630 call a meeting to order. Welcome to everyone to the meeting of the Court Services Committee Wednesday, May 13th, 2026. I appreciate everybody that's here. First agenda item is the prayer. Anybody want to take care of that? I'll do it.

Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us this time to get together and work on the county's business. Thank you for the beautiful day. Looking forward to spring and summer. Father, please help us make wise decisions as we work on the important business for the county. In Jesus' name, amen.

Thank you very much.

Can I get a motion for the approval of the agenda?

So moved.

Moved by Mr. Busker.

Second.

Second by Mr. Hadley.

Any discussion?

Seeing none, all those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign.

Motion passes.

Next, 4.0 is a review and approval of meeting minutes from April 8, 2026 meeting.

Can I get a motion?

So moved.

Second. Seconded by Mr. Hadley. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. 5.0 is approval of claims. And the total is $56,422.08. Does anyone want to look at them?

can I get a motion second motion by Ms. Williams second by Mr. Busker any discussion seeing none all those in favor say aye aye those opposed same sign Eric none motion passes a 6.0 public comment anybody here for public comment?

It's been interesting lately.

Okay, reports to the committee by Judge Hauser.

I have not heard from Judge.

Last time I talked to him last month, he said everything was gone.

Public defender, Travis is out.

Probation, Dr. McGee is here.

Good evening.

Good evening.

So just a few updates.

So you have the report in front of you.

Tammy Neiman was going to had accepted the second probation supervisor position. However, due to some personal issues, she is not able to relocate at this time. So in speaking with the administrative office, we've decided to move forward with that position. So it has been reposted as of April 27. So if there is someone that you know of who is interested, please send them my way.

I'll probably be conducting interviews maybe around the first week of June. That position does need to be filled by August 20th, or I would have to file a supplemental because it is to be done within this fiscal year. Secondly, I have Mr. Hale here, Lamont Hale, some of you may know him. I know, Mr. Haley, you have talked about juvenile services and youth programming and I have done research and looked into different programs and really the push now is more towards the cognitive behavioral programs and that's what we're doing now with our thinking for a change program we brought in pastor soul to help with our adults who come out of DLC to help in that area as well and that's another cognitive behavioral type program. And with the juveniles, we have started the MRT. And in speaking with Mr. Hale, I thought it would be very beneficial to collaborate. One of the things that I feel is important in this community is mentoring for our youth. And in reviewing our juvenile caseload, and this is not a knock against single parents, but we did find that the majority of them the youth that were in trouble came from single parent homes, mostly where the male, there was no male father figure, so

Ron, I think right time, so I'm going to let you kind of take away and talk about what we're waiting for.

So I got Twin Image Counseling Services, I'm the owner, CEO of it, and then I teamed up with Chris.

Chris is from Rockford, he owns Course Corrections, he does stuff with Domestic Violence and Substance Abuse over in Rocker. And so him and I teamed up together. So with this 16-week program, it's called Pathways Forward. I focus on the mental health portion of it. He focused on the substance abuse portion of it. And it's really, just like we're sitting in here now, we'll bring up a topic. So this week, the topic was coping skills, right? So I asked him, have you become overwhelmed, right? Everybody's needed to become overwhelmed. What do you do when you become over a while. What do you do when you become sad? What do you do when you become angry? And each person went around and gave their story, right? So now is this how you dealt with it? Is it an unhealthy coping skill? Is it a healthy coping skill which you consider to be neutral, right? And if it was unhealthy, what do you think you could do to make it healthier, right? And then young people are more, I'm going to say emotional and don't control their thoughts per second.

They just look at the moment, right?

And so choosing like looking at the moment can get you in trouble based off the stuff we talk about, right?

The stuff we talk about that's overwhelming them and their behaviors, the skills they were using.

Some of them was unhealthy.

And so looking at that and saying, hey, who else could this affect and what could have went wrong, right?

You could have went to this person's house and you might be dead, right?

Now, if you're dead, now who's going to feel remorse for that?

And in this situation, the key would be like, hey, I went there because of my sister.

So now your sister is going to feel remorse because somebody just says you're dead because of her, right?

And so it's really based on what they tell us or share with us is how we approach it.

And so I could have used coping skills that I used in traditional counseling, but I'll incorporate that such as breathing techniques and music you know that stuff works but being able to listen to them where they're at and finding out hey that's how we can change this skill. Probation gets a report every the group is held on Mondays from 5 to 6 30 at the Boys and Girls Club. Probation gets a report what happened in the group what was the topic about for that week what was the topic about for next week, what was the attendance who all showed up, and then the participation, did they participate?

So we don't go into detail with probation about what was discussed, it's just more of an overgeneral view of they participated, they showed up, this is what was talked about, this is what's going to be talked about next, is kind of what we do.

Anybody got any questions?

Yes.

So, we're sending the juveniles to this program, correct?

