The Council of State Governments (CSG), coordinator of the Consensus Project, in collaboration with the TAPA Center for Jail Diversion, recently convened a forum on ensuring prompt access to benefits for eligible individuals with mental illness who are released from prison. The forum, supported by the MacArthur Foundation, the Department of Justice, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), was attended by a select group of high-level state officials including directors of correction and mental health departments as well as representatives from SAMHSA, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE), and the Social Security Administration (SSA).

Many individuals with a serious mental illness who are in US prisons or jails are eligible for Medicaid and/or SSI/SSDI when they enter the facility; few, however, are enrolled in these federal benefit programs upon release. As a result, their access to medications and treatment -– typically essential to compliance with conditions of release for people with mental illnesses –- is severely limited, presenting a significant obstacle to their transition from prison or jail to the community.

The question whether to suspend or terminate benefits while a person is incarcerated has recently been a subject of conversation among high-level federal and state officials. CMS recently wrote a letter to State Medicaid Directors, encouraging states to "'suspend' and not 'terminate' Medicaid benefits." Click here to read this letter. The response from the National Association of State Medicaid Directors (NASMD) illustrates the compexity of the issue. To read the response co-signed by NASMD's Chair and Executive Director, click here.

At the forum, nearly 50 state legislators, researchers, and mental health and criminal justice officials met to
improve understanding of these problems in order to maximize the value of local, state, and federal responses. Representatives from federal agencies explained their rules to relevant state stakeholders and highlighted their agencies’ commitment to this issue. State teams from Minnesota, Texas, New York, and Pennsylvania discussed
what their states have done to streamline the enrollment process, and to determine successful ways to further improve their efforts.

In addition to collaborating to ensure access to federal benefits for eligible individuals, CSG and TAPA have collaborated to promote judicial leadership and improve understanding of the fiscal implications of the disproportionate involvement of people with mental illness in the criminal justice system. For more information on CSG/TAPA collaboration, click here.

To view the agenda for the forum, click here. To view the attendance list of meeting participants, click here.

To read more information on the issue and the forum, see this Issue Brief published on the Council of State Governments / Eastern Regional Conference website.

In partnership with another CSG initiative, the Re-Entry Policy Council, the Consensus Project is in the process of developing documents explaining the relevant federal regulations and describing promising practices for each of the participating states. These documents, which provide valuable guidance for any state looking to address this issue, will soon be available on the Consensus Project website.