Recent school budget cuts result in difficulty for HC Youth Service Center

Over the last decade, budget cuts have been a reality for Kentucky school systems. HC, and Fayette County as a whole, are impacted by these cuts every year. The 2017-2018 school budget took more than two million dollars out of student service centers across the state. These cuts have made the job of the HC Youth Service Center more difficult than in previous years.

HC’s YSC is designed to help any student in need, providing school supplies, personal care items, shoes, clothes and many other basic necessities. This includes HC families, assisting with some bills whenever needed. However, the cuts have made the YSC struggle when providing their usual services. The Youth Service Center Coordinator Paula Caise is determined to still give HC students much needed help.

“We are still providing services just as usual,” Caise said, “it may be a little bit more difficult, but we still have resources we can still tap into. We still work with families, we still provide assistance if they need rent, utilities, food referrals throughout the school year. So if a family is calling, struggling, we still look for resources for our families. We are still maintaining.”

The cuts have also resulted in one of HC’s on-site therapist being defunded, reducing the number of students that can be professionally help with depression, anxiety and many of other mental health needs.

“The therapist we normally get through the youth service center can’t be paid for this year because there’s no money,” HC counselor Lyndsey Timoney said, “This is a professional therapist that we have in this building to work with our students [that] need a therapist, who otherwise would not have transportation or the money to pay for therapy.”

HC is not the only school to be hit with recent cuts. Statewide, YSCs and the like have been cut over two million dollars. Leestown Middle has also been affected, having a $6000 budget reduced to $500. Breckenridge Elementary School, a school with almost a 75% reduced/free lunch population, provides many services to their students through their Family Resource. The center has many partners such as the Lexington Rotary Club, the Big Brother/Sister program, as well as support through the Spindletop program, providing backpacks, luncheons and watches to rising sixth graders. Luckily, these partners have helped the center survive through these cuts.

“I have a lot of partners,” Breckenridge Elementary School Family Resource Center Coordinator Monica Hall said. “I’ve been working on that for the five years that I have been in this position and I’ve been very fortunate to receive quite a bit of donations.”

YSC’s are now being assisted by a variety of organizations in order to help struggling students. HC’s YSC accepts donations in the form of clothing, shoes, food and school supplies. If you would like to donate, the YSC is located in the upstairs blue hallway in room