This week U.S. Senators Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Pete Domenici (R-NM), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), and Arlen Specter (R-PA), and U.S. Representatives Bobby Scott (D-VA) and Randy Forbes (R-VA) introduced the Mentally Ill Offender Treatment and Crime Reduction Reauthorization and Improvement Act.

This legislation, which has received bipartisan support in both the House and the Senate, will reauthorize the Mentally Ill Offender Treatment and Crime Reduction Act or MIOTCRA (Public Law 108-414). Enacted in 2004, MIOTCRA created the Justice and Mental Health Collaboration Grant Program (JMHCP) designed to help states and counties design and implement collaborative efforts between criminal justice and mental health systems. Through appropriated funds, the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) within the Department of Justice has awarded 53 communities in 35 states with additional resources to plan and implement collaborative efforts between criminal justice and mental health systems.

"Far too often, mentally ill individuals encounter the criminal justice system when what is really needed is treatment and support&" Senator Kennedy said. "With this bill, Congress can provide significant support to improve and expand cooperation between law enforcement and mental health experts in order to improve our nation's public safety."

This new bill will raise the authorization level of MIOTCRA from $50 million per year to $75 million per year and will extend the authorization through 2013. The bill will also reauthorize the Mental Health Courts grant program (Public Law 106-515), and require that a study be completed on the prevalence of mental illness in prisons and jails. Download the complete bill text (pdf).

"This legislation will impact states across the United States, including Virginia where sixteen percent of all inmates in Virginia jails are estimated to have a mental illness. We have a significant way to go in Virginia to better diagnose and treat mental illnesses in our jails and this legislation is a step in the right direction," said Rep. Forbes. "I am pleased that Congressman Scott and I could join together and introduce legislation that will have a much-needed impact on our criminal justice system and make our communities safer."

The bill, which is scheduled for consideration in the full House Judiciary Committee on November 7, 2007, passed the Crime Subcommittee on November 1. The Senate sponsors intend to move the bill before Congress breaks for recess.

The Pennsylvania Legislative Budget and Finance Committee voted on October 3 to release a research summary report showing that programs that divert people with mental illnesses from the criminal justice system into community-based treatment can save money, increase public safety, and link people with the treatment they need to succeed in the community. The report, co-written by staff from the Committee and the Council of State Governments Justice Center, summarizes studies conducted by independent researchers in Chester County, Allegheny County, and Philadelphia County.

Click here to download the report.

The report was commissioned by Senate Resolution 125 in 2003, under the leadership of the late Senator Robert Thompson.  The resolution instructed the Committee and the Justice Center to facilitate fiscal impact evaluations of three diversion programs and determine whether they warranted replication across the state.

The studies, which were completed in December 2006, found that such programs can be cost-neutral at the very least and have the potential to be cost-effective. Depending on aspects of program design, such as the clinical and legal eligibility criteria for program participation, costs associated with administering these programs can be less than the expenses that local and state governments incur for traditional case processing in the criminal justice system, without jeopardizing public safety objectives.

To read more about the findings of each study, click here.

Criminal justice and mental health leaders in Florida held a workshop this month to help counties prepare for a new statewide grant program. The Criminal Justice, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse Reinvestment Grant Program will provide funds to counties to plan, implement, or expand initiatives that increase public safety, avert increased spending on criminal justice, and improve the effectiveness of treatment services for individuals with mental illnesses, substance use disorders, or co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders in contact with the criminal justice system.

Florida Partners in Crisis, a statewide advocacy organization, and the Criminal Justice, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse Technical Assistance Center at the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute, University of South Florida, sponsored the free event on October 4 in Orlando.

National and state experts gave presentations on a variety of issues:

• Dr. Henry Steadman, director of the National GAINS Center, and Michael Thompson, director of the Council of State Governments Justice Center, provided examples of effective cross-system collaboration, strategies for system change, and the use of best practices in criminal justice diversion efforts.
  
  
• The Honorable Steven Leifman, special advisor on criminal justice and mental heath to the Florida Supreme Court, and Ellen Piekalkiewicz, executive director of the Florida Substance Abuse and Mental Health Corporation, provided an overview of the many initiatives in Florida, including the grant program and the work of the Florida Supreme Court’s Mental Health Subcommittee.
  
  
• John Petrila, director of the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute, University of South Florida, spoke about common myths surrounding the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), data collection, and information sharing.

In the afternoon, issue experts led breakout sessions to discuss specific strategies for cross-system collaboration.  Topics included

• Police-based strategies
• Jail-based strategies
• Court-based strategies
• Community care

Please visit the Florida Substance Abuse and Mental Health Corporation website for more information about the grant program. 

The Council of State Governments Justice Center recently released two new briefs describing how bipartisan groups of policymakers in Texas and Kansas employed a data-driven strategy called justice reinvestment during the 2007 legislative session to avert the projected growth in their state's prison population and increase public safety.

In Kansas, policymakers enacted legislation to reduce recidivism rates, including a 60-day credit for those in prison completing risk reduction programs and a grant program for local community corrections agencies to increase success rates by 20 percent among those under supervision.

To avert further growth in the Texas prison population, the state legislature enacted legislation to improve success rates for people on community supervision, expand the capacity of treatment and diversion programs, and enhance the use of parole for low-risk offenders. By implementing these policies, the state reduced expenses for the next fiscal biennium by $210.5 million.

The Justice Center provided intensive technical assistance to policymakers in both states with funding support from the Public Safety Performance Project of The Pew Charitable Trusts' Center on the States and the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), a component of the U.S. Department of Justice.

To download the Texas and Kansas briefs or for more information about the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, please visit www.justicereinvestment.org.

• CMHS funds national Transformation Center continuing work of GAINS Center
  
  
• Justice Center's Reentry Policy Council issues a comprehensive report on the financial obligations of people released from prisons and jails
  
  
• Save the date: 11/14/07-11/16/07 - Allegheny County Department of Human Services' Office of Behavioral Health conference "Which Way Out? The Sequential Intercept Model: A Framework for Decriminalizing Mental Illness"
  
  
• Save the date: 11/26/07 - North Carolina Crisis Intervention Team Statewide Conference
  
  
• Save the date: 11/27/07 - NAMI Fall Institute: Decriminalizing Mental Illness, Raleigh, N.C.