IMPLEMENTATION SITE GRANT RENEWAL APPLICATION Section 1. 1. SUMMARY OF PROJECT OR FUNDED ACTIVITIES (2,000-character limit – up to half a page): a. Please summarize your implementation plan for the next two years. Spokane intends to reduce its jail population by 15% and racial and ethnic disparities by 10% over the next two years by implementing new and improved strategies designed to reform the law and justice system. Strategies include: improve case processing in all three levels of court systems with the guidance of the National Center for State Courts (NCSC); create a Data Dashboard to assist in tracking and monitoring trends, changes, and needed interventions; implement the Public Safety Assessment (PSA), a validated risk assessment tool, with technical assistance (TA) provided by Justice Systems Partners (JSP); robust Regional Pretrial Services (RPTS), by continuing to provide pretrial release supervision, together with PSA scores; and Diversion by continuing the Felony Pretrial Diversion (FPD) program, adding a Pre-Filing Program, and by reassigning the County Public Defender (PD) social worker to the “5177” jail mental health diversion program. Using the myriad of lessons from Phase II, including invaluable technical assistance from the Vera Institute, Policy Research Inc. (PRI) Sequential Intercept Mapping (SIM) exercise, Government Alliance for Racial Equity (GARE), and Jim Austin, we are confident that, taken as a whole, these improved strategies will increase rates of pretrial release, including monitored supervision; decrease the number of Failures to Appear (FTA) and consequent Bench Warrants (BW); decrease Length of Stay (LOS) while in jail; and provide access to better data to track these measures. Use of a validated risk assessment tool (PSA) will provide judges and prosecutors with more confidence in release decisions, which will be monitored by RPTS officers. For those in jail, improvements in case processing will reduce their LOS and the Data Dashboard will provide the necessary oversight for all reform efforts and allow for a deeper understanding of the jail population, identification of target populations and opportunities for decreasing incarceration. 2. ORGANIZATION OVERVIEW (1,000-character limit – up to a quarter page) a. Please briefly describe the lead agency for this grant. If this a different agency from your original grant, please explain why. The lead agency will continue to be the Spokane Regional Law and Justice Administrator’s Office (SRLJAO). Ms. Maggie Yates (see 6b), leads this office and is the Law and Justice Administrator (SRLJA), assuming this position after it was vacant for a year. Ms. Yates leads the SRLJAO, which oversees regional law and justice improvement activities occurring throughout the Spokane region. This includes facilitating the Spokane Regional Law and Justice Council (SRLJC), which meets monthly, and the MacArthur SJC Core Team, which meets biweekly. This office also oversees law and justice systems planning and meeting facilitation; data and policy analysis; management of long- and short-term projects of high complexity; collection and distribution of law and justice system information; and consultation with entities in the local, state and federal justice system. The SRLJA is viewed as a “neutral party” and is not elected, which is important to move reform forward. 3. CONTEXT (4,000 character limit – up to one page): a. Why is now the right time to engage in this work in your jurisdiction? b. How will you ensure that you have the necessary political commitment and system stakeholder support to implement your strategies? c. Who are the key stakeholders that have supported your work over the past two years? Do you anticipate any turnover? d. How supportive are local community leaders of your jurisdiction’s reform strategies? What will you do to ensure community leaders are effectively engaged? 3a. This is the ideal time for our jurisdiction: key community stakeholders exude a collaborative spirit, shared across the region’s judicial branches, including prosecutors, public defenders (PDs), detention services, and law enforcement agencies. Local community leaders have emboldened the region to embrace significant change in the local law and justice system. The region has been engaged in earnest reform efforts over the past five plus years, including gathering data for the past two years, to allow the community to forge ahead with bold and innovative strategies. Other reasons include:  After not having a SRLJA for a year, we now have an SRLJA with a fresh perspective to bring to reform efforts;  The city/county working relationship is better than ever; the community wishes to capitalize on this momentum;  We are excited to adopt the Public Safety Assessment (PSA) as the risk assessment tool to assist in decision-making;  The region has embarked on significant mental health diversions through State and local funding which dovetails with our efforts (see 7c);  We want to build on the successes of recently implemented strategies that, with proposed modifications, we believe will enhance our ability to safely decrease the jail population and racial and ethnic (RE) disparities. 