What are we doing about juveniles that are kicked out of high school and to try to get their GED and stuff like that? Is that something you work with?

So, I don't specifically work with juveniles trying to get their GED. I mean, the kids that we hear are referred to by the probation officer.

and so if they may be kicked out of school or they may be working on their GED but I don't have that information. Yeah that's a collaborative effort with the juvenile officer and other agencies to work with the families with truancy they come over to probation and meet with us to discuss people who are on the brink of being kicked out of school. There's the GED program, but, you know, you have to be engaged to get involved in that, but there are resources available in the community, so they work with their juvenile officer. I might recommend Chairman Helms, you're on the Workforce Connection Board. There's juvenile money for Stevenson County programs and stuff like that. You might might want to collaborate with her. Maybe she already knows about some of these programs, but, you know, there is programs through Goodwill Services, I believe, that pays for them for their pre-test and then their testing and they take care of that stuff. But there, you know, there's money allotted to Workforce Connection and it's no secret out there.

It's been going on for years that it's a one parent family situation, you know, and no male figure there at the house and stuff like that.

And I want to say, sorry to interrupt you, but I think that's why myself and Chris can relate to the kids because we both like males and they open up and talk to us.

Right. And so they feel like they can relate to us.

When I first started, I was thinking that it may be some resistance because either they know me or their parents know me and they know I used to be the police.

know me, and they knew I used to be the police, and, like, when I was at the detention center, one of the kids came in, the same group, and he was like, hey, weren't you at the detention center over at Hopingford? And I was like, yeah. He's like, yeah, I was locked up there. I go, okay, I recognize him, too. So they can relate to us because we look like him, right? Right. So, really.

And I think that is important, too, because that relatability factor, I mean, let's be honest, it's not there as much. There's not a lot of diversity within the department. But also, what is the comment that they made about probation? Because, you know, we try all these different things. But didn't they say what they say about probation that we do?

Yeah, probation does too much is what they say. And so I was like, okay, let's examine, let's examine that thought, probation does too much. What do you mean by that? Well, probation, they restrict our freedom is basically the main concern that restrict our freedom. I said, so does probation restrict your freedom? Or the things that you do cause probation to put restrict your freedom, right? So what did you do? Let's talk about that. And so then they talk about what they did. And so if you really don't want to be on probation, then you might not want to do those things again and so what we do is I'll never tell them hey stop doing it I'm gonna give you options and so you can think about is this where I want my life to lead like if you want to continue to stay on probation that's on you right but if you want to make your life better here's some options that make your life better and really the kids listen on my way in here today there's a kid down there from our group and he had like 25 hours and quarters he's like hey Did the bank open? No, the bank's not open. So they talked to us. I saw a couple at KFC, one of the kids worked at KFC, and he had to come to the drive-thru one because his police saw me there. He's like, hey, that guy teaches our group. And so we built connections.

So what age are you working up to, 18?

18, yeah 18. Now, I know Mr. Newton that's on the board, he has a program that he's working with too, with people, getting them prepared for jobs and stuff like that. I don't know if you're aware of that. I think he starts taking them at the age of 18.

Okay. That was one of the other things we talked about was the emerging young adults and maybe moving into that group as well, which is like the 18 to 25-year-olds.

We did talk about doing that because we have a curriculum for that age group too. Probation, the juvenile officers, juvenile detectives, the big detectives.

Obviously.

Okay. The juvenile laws have thought it might be, or they may not want to come because it wouldn't be court order. It'll be voluntary. So there may be some pushback, like I don't want to attend another group. So we have curriculum for it. It isn't in place right now.

So, juvenile probation has more flexibility in terms of what they can order them to do than what we can do in adult court. If it's not specifically on a court order in the adult court, we're limited. So, we may know someone is, like, using drugs, but they may not be ordered to test. So, that order would have to be modified by the court.

So, or a particular program that we feel might be beneficial may not be ordered by the court, whereas the juvenile officers have more of a window to say, okay, this is what we feel you need to do. It's more of an open court order, if that makes sense.

It's a stronger suggestion. Is that it?

So, do you see progress in this? I mean, they want to, you know, some just don't want to be helped and some want to be helped, you know.

I would say all the kids that we got that's been coming, you can see a difference from the beginning. And some kids aren't in the group anymore, but I see them in the community and they still remember what was taught to them.

So really, I want to just give them that option, what I said before, of I can do something different.

I don't have to respond this way.

So I'm going to say, yeah, they've been affected by it.

What exactly is the name of your 16-week program?

Pathways Forward.

Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Mr. Hill, I apologize.

I didn't even recognize you there, and I somehow skipped over the paragraph saying you were going to be here.

Oh, okay.

So thank you for coming.

No problem.

And I've been talking to the school board and accountability, in my opinion, is lacking in the school and it sounds like you're addressing that head on, which I think is, you know, you're telling these kids, if you do this, that's why you're in probation, you know, so I think that's very important.

