Sebastian County To Mark 5-Year Anniversary of 100 Families Initiative
Effort to reduce nation’s highest rate of incarceration, foster care shows progress
An initiative that began five years ago to reduce Arkansas’s high incarceration and foster care rates in Sebastian County is showing tremendous progress. Community members and city leaders in Sebastian County will come together on Wednesday, Feb. 28 at 11 a.m. at the Peak Innovation Center in Fort Smith to celebrate the initiative, known as 100 Families. Media is invited to attend. The event will also be live-streamed. A link to the live stream will be sent out the day of the event.
Sebastian County was the first county to be a part of the 100 Families initiative, which launched in 2018. The county was chosen for the initiative because of the high incarceration rate and the highest number of children in foster care in the state. Today, Sebastian County has seen a 50% decrease in the need for foster care and the city of Fort Smith has seen a 20% reduction in crime.
The model for the 100 Families initiative was created by the non-profit Restore Hope, which works to reduce incarceration rates and the need for foster care. A key component of the initiative is software that was developed to allow service providers who are helping families in crisis to effectively communicate with one another and serve an individual holistically.
“Service providers in Sebastian County have worked diligently to come together and use the software, called HopeHub, to help people in crisis. They are connecting with one another to serve an individual who is in need in many areas, from housing to transportation to childcare to therapy.”
“Our overall crime rate has declined significantly in the past couple years. I think there is an association.”
“I think in the past we all did our own thing. There was some territorialism. But we started pulling in stakeholders to work together and we’ve educated ourselves about the needs of Sebastian County.”
To date, the Sebastian County 100 Families initiative has served 1,390 parents and over 3,000 children. The initiative has expanded into sixteen counties in Arkansas.
“We’re a homeless shelter and so we need to connect families in crisis to as many resources as possible. And not only do we get to help families at a moment of crisis, but HopeHub allows us to follow them along all the way to career and see outcomes.”