3b. The SRLJC, created by statute, is comprised of the Mayor of Spokane, two of the Spokane County Board of County Commissioners, together with leaders from every aspect of the region’s law and justice system, from both city and county, from law enforcement to mental health providers. As such, we ensure needed commitment and support by fostering an open, transparent relationship with stakeholders, including ongoing education and information sharing. We have strong support from local city and county leaders, and from the State. 3c. The key stakeholders include: SRLJA Maggie Yates; Spokane County Chief Operating Officer (COO) John Dickson; Superior Court Judge Maryann Moreno; District Court Presiding Judge (changing due to pending retirement); Municipal Court Judge Tracy Staab; Prosecutors (County: Larry Haskell, City: Justin Bingham); PD (County: Tom Krzyminski, City: Kathy Knox); Pretrial Services Director Cheryl Tofsrud; Detention Services Director John McGrath; Jail Mental Health Department Manager Kristie Ray; Spokane Police Department Chief Craig Meidl; Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich; Community leaders: Alex Jackson, COO of MultiCare Rockwood Clinic; John Haley community volunteer extraordinaire; RE Committee Chair Carmen Pacheco-Jones; and Lutheran Community Services District Director Erin Williams. The only anticipated turnover is replacing the District Court’s Presiding Judge, who is retiring this year. 3d. Local community leaders want to support reform efforts, as demonstrated by their eagerness to see immediate changes. There is also understandable frustration with the lack of apparent progress in system reform. The RE Committee, comprised of local community leaders, together 2 with Smart Justice Spokane1, Spokane Alliance2, and the local NAACP, along with several other community organizations, continue to provide invaluable advisory input. The RE Committee has been holding quarterly community meetings for the public, and will continue to do so. We will continue to foster an open and transparent relationship with community leaders and encourage their engagement through participation, education and sharing of information. During Phase II, two more community members were added to the SRLJC, totaling four community members. 4. DESCRIPTION OF FUNDED ACTIVITIES (8,000-character limit – up to two pages) 4a. How does the plan you are proposing build on/improve upon the plan you were advancing over the past two years? Are you proposing new strategies, or making adjustments to your original strategies? If you are doing either of these things, why do you believe they will make your plan more effective? 4b. How does your jurisdiction plan to address racial and ethnic disparities going forward? 4c. How does your jurisdiction plan to engage the community in local system reform? 4d. At the end of the two-year grant period, what will success look like for your jurisdiction’s justice system? How will you know you have achieved this vision? Done 4e. What specific goals do you have for the first year of work? For the second year? 4a. We are building upon the Phase II plan by adjusting current strategies and proposing new strategies to effectively pursue and implement reform. From Jim Austin’s Stress Test recommendations, we are prioritizing and greatly expanding the strategy to improve case processing. Superior Court contracted with NCSC to conduct a review and assessment of felony case flow management policies and practices. NCSC identified four general categories for improvement and nine specific recommendations, including the adoption of CourTools and Case Processing time standards, to improve case-flow management principles and effective practices. We are supporting Superior Court’s intent to adopt the nine recommendations through further collaboration with NCSC for implementation assistance. And, we will partner with NCSC to evaluate District and Municipal Courts and implement its recommendations. Municipal Court has already begun efforts to adhere to NCSC’s High Performing Courts Framework. The City has installed E-Suite Software in Municipal Court, accessible by the City Offices of the PD and Prosecutor, which will increase efficiency and improve data collection. We anticipate that these efforts will increase success, especially by reducing LOS for the pretrial population. At the close of Phase II, Spokane County contracted with Uptrust, a PD text messaging service, that sends personalized texts to defendants reminding them of court dates and allowing for text communication with their attorneys. We anticipate that these improvements will reduce overly lengthy and increasing case processing times, thereby reducing LOS, the number of FTAs, BWs, and related jail stays. We are adding a new strategy to have a fully functional Data Dashboard which will be publicly available on the internet. This strategy directly addresses our need to collect, measure, track, analyze and interpret law and justice system metrics, including demographics such as race and ethnicity, all of which will allow us to timely and appropriately react to emerging trends. The Data Dashboard will enable us to build the necessary infrastructure to develop an integrated data repository; allow us to engage in an iterative process of evaluation and refinement of strategies; and improve community relationships through transparency. 