You know, working at the juvenile detention center, I always related back to that, too, like, hey, look, I was at the detention center, and there were six kids in a first-degree murder, they're going to be in there for, like, 30, 40 years, right? So, you have opportunity to change your life around. It's kind of up to you. You weren't here for any smoking weed because you didn't pass a drive. We weren't here for fighting, right? So, it's not as serious as murdering somebody. So, let's do something about it.

But like you said, they're making the choice between these things, so then they're being held accountable, so that's great, that's a great program And the other thing, Mr. Hadley, is if a juvenile isn't formally charged, if they have like an ordinance violation, one of the things that we do is we'll put them in our life skills program, which is an online program so we'll order them to take different courses based on what type of trouble they're getting into so like if they may have like a disorderly conduct we may when they take any management course so there's various courses that they can take there too and the PO may recommend they do something as a part of their sentence. Do we still have a curfew in Freeport? Yeah.

We don't see a lot of the ordinance violations for Freeport because it's prosecuted by different attorneys, prosecuted by their city attorney, and it's fine only, so they won't see them either in the application.

Okay. All right. Okay. Anything else from Australia?

Yeah.

So, like I was saying, each 16 weeks is a different subject.

Nice.

So, yeah.

Very nice.

What day of the week is that? Mondays from 5 to 6. And this is paid for out of probation service fees. Okay. And you welcome visitors? Oh, if you can let us know ahead of time, because I want to say is because the kids are open up and they share that. Okay. It may kind of be resistant. Okay. If somebody. Nope, I understand. I understand. Yes. It's like it's going to make sure that we tell them that we're not going to go back into a probation.

unless you say you're going to hurt somebody or you're going to basically kill somebody, stuff like that.

But if you tell me that you were smoking and you know you're not supposed to be smoking, I'm not going to run back into a probation that you smoke.

I'll just check in with Dr. McGee every now and then.

I don't want to feel any waves.

How many participants do you have?

So last week, this week, we had, I think it was six.

We've had nine, up to nine, nine or ten. Some of them got us in trouble and had to stop coming back to the group, but it wasn't a group related, but they removed them from the group. So now we've got about six. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. No problem. Yes. Thanks a lot. Okay. And we'll move on to state's attorney. Hi, for those that don't know me, my name is Tom Madigan. I'm one of the assistant state's attorneys. Carl is out tonight.

is at Highland Community College Leadership Institute graduation. One of our attorneys, Alexis Heisel, is graduating from that program. We typically have someone from our office attend all of those. I think the circuit clerk's office tries to be heavily involved with that as well. So it's a good program, not only to gain some leadership skills, but also just to learn about the community and establish a network with other leaders within the community so it's been very beneficial for our office. As far as Carl's report, I guess one of the main positives is for following the offenses. We closed more cases than we're open in the past month. It doesn't seem that way being in that courtroom. It always seems like it's always busy but it is nice to see that and really everything's going pretty well in our office right now.

So, anyone have any questions?

Are you fully staffed?

No, we're short.

One position right now, we hired our victim witness coordinator, Caden Goodman, was hired as a 7-Eleven student attorney.

So, she's been handling juvenile abuse and neglect, juvenile delinquency, and our felony petitions to revoke.

She's been doing very well handling that.

But when she's in the courtroom, we have to have an attorney with her supervising.

that's the only caveat with that. So like this week, I've been in court supervising her Monday, Tuesday, and then today as well. We rotate off on that. So when she becomes fully licensed, she'll take the bar in February next year. She passes and then she'll get fully licensed this morning in May. We'd still be one short.

in May. We'd still be one short in our office yet.

Okay. All right. Anybody have any questions? Well, Mr. Madigan, appreciate your time.

Thanks for coming. I'm a state attorney, circuit clerk. Chanel is absent because she is also at the the graduation for Chief Deputy Clerk, Brandy Malencon, I think her name is, graduating from today from the Leadership Institute at Highland College, so congratulations to her.

And also in her department, Ellen Williams is retiring June 1st.

She has 20 and a half years of dedicated service, so congratulations to Ellen and thanks, Ellen, for all those years of service.

Service. Other than that, we have the circuit clerk's report, and I didn't see anything.

Anybody see anyone there? Okay. All right. Moving on. Youth diversion fees. This month, we got $607.50.

And I'm assuming that's what the balance is, because we're pretty close to that. We're not sure, but we gave most of that away last month in the youth diversion fee. So we'll start over and and I'll go from there, so 8.0 is old business, seeing none, 9.0 is new business, does anybody have anything you want to share? Nope? Okay. Can I get a motion for adjournment? So move. Second. Motion by Mr. Busker, second by Mr. Hadley, all those can better say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Same sign. Thank you, everyone. Thank you very much.

Yes, sir, I do say, are you serious?

Wow, that's good.