Boone County Mental Health Group Renamed, Cuts Services

Boone County’s main program for connecting kids and families to mental health care has a new name and a much smaller footprint, after the county board that funds it ordered deep budget cuts.

The Family Access Center of Excellence, known locally as FACE, is now the Boone County Schools Mental Health Coalition, according to ABC 17 News. Coalition director Sarah Owens told the station the new name reflects what the group actually does now — it’s no longer an access center for the whole county, just a school-based program.

Why did Boone County cut FACE’s funding?

The cuts trace back to the county’s Children’s Services Fund, a quarter-cent sales tax Boone County voters approved in 2012 to pay for programs serving kids and families. ABC 17 reported the fund peaked at $16 million in 2017, and the county is required to keep 17% of it in reserve — pressure that’s now landing on FACE’s budget. Kristin Cummins, deputy director of the county’s Community Services Department, told ABC 17 the cuts weren’t about FACE’s performance, calling the quality of its work “great.”

Boone County Children’s Services Board minutes from a May 14 meeting, posted on the county’s own website, lay out how deep the cuts go. FACE’s Therapy Access Program budget — $75,000 a year, covering outside clinicians who see families with no other way to afford therapy — is being cut in half for the 2027 fiscal year, with a further cut to $6,000 possible by 2028 if staffing stays the same. ABC 17 reported the coalition’s overall budget falls from $3.6 million this year to about $2.3 million in 2027, and to $2 million — a 43% cut — by the start of 2028.

What’s ending, and what’s moving into schools?

Per the May board minutes, FACE’s community-based work — case management and direct services not tied to a school — is being scaled back, with staffing cut from 6.5 full-time positions to 4.5. The group’s office lease in Columbia ended Oct. 1, and the minutes set Dec. 18 as the last day of direct community-based services; after that, FACE’s work runs entirely through the schools it already partners with. ABC 17 reported the coalition lost its building outright — Owens said the rent wasn’t sustainable, and the group now has no single shared meeting space.

What continues: the three-tier school program FACE already runs in Boone County schools — an early-screening survey, small-group intervention for kids it flags, and individual care for students who need the most support — along with the Therapy Access Program and juvenile-justice diversion work. That diversion work is moving from FACE’s community side into its school-based side, so schools and officers can flag at-risk students earlier, according to ABC 17 and the board minutes.

Does this affect other county-funded programs?

Not yet. ABC 17 reported that more than 40 organizations draw on the Children’s Services Fund — among them City of Refuge, First Chance for Children and the Food Bank for Central and Northeast Missouri — and that the roughly 57 other funded programs are protected from cuts through 2026. Those groups reapply for funding each spring, with new awards decided over the summer; FACE operates on a separate contract timeline that put it first in line for this year’s reductions.

The change comes the same month Columbia/Boone County’s latest health assessment flagged bullying as worse locally than the state average — one more sign of how much weight school-based support systems are being asked to carry. Boone County schools have had safety on the agenda all fall, too: Southern Boone’s board spent part of its October meeting on keeping kids safe inside the building, even as the mental-health support meant to help them outside the classroom keeps shrinking.