1 2 Smart Justice Spokane is a coalition of 30 organizations focused on creating a fair & safe local justice system. The Spokane Alliance is a non-partisan alliance of congregations, unions, school & community groups. 3 We are revamping the approach of implementing a validated pretrial risk assessment instrument. As discussed in Sec. 9, although the previous strategy never fully materialized, we are committed to implementing an objective pretrial risk tool to guide release decisions and monitoring levels. We have chosen the PSA to replace the unsuccessful SAFER tool, which will support our success because: 1) the PSA is a nationally validated risk assessment tool; 2) it is more user friendly than the SAFER, allowing us to implement and use the tool successfully; and 3) we have consulted with other jurisdictions currently using the PSA that report significant reductions in their jail population and in RE disparities. We are confident that the PSA and its decision framework, carefully implemented with comprehensive TA (provided by Vera and JSP, an SJC site coordinator organization) and will assist in safely reducing jail population and provide a baseline from which to make equitable release decisions. We are expanding and strengthening the strategy of robust Regional Pretrial Services (RPTS). With 6 PTS Officers, RPTS provides the ability for coordinated release decisions across all three courts; expands Pretrial Monitored Release (PMR) by serving both felonies and misdemeanors, and provides screening for PD eligibility across all court levels rather than just for felony charges. We are expanding RPTS through a “Second Look” program, in which they will work to verify and provide additional information to the Court with the aim of releasing more pretrial defendants. These efforts have been successful in increasing release rates, reducing unnecessary pretrial detention and FTAs, and providing PD representation (see Sec. 9a). We are strengthening the Strategy of Diversion through two efforts: we are continuing the Felony Pretrial Diversion (FPD) program and adding a Pre-Filing component, both with RPTS officers providing monitored release, and we are reassigning the County PD social worker (and eliminating the City position). The County PD social worker will now provide case management and support services for the successful “5177” jail mental health diversion program (see Sec. 7c), thereby expanding its enrollment and impact. We are continuing the strategy to address racial and ethnic (RE) disparities in the law and justice system, as described elsewhere in this narrative. Briefly, we are offering Implicit Bias trainings five times yearly and crafting an online training for all new County employees; piloting a local Racial Equity Toolkit; continuing collaboration with local community agencies and the RE Committee; and supporting the latter’s supplemental community engagement (SCE) grant proposal to fund peer and community navigators to support individuals at every point in the law and justice system. 4b. We plan to continue collaborating with the RE Committee, working closely with them to implement joint recommendations, such as the regional implementation of a Racial Equity Toolkit and Implicit Bias and Social Cognition Trainings. We are fully supportive of the SCE grant application designed and proposed by the RE Committee, which provides guidance for moving forward in this work (see application for details). Equally important, we will continue to ensure that all data tracking includes demographic information about racial and ethnic identity, so that we can use the Data Dashboard to closely monitor how reform efforts are reducing the disparities that exist in our law and justice system. 4c. See SCE 4d. We will have achieved our vision of success when:  The average daily jail population is safely and consistently reduced by at least 15% in 2020.  Racial and ethnic disparities in the law and justice system are significantly reduced by 10% in 2020.  Pretrial release decisions are based on a validated risk scale (the PSA), not on the defendant’s ability to post bond or subjective considerations; and are aligned with appropriate monitoring oversight. 4  Cases are adjudicated efficiently through uniform case processing standards, thereby reducing costly continuances, caseloads, and LOS.  Diversion programs are robust, evidence-based, and show reduced recidivism rates.  The number of BWs issued for FTAs is significantly reduced, thereby reducing jail days for those infractions.  