
Childhood Mental Health

Healthy Minds, Strong Futures Policy Toolkit

Toolkit Sections:

BRPC Toolkit Home

Colorado Opportunities

• House Bill 1451
• Mental Health Special Tax Districts
  

Key Messages

• Invest in young children's social and
  environmental development
• Mental health is fundamental to the overal
  l health and well-being of young children

Resources

• Data and Information
  • Quick facts
    • National data
    • Colorado data
  • Links to other websites
  • References
• Strategies
  • Educate and inform policy makers
    • Meeting with your public officials
    • Testimony
    • Legislative briefing
    • Effective strategies for
      legislative advocacy
  • Getting the word out through the media
    • Public service announcements
    • Letters to the editor
    • OpEd
    • Drop-in article
    • Media alerts and news releases
    • Press conferences
    • T.V. and radio interviews
  • Community awareness: activities and materials
    • Billboards
    • Shopping Carts
    • Community Events and Activities
      

Other Tips

• In the community
• In the classroom
• At colleges and universities
• In faith communities
• Creating and presenting organized and
  compelling speeches
• Creating powerful data presentations
• Overcoming stage fright

About the Blue Ribbon Policy Council

• Members

About the Blue Ribbon Policy Council

In October, 2003, the Blue Ribbon Policy Council for Early Childhood Mental Health was developed to bring stakeholders together to address policy and practice issues regarding early childhood mental health, heighten awareness of the issues, and to develop a comprehensive approach to addressing the needs of young children's social and emotional health. The council's focus areas have been in funding, system of care, and policy.

The Council's mission is to craft public policies and implementation strategies that support the social and emotional well-being of young children and their families. The Council's youth, family members, legislators, university partners, state agencies, health/mental health providers, and system of care leaders cooperatively address the policy barriers that arise in attempting to create a seamless system of care. Because the Council wants to ensure that policy development is valuable at the local level, recommendations are tied to practical experience in communities. Outcomes from these policy recommendations encourage changes on the state level in areas such as reimbursement and Medicaid funding.

Purpose of the Council: The Council is a group of early childhood champions who use their knowledge and leadership to ensure that:

1. They utilize three early childhood mental health projects (Project BLOOM, Harambe Colorado, and Kid Connects) for expertise and guidance, and for their projects to draw on the knowledge of the Council.
2. They create public policies and implementation of such policies that support the social / emotional well-being of young children and their families.
3. They ensure that the principles of systems of care for young children guide the work they all do for the mental health of young children in Colorado.

Values of the Council: Consistently approaching problems from the family perspective is one of the shared values and objectives of many of the agencies represented on the Council.

 

Members

With over 35 members, the Council brings together representatives from early childhood mental health, family members and policymakers. The members list below is not comprehensive, it is merely representative:

Adoree Blair, Family Member
Carol Breslau, The Colorado Trust
Christine Collins, Alliance
George DelGrosso, Colorado Behavioral Healthcare Council
Tom Dillingham, HCPF/Child Health Plan Plus Division (CHP+)
Kelly Dunkin, The CO Health Foundation
Jose Esquibel, CDPHE/Interagency Issues for Prevention Systems
Megan Floyd, CO Federation of Families For Children's Mental Health
Jerry Frangas , Colorado State Legislature
Rhonda Goodman, Family Member
Chris Habgood, Mental Health Association of Colorado
Anna Jo Haynes, Mile High Montessori
Beverly Hirsekorn, Colorado DD Council
Rebecca Karlin, Office of the Governor, Policy Initiatives
Moe Keller, Colorado State Legislature
Karen Knoll-Moran, OFA/CCB/Region VIII
Bill Kottenstette, Office of Lt. Governor
Lorraine F. Kubicek, OMNI Institute Jennifer Landrum, Project BLOOM staff
Linda Meredith, CO Head Start Assoc. / Comm Partnership for Child Dvlpmt
Sandy Petersen, Zero to 3
Teri Pinney, CDPHE, PSD-CASH-A4
Steve Poole, MD, The Children's Hospital
Corry Robinson, Univ. of CO Health Sciences Center, JFK Partners
Jeanne Rohner Mental Health Association of Colorado (New Address)
Lisa Roy, The Piton Foundation
Beverly Solomon, Family Member
Barbara Smith, Ph.D., UCD/Center for Evidence Based Practices in Early Learning
Dave Smith, Colorado Dept. of Education
Debbie Stafford, Colorado State Legislature
Steve Tool, Health Care Policy and Finance
John VanDenBerg, President
Kathy Watters, CDPHE-HCP, PSD-HCP-A4

 

For more information on the Blue Ribbon Policy Council, contact:
Claudia Zundel, CDHS, Division of Mental Health, claudia.zundel@state.co.us, 303/866-7528
Penny Gonnella, CDPHE, penny.gonnella@state.co.us, 303/692-2362
Tracy Kraft-Tharp, Kid Connects, tkth@aol.com, 303/421-2787
Sarah Hoover, JFK Partners/UCDHSC, sarah.hoover@uchsc.edu, 303/315-2152