NCJ Number
254852
Date Published
April 2020
Length
9 pages
Annotation
This report presents the policy framework for Oregon's Justice Reinvestment approach for improving health and reducing recidivism for people with complex behavioral health needs who are cycling repeatedly though local justice systems.
Abstract
In the summer of 2018, Oregon state and county leaders requested support from the U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) and The Pew Charitable Trusts (Pew) for the purpose of using a data-driven Justice Reinvestment approach to improve health and reduce recidivism for people with complex behavioral health needs who are cycling repeatedly through local justice systems. As public-private partners in the federal Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI), BJA and Pew approved Oregon leaders' request and asked the Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center to provide intensive technical assistance under the direction of Oregon's Behavioral Health Justice Reinvestment (BHJR) Steering Committee. As a result of the data-driven JRI process, the steering committee recommended that an innovative new grant program be created to support counties and tribal nations in developing stronger community-based continuums of care to improve health and criminal justice outcomes and reduce financial and public safety impacts for people cycling in and out of Oregon's jails and hospitals. In presenting the JRI policy framework, the current report describes the data- collection effort and key challenges identified in the review of state data analyses. To address these challenges, the BHJR Steering Committee recommended creating a state-run grant program to support jurisdictions in developing a stronger community-based continuum of care to improve health and criminal justice outcomes. The current report summarizes the features of this IMPACTS grant program. 1 figure and 12 notes