The majority of people in prison and jail have a substance use disorder. Despite the promise demonstrated by some treatment programs for people who are incarcerated, just a fraction of the people who need services for substance abuse receive it. Connecting people incarcerated to treatment programs proven to be effective, prioritizing resources for those nearing release, and encouraging community-based aftercare will ensure better outcomes for people released from prisons and jails, and the communities to which they return.
Providing answers on relevant topics concerning Mental Health, Health and Substance Abuse topics.
Last year, Massachusetts passed legislation representing the most significant changes to the state’s criminal justice system in decades. This legislation took concrete steps to incentivize good behavior in prison, divert people to treatment and programming as an alternative to incarceration, and strengthen community supervision.
“We have just finished the first module of the course and can see the commitment and determination mounting as the women in our class advance through each session,” said Deborah Simmons, founder of The Reentry Initiative, which is delivering CBI-CA to participants in the Denver Women’s Correctional Facility in Colorado.
The IMPACTS (Improving People’s Access to Community-Based Treatment, Supports, and Services) grant program will offer supports and services to aid people with mental illnesses and substance addictions who frequently end up in the state’s jails, courts, and hospitals, which is currently costing these systems millions of dollars annually.
This pilot program stems from policy recommendations made during the state’s Justice Reinvestment Initiative in 2015. As a result of this initiative, Massachusetts invested more than $1 million in providing specialized treatment services to people who have substance addictions, mental illnesses, or co-occurring disorders and are at a high risk of reoffending.
Michael P. Boggs, a Georgia Supreme Court justice, has been appointed chair of The Council of State Governments Justice Center’s Advisory Board.
I arrived at the CSG Justice Center aware that the field of criminal justice has changed dramatically since our inception in 2007, presenting our organization and others with new challenges and exciting opportunities. As we entered our second decade, I felt that we first needed to be sure we understand who we are, what we stand for, and how we fit into this growing field.
The conference will explore gaps in services, discover new and improved practices, share cutting edge research, and motivate participants to explore positive case outcomes for youth involved in the delinquency system.
![[Apply Now] Establishment of a National Center on Restorative Justice](https://csgjusticecenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Council-of-State-Governments-CSG-e1573837419381.png)
The program, funded by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance, will provide funding to an accredited university of higher education or an accredited law school for the purposes of establishing a National Center on Restorative Justice.
![[Register for Webinar] Family Treatment Court Best Practice Standards: Laying the Groundwork](https://csgjusticecenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/SAMHSA-GAINS-center-e1574185876649.png)
This webinar from the SAMHSA GAINS Center will provide an overview of recently released best practice standards for family treatment courts standards and how programs and courts can begin to implement them.
These workshops are for communities that are interested in developing strategies to better identify and respond to the needs of adults with co-occurring mental health and substance addictions in the criminal justice system.
This webinar highlights two jurisdictions—the State of Oklahoma and Douglas County, Nebraska—and explains how they used Collaborative Comprehensive Case Plans to enhance their case planning processes and promote recovery, successful diversion from the criminal justice system to treatment, or reentry to the community among their participants.
This webinar focusses on the programming developed specifically for veterans in two jurisdictions—the Middlesex County Sheriff’s Office in Massachusetts and the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department in California—and explains how these jurisdictions developed partnerships with their Veterans Affairs resources and other entities in their criminal justice systems.
In this webinar, representatives from the NRRC, along with staff from BJA, provide an overview of the Second Chance Act’s Reentry for Adults with Co-Occurring Substance Abuse and Mental Illness (CSAMI) grant program and explain the training and technical assistance opportunities that are available to grantees, including the Planning & Implementation Guide, and other resources available to grantees.
This webinar includes information on planning and coordination, behavioral health treatment, cognitive interventions, and community supervision practices as well as community resources such as housing and recovery support services.
This webinar focusses on best practices for screening and assessment of people in the criminal justice system who have opioid addictions.
In this webinar, Leigh Ann Davis, director of the National Center on Criminal Justice & Disability, discusses differences and similarities between various kinds of behavioral health diagnoses and I/DD, how to identify someone with I/DD, and tips for to work more effectively with people with I/DD in correctional settings.
