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Educating Policymakers: SS/HS Indiana Affinity Group
Indiana sites’ PDs:
Misty Hollis, Barry Humble, Cynthia Smith, and Lisa Lutgring
In Indiana, four SS/HS sites are working together to educate their State’s
policymakers about the benefits of the partnership and its impact on their communities
and the State. In this Communication & Social Marketing (CSM) Center interview,
Misty Hollis, Project Director for Richmond, IN, shares her experience reaching
out to policymakers: the steps she took, connections she made, and advice she has
for other project directors.
Q. What made you decide to reach out to your policymakers to educate them about
SS/HS?
A. We wanted to share the great things we were doing with our Federal
resources. Over the past couple of years, there have been some significant changes
to Indiana’s funding structure, and many previously local or county decisions
were being moved to the State level. We thought that policies that were being implemented
on a State level—for example, public access to mental health services—could
benefit from the lessons learned through SS/HS, and we wanted to share our outcomes.
Q. What kinds of outreach did you do to educate your policymakers?
A. Most of our outreach has been a collective effort through the
SS/HS Indiana Affinity Group to our State decisionmakers. However, about a year
ago when I was in Bethesda, MD, for an SS/HS training, I made the short trip to
Capitol Hill to meet with the district leader in our Indiana Congressman’s
office. I called the office before my trip to make an appointment, and the district
leader, whom I had a positive relationship with, just happened to be in Washington
at the same time. It was good timing! I met with him and presented information on
SS/HS and how our programs are impacting our State’s children. He was very
interested, and we have kept in touch about SS/HS. We’re going to add him
to our newsletter mailing list to keep him informed of our efforts.
Q. You mentioned the Indiana Affinity Group. Can you tell us a little more about
what the group is, who’s involved, and how you’ve come together to reach
out to your policymakers?
A. Sure. There are four active SS/HS sites in our State—North
Adams, Mount Vernon, Perry Central, and my site, Richmond—and all of the project
directors communicate regularly. We came together to ask our TASs [technical assistant
specialists] to start the affinity group because we found that we face many of the
same issues. We started having monthly conference calls a little over 2 years ago,
and we’ve collaborated closely ever since.
Each project director in the affinity group has made contact with different policymakers
at the Federal level, but we decided to appoint one person to be the voice of our
group, Project Director Cynthia Smith from Mount Vernon.
All of our sites’ evaluators have supported our efforts as they exchange data
and compile information to tell the story from a State perspective as opposed to
site by site.
Q. How did you decide what information to present to your policymakers and how
did you present it?
A. We initially put together a factsheet that was emailed to every
State legislator. This helped us connect with the Commission on Mental Health and
Addiction for the State of Indiana, which plays a major role in mental health in
our State. We knew that mental health and marijuana use were big issues statewide,
so we showcased the GPRA [Government Performance and Results Act] data that supported
our efforts in those areas. We also knew that statewide funding cuts were going
to affect our State’s mental health services, so we wanted to help our policymakers
understand what outcomes occur from the SS/HS model.
Q. Where are you now in terms of your outreach? What are your next steps?
A. Right now we are working on getting a presence at an upcoming
hearing of the Indiana Commission on Mental Health and Addiction. We want to keep
driving the message that the SS/HS model is making a difference and that mental
health services are very important in our State.
We’re working on developing our “ask” for the hearing, but we
know that we’ll focus on providing information on what is working for mental
health in our State, which is SS/HS. We need to get our message out to the State.
We want to encourage leaders in Indiana to replicate our model throughout the State.
Q. What are the biggest challenges you experienced throughout
this process?
A. By far, making time to do this work is the biggest challenge.
We actually scheduled an in-person retreat earlier this year for one evening, and
we got a lot of work done that will guide our efforts moving forward. Phone calls
and Webinars are great, but we got more done sitting face-to-face with our laptops
than we ever have with discussions over the phone.
Q. What outcomes have you seen result from your outreach?
A. Our biggest outcome right now is that all four sites are on
the same page with our policymaker education. We have only been doing this work
aggressively for about a year and a half, and we hope the fruits of our labor will
be seen next year. For now, we can all speak about one another’s projects,
we have all made inroads and connections with and for each other, and we continue
to have open communication with our colleagues.
We’ve really seen that this work takes time. It takes time to build relationships,
and we don’t expect our conversations about policy changes to take effect
overnight. SS/HS is about systemic change, and it’s not any different for
policymakers.
Q. If you could provide one piece of advice for SS/HS grantees considering educating
their policymakers, what would it be?
A. Pick up the phone and start calling! Find out who knows your
elected officials and get access to them. Just make the effort.
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