CORPUS CHRISTI, Tx — On Wednesday, Nueces County Commissioners decided to eliminate the Social Services Department. This comes as the department is the focus of a criminal investigation into its use of federal COVID relief funds.
The department helps the community with assistance for food, utilities, transportation, rent and indigent burials. Without those resources, people will have to go directly to these agencies for each individual resource:
- Catholic Charities- 615 Oliver Court, (361) 884-0651
- Coastal Bend Food Bank - 5442 Bear Lane, (361) 887-6291
- Corpus Christi Hope House- 3226 Reid Drive, (361) 852-2273
- Loaves and Fishes-Metro Ministries- 1919 Leopard Street, (361) 887-0151
- Nueces County Veteran Services Department, 602 N. Staples Street, Suite #180, (361) 888-0820 or (361) 888-0821
- Texas Health and Human Services, 5155 Flynn Parkway, (361) 888-7837
- The Salvation Army of the Coastal Bend- 1804 Buford Street (361) 884-9497
- WIC- 1702 Horne Road, (361) 826-1335
“Part of that decision is budgeting and the problems that the county has been through, also that it’s statutorily required, what we have to do and what we don’t have to do," Nueces County Judge Connie Scott said.
The department won’t disappear until the 2024-2025 fiscal year.
However, it will not only impact the thousands of people that use it’s resources, but also the employees that work there.
“Were worried about our employees over there because we have a lot of great longtime employees and we wanted to give them as much time as possible to go out and apply for jobs," Scott said.
Judge Scott said with the closure of Social Services, the county will transfer some employees to the Veteran Services Department.
Money that was going to be spent to run the department will now be used to increase employees salaries without a burden to taxpayers.
"This money is going to stay in a pot over here that we are going to use for employee salaries, to raise and give everybody a little something to help them," Scott said.
Scott added that Wednesday was the first of many discussions county commissioners will have in the elimination of the social services department.
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