The explosive growth of the group home industry in the northwestern suburbs of the Twin Cities is being driven largely by a relatively new licensing system overseen by the Minnesota Department of Health. And in Brooklyn Park, which has more group homes than any other city in Minnesota, those Health Department-licensed facilities appear to be responsible for an outsize number of the police calls that the city says are overwhelming its first responders.
Historically in Minnesota, group homes have been overseen by the Department of Human Services. But since 2009, there’s been a moratorium in place prohibiting the department from licensing any new group homes.
Despite the moratorium, the industry continued to grow. Providers were able to seek exemptions from the Department of Human Services or enter the industry under the auspices of the Department of Health. Today, those Health Department licenses are technically classified as “assisted living” facilities, and they have been expanding rapidly in the northwestern metro area.
About two-thirds of the group homes in Brooklyn Park are licensed by the Health Department, but even so, their impact on the city’s first responders appears to be disproportionate. The Brooklyn Park Police Department maintains a list of the group homes it responds to most often. Of the top ten facilities on the list, nine are licensed by the Health Department.
An analysis of state maltreatment investigations and police reports found that all 12 Brooklyn Park group home residents who died in the past few years were living in group homes licensed by the Health Department. In three of those cases, the state found neglect by the group home contributed to the resident’s death.
In a statement to MPR News and APM Reports, a Minnesota Department of Health spokesperson said the division’s "goal is always that Minnesota have zero deaths from maltreatment or neglect”.
“We are always open to improving relationships with our local partners,” The Minnesota Department of Human Services said in a statement.
Even the lobby groups for group home providers agree that the current system is overly complicated.
“It seems weird to have these populations served in two disparately regulated settings,” said Matthew Bergeron, a lawyer for the Residential Providers Association of Minnesota, the trade group that represents group homes licensed by the health department.
Sue Schettle, CEO of the Association of Residential Resources in Minnesota, the trade group that represents facilities licensed by the Department of Human Services, said she expects the state will eventually need to t streamline the system.
“The system right now, where there are differences in how these organizations are regulated, is puzzling to me,” Schettle said. “I would imagine at some point in time that that will be rectified and it will be tightened up.”
