Strategy

Integration of Public Safety and Human Services

The CJCC’s top priority is to reduce system barriers and create opportunities through innovative programs and policies by creating the most effective service models for those experiencing both public safety and human service needs. The CJCC has recently added a Human Service Senior Department Administrator to the committee who chairs the Criminal Justice Behavioral Health Initiative and co-leads the 911 Mental Health Task Force. Actions within this goal include the promotion of embedded social workers within police departments, tracking outcome of the 911 Mental Health Task Force and promoting new funding models for the expansion of human service providers across justice platforms.

The Criminal Justice Behavioral Health 5-year report can be found in the documents section of this website.

Criminal Justice Behavioral Health Initiative accomplishments include:

• Launched Integrated Access Team (IAT) inside the Hennepin County Jail
• Trained Minneapolis Police Department in Crisis Intervention Training (CIT)
• Developed Forensic Intensive Assertive Community Treatment Team
• Launched Co-Responder Model
• Expanded withdrawal management
• Embedded social workers in various system touchpoints
• Launched Restorative Court
• Opened Mental Health Crisis & Triage Center at 1800 Chicago Behavioral Health Center
• Launched embedded social worker program in police departments
• Provided medically assisted treatment in two residential facilities
• Pilot 911 Mental Health Dispatch Program within the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office dispatch center

Continued work includes:

• Policy reform that further identifies needs and prevents future deep-end criminal justice involvement
• Collaboration with 911 Mental Health Task Force

Promote innovative and effective response and outreach models

The CJCC is committed to promoting effective response models and continuing comprehensive communication strategies with residents across the entire county. Action items for this goal include assessing community liaison models, presentations & discussions with the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office Community Engagement Team and developing ongoing methods to stay connected with community as a committee.

Strengthen system unity and collaboration

The CJCC strives to strengthen system unity through engaging internal and external partners which may include offering open houses, informational interviews, strategic retreats and cross-departmental shadowing/mentoring opportunities. The CJCC would like to share their efforts with the community through diverse channels such as website, Boards, City Councils, Chief’s Associations, suburban partner meetings and more. Further, the CJCC would like to increase awareness through a one-stop online center to help residents navigate resources to meet their needs.

Additional long term goals

The CJCC has set long terms goals to include the continued development of Juvenile Assessment & Triage work, collaboration with diverse existing forums such as Youth Justice Council, participation in community conversations and seeking opportunities to collaborate with crime prevention coalitions and Citizen Advisory spaces.

The CJCC, along with other committees and initiatives, will begin to develop data dashboards to create transparency and opportunities for the community to evaluate progress.

Other programs and initiatives

Adult Detention Initiative

The Adult Detention Initiative (ADI) is committed to using best practice strategies system-wide to assess who needs to be in detention, to create alternatives for those who don't, and to reduce the length of detention while protecting public safety and remaining cognizant of the impact detention has on economically disadvantaged communities and communities of color. The Adult Detention Initiative’s goal is to work across all criminal justice agencies to foster a just, equitable, efficient, and effective criminal justice system. A system-wide group of executives from the varied departments work on reviewing policy, practices and procedures to improve client service delivery, reduce unnecessary system delays, and evaluate disparities and the use of objective measures at multiple intercepts.

The CJCC and collective partners have agreed to move forward with a Phase II of ADI with a larger focus on criminal justice reform. The Criminal Justice Reform Partnership includes the following goals:

• Implement, expand, and sustain the Court Ride Program, providing rides for public defender clients to/from court and trial preparation appointments
• Study further validation of the Service Priority Indicator – Revised (SPI-R) to maximize assessment utilization across the pretrial jail population
• Continue warrant prevention and reform approaches
• Reduce the number of people placed on probation, conditions of probation, length of probation, etc.
• Explore pre-arrest diversion opportunities
• Review the impact of economic sanctions

Data Driven Justice Initiative

To break the cycle of incarceration, Data-Driven Justice Initiative (DDJ) was launched nationally with 67 city, county, and state governments committed to using data-driven strategies to divert low-level offenders with mental illness out of the criminal justice system and change approaches to pre-trial incarceration. These innovative strategies, help stabilize individuals and families, better serve communities, and often save money in the process. The DDJ communities will implement the objectives below that have proven to be effective in reducing unnecessary incarceration in jails.

Goals:

• Use data to identify and proactively break cycle of incarceration
• Equip law enforcement and first responders with the tools they need to respond and divert
• Use data-driven, validated, pre-trial risk assessment tools to inform pretrial release decisions

Public Safety Data Team

A group of public safety data / research managers and analysts that come together to discuss the continuous improvement of data collection, best practices in data collection, analysis and outcomes and how to publish and share data by enhancing integrations. This team includes representation from the Sheriff’s Office, County Attorney's Office, Fourth Judicial District Court, Department of Community Corrections and Rehabilitation, Hennepin Justice Integration Program and County Administration.

Goals:

• Oversight of Public Safety data lake
• Aide in the creation of public safety dashboards
• Convene to discuss best practices, data sharing and project work across the line of business of Public Safety
• Collectively analyze data sets & questions at the request of professional stakeholders

Court Ride Pro

The Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee partnered with the Minneapolis City Attorney’s Office and the Hennepin County Public Defender’s office to pilot the Court Ride program in 2019. Funding for this pilot project was secured through the Safety and Justice Challenge sponsored by the McArthur Foundation. The Court Ride Program used existing ridership technology used by Hennepin Healthcare through Hitch Health. Court Ride provides free rides through Lyft ride share service to court and court-related appointments for those individuals who lack reliable access to transportation. The program is now operational through the Hennepin County Public Defender’s Office and renamed Client Ride