CSAC Bulletin Article

Stepping Up In California
Two-Day Summit Addresses Locally Incarcerated Mentally Ill

January 19, 2017

The National Stepping Up Initiative held a two-day California Summit in Sacramento this week, focused on improving the way we respond to people with mental illness who are also in contact with local criminal justice systems. More than 400 people attended, including County Supervisors, Administrative/Executive Officers, Sheriffs, District Attorneys and Behavioral Health Directors from 53 California Counties.

The event started with an incredible presentation by the Council of State Governments’ Dr. Fred Osher who talked about the complexities of the population with mental health diagnoses in our jails and the difficulties of finding solutions to help address this growing trend. Dr. Osher laid out the history of how various state and federal policies which helped get us to this point, but did show there are ways to address this problem. His presentation did talk about the importance of assessments and making sure that a comprehensive risk assessment is being done so the mental health professionals can work at addressing the mental illness; knowing baseline data so you know if you are making improvements or not; and the need for training for staff to help improve the situation.

The Conference focused on county solutions from county leaders, talking about what they are doing in their communities that can work in other counties. Panels were comprised of Probation Chiefs, Supervisors, Behavioral Health Directors, Judges, and County Reentry Specialists. The panelists included leaders in county and state government working on this issue including Diane Cummins from Department of Finance, Sheriff Bill Brown from Santa Barbara, Linda Penner the Executive Director of the Board of State and Community Corrections. The speakers discussed approaches, challenges, goals, outcomes and successes when looking at how counties respond to people with mental illnesses who are in contact with local criminal justice systems.

The various breakout sessions focused on six key questions that county leaders need to ask to start addressing the growing problem of mentally ill individuals in our criminal justice system: is our leadership committed; do we have baseline data; have we conducted a comprehensive process analysis and inventory of services; and do we track progress. These questions inspired not only county team discussions, but cross county peer discussions. As an example, during the breakout session “Making the Most of Your Role to Reduce the Prevalence of People with Mental Illnesses in Jail” County Supervisors and Administrative/Executive Officers discussed their specific roles in driving change at the county level and exchanged ideas, personal and professional experiences, funding sources, collaboration strategies and addressed system gaps.

The second day’s session discussions looked at approaches to reducing homelessness, pretrial programs that link people with mental illnesses to comprehensive case management and community-based treatment and promising practices for integrating mental health needs into jail and probation based case management processes.

In conjunction with the start of the California Summit, Stepping Up released the report Reducing the Number of People with Mental Illnesses in Jail: Six Questions County Leaders Need to Ask.

The report is intended to:

  • Assist counties with developing and implementing a systems-level, data-driven plan that can lead to measurable reductions in the number of people with mental illnesses in local jails.
  • Serve as a blueprint for counties to assess their existing efforts to reduce the number of people with mental illnesses in jail by considering specific questions and progress-tracking measures.
  • Drive and inform the Stepping Up technical assistance that will be offered moving forward.

For more details about the Stepping Up Initiative please click here. For a copy of the Summit agenda please click here.

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