In this webinar, representatives from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance and the National Reentry Resource Center review the FY18 Improving Reentry for Adults with Co-occurring Substance Abuse and Mental Illness application process.
In this webinar, representatives from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance and the CSG Justice Center review the FY2018 Justice and Mental Health Collaboration Program grant application process.
This webinar provides an overview of national estimates of incarcerated veterans; explains components of the Veterans Health Administration’s veterans justice programs; expands awareness of the needs of veterans in the justice system; and discusses new developments in the Veterans Administration and community interventions to provide services to veterans in the justice system.
This webinar features Roger Peters, PhD, a licensed clinical psychologist and professor in the Department of Mental Health Law and Policy at the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute, University of South Florida. The webinar discusses the prevalence of co-occurring substance use and mental health disorders among people involved in the criminal justice system, as well as effective screening and assessment instruments to use with this population.
This toolkit reviews promising strategies that state Medicaid programs are adopting to address the substance use disorder crisis, specifically the opioid epidemic, including for people involved in the criminal justice system.
This report presents opportunities to expand what Douglas County is already doing well and improve upon systems performance.
This toolkit offers information and resources about officer wellness and safety and provides links to outside resources, including information on the increased risk of suicide for law enforcement officers and the effect of secondary trauma.
This report explores the persistence of jail expansion by examining a convenience sample of 77 counties in 31 states that considered or pursued jail expansion between 2000 and 2019 and identifies three major arguments county officials make to support construction.
This publication provides an overview of pre-arrest diversion strategies and delves into five categories of law or regulation that most directly affect these strategies and often serve as the basis of fully-fledged crisis responses in their own right.
This Treatment Improvement Protocol provides an update on the original 1991 and updated 2002 works, reflecting a fundamental rethinking of the concept of motivation as a dynamic process, not a static client trait.
This project uses expert consultations, a program scan, and case studies to better understand how human services organizations help participants build and leverage social capital to improve economic opportunity.
This report identifies ten specific areas, or guiding principles, that will assist states and federal policymakers—including criminal justice professionals—in defining and understanding what comprises safe, effective, and legal recovery housing.
This report from the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law describes the essential community mental health services that must be expanded to divert people with significant psychiatric disabilities from the criminal justice system.
This issue brief discusses how geographic information systems and other data visualization technologies enhance the way that state substance use agencies plan, implement, monitor, and communicate about their prevention, treatment, and recovery activities.
Each person coming in to the jail is screened for drug use and withdrawal symptoms. They’re asked if they’ve been prescribed medication and if they want it. About half say they’re addicted to heroin.
Judges, law enforcement officials and health agency representatives filled a room on Wednesday at the Hawaii State Supreme Court for the inaugural Hawaii Summit on Improving the Governmental Response to Community Mental Illness.
In 2018 the county was recognized as one of 16 innovator counties among more than 450 counties that have joined the Stepping Up Initiative, a national effort to divert people with mental illness from jails into treatment.
New Castle County Police are among many moving to offer treatment in lieu of an arrest. The Council of State Governments Justice Center says that “police departments are increasingly seeking help from the behavioral health system.”
Almost 40 percent of people in San Diego jails were homeless when arrested last year, marking a significant increase from the previous two years, a study released Thursday showed.
Arnold Ventures has committed $720,000 to assist 16 counties across the country in providing opioid treatment in jail. Through a facilitated nine-month planning process, each jurisdiction will build comprehensive jail-to-community treatment programs.
Here’s how it works: The program takes care of housing and food—things the women would normally need from their trafficker. Participants get treatment for trauma and addiction, and they are eligible to get their records expunged.
The Cook County Housing Authority issues 15,000 Section 8 housing vouchers to low-income county residents every year. Now 25 of them are going to drug court graduates. If the pilot program is successful, it could be expanded.
Holyoke Medical Center says it is beginning to see less recidivism among opioid-dependent individuals coming through its emergency department, where it has added staff to help such individuals not relapse and to access help.
Council of State Governments Behavioral Health Director Ayesha Delany-Brumsey says, “The question that needs to be answered is, if there is a call to 911 for someone in crisis, how do we respond most effectively? As of now, the only options are to send the police or EMS.”