Holly Schleuter: A Neighbor You Should Know (Preview)

by Owen Wiese

The neighbor is Holly Schleuter, who works for Minnehaha County Human Services, which provides many services to the people of the county and to Garretson.

Holly, who has a Teaching degree and a degree in Sports Medicine, had been teaching school early in her career in western South Dakota. She and her husband Jay decided that they wanted to live closer to relatives and friends. They moved back to eastern South Dakota. Holly planned to find a teaching position, but instead she accepted a job where she provided case management for kids with special needs. Holly has been employed in the social services field since that time. She became aware of Minnehaha County Human Services, and very quickly made the decision to work for them. She felt that it would give her the opportunity to work in a job that helped people in need.

Some of the services county Human Services provide are; Jail Reentry Services, which are sometimes very difficult to provide, because of the stigma of serving a jail or prison sentence; Safe Home, which is a service to help people secure first housing; and Synergy, which provides Family Case Management. Synergy helps families solve problems that affect their living situations. Holly works for Synergy.

The mission of Synergy is to provide a community-wide collaborative approach to the family with short term financial support and care facilitation to homeless families, empowering them to obtain adequate housing. That is a big mission and it involves many people and many groups. Holly and one other person are Minnehaha County Human Services Synergy Case Managers. Every time a family comes to Minnehaha County Services requiring help with their living situation, they are assigned a Case Manager who finds the help they need.

Continued on Part 2- online subscription required