How will Fort Carson's boom affect DHS? Study will try to find out

With Fort Carson’s population expected to boom in the next four years, the Department of Defense wants to gauge how that growth will affect the civilian community in areas that include the economy, transportation and schools.

On Thursday, attention turns to social services, as county commissioners consider a request to authorize $50,000 for a study to determine the how much soldiers and their families use El Paso County’s Department of Human Services.

The commission’s approval of the proposal is mostly a formality: The Department of Defense’s Office of Economic Adjustment will foot the bill for the study. In all, the federal government is spending $2 million to assess the Army base’s current impacts and future needs.

The Pikes Peak Area Council of Governments is overseeing all aspects of the project, and expects to have the social services study completed by May, said Kate Hatten, military impact planning program manager for the agency, which serves as a voluntary advisory board for 15 municipal and county governments in the region.

Because of military base realignment, Fort Carson is expected to double its 2006 population to 25,000 by 2013. PPACG has been working on a regional growth plan since 2006, using federal, state and local funding.

The social services portion will compile data specific to soldiers, including referrals and reports of child abuse and neglect, the need for child protection and youth-in-conflict services, demand for child support services, use of economic assistance programs such as welfare, and the simultaneous occurrence of mistreatment of children and domestic violence.

“The intent is to help local governments and DHS know what to expect as the rest of the soldiers arrive and come back from deployments because we do see a spike when we get an influx of people that age, who sometimes need help with parenting skills,” said County Commissioner Dennis Hisey, whose district includes Fort Carson.

While Fort Carson has an array of community and family services on base, the Department of Human Services is the only entity with jurisdiction over child protection and other social service issues on the region’s military installations.

The study will help DHS make improvements to serve the military population, such as possibly locating staff closer to Fort Carson, said Richard Bengtsson, director of El Paso County’s Department of Human Services. The information also will be used to apply for grants to expand services, he said.