PMR defendants are responding to appropriate levels of oversight, thereby appearing for court appearances and remaining crime free.  The Data Dashboard is fully functional, accessible to the public, and clearly tracks processes and outcomes monthly. 4e. The overall project purpose is to move from a charge-based to a risk-based system to reduce the jail population and racial and ethnic disparities. To achieve that, we have the following goals for the next two years: 1st year – 1) Implement PSA and adopt RPTS release decision framework 2) Pilot Racial Equity Toolkit 3) Provide Implicit Bias and Social Cognition trainings five times yearly 4) Implement NCSC recommendations for case processing across all three court levels 5) Train justice system actors on pretrial best practices and risk principles 6) Establish “second look” process 7) Continue Felony Pretrial Diversion (FPD) program 8) Shift social worker to 5177 jail mental health diversion to expand participation 9) Fully implement Uptrust 2nd year - continue all of above goals, plus: 1) Fully functional Data Dashboard 2) Add Pre-Filing Diversion program 3) Evaluate outcomes of strategies, modify, adjust as indicated 4) Secure sustainable funding 5. RESULTS (8,000 character limit – up to two pages) a. How will you ensure that you reach your original jail population reduction target by May 2019? If you have already met your original target, how will you ensure you reach your new target for the next two years? b. What metrics will you track along the way to monitor the effectiveness of your strategies? Your response should correspond to the metrics proposed in the accompanying implementation plan. c. What results do you anticipate around reducing racial and ethnic disparities? How will you track results in this regard? 5a. We believe that our newly proposed and improved strategies, comprehensively implemented as outlined in this proposal, will ensure that we reach the jail reduction target of 15% in 2020. The primary reason we did not meet our goal in Phase II is that the RNR+f tool, the SAFER, was never successfully implemented, which consequently hindered our ability to implement the other strategies as well. We have realized that we cannot rely on one strategy alone; more overall system changes, such as improved case processing, are necessary to meet this goal. We will ensure that we reach our target for the next two years with careful oversight from the SJC Project Director, who will perform quality assurance reviews quarterly that will be designed to make necessary changes to plans promptly and efficiently, and increased Core Team involvement. To ensure that 5 we meet our planned targets (see Sec. 5b), including changes in our jail ADP and LOS, we will track multiple metrics, all disaggregated by race, gender, and ethnicity (and plans also for disaggregating by having an identified mental illness and pretrial vs. sentenced status). 5b. All metrics are designed to provide comprehensive pictures of strategy effectiveness. All metrics will be disaggregated by type of charge (felony or misdemeanor), race, gender, ethnicity, with twice-yearly data reviews with the SRLJC relevant subcommittees and the community. The metrics tracked to monitor the effectiveness of the proposed strategies include: Decrease Jail Population: • Average LOS: both PTS and sentenced, • Number of arrests, • Number of admissions, • ADP, by status (pretrial due to warrant or other; sentenced; contract), Improved Case Processing (with CourTools, an NCSC performance measurement system: ▪ Access and fairness [CourTools Measure (CTM)1] ▪ Clearance rate of disposed cases as percent of number of cases filed (CTM2) ▪ Time to disposition from date of case filing (CTM3) ▪ Age of pending caseload (CTM4) ▪ Elapsed time between major case processing events (CTM4) ▪ Number and percent of cases meeting NCSC time standards (CTM4) ▪ Trial date certainty (number of times trial has been rescheduled) CTM5) ▪ Continuance rate/average number of hearings (CTM5) Data Dashboard: ▪ Number of policy decisions currently informed by Jail Tracker data review, assessing change in ADP, LOS, RE disparities ▪ Number of internal users and public/community members accessing Data Dashboard monthly ▪ Number of policy decision informed by Data Dashboard ▪ Number of requests for additional data analysis after review of Data Dashboard ▪ Number of end user generated data questions on website ▪ Change in jail population in 6 month and 1 year period increments, including changes in ADP, LOS, RE disparities Risk Assessment (PSA): • Hours of completed training by staff, • Number of PSAs completed, • Review of scoring practices, • Fidelity to policy and protocol, • Number and percentage of recommendations by type of release recommended (if any), type of charge, and cross-tabbed with judicial decisions (all disaggregated by gender, race and ethnicity), • Number of pretrial releases: on recognizance, to supervision, and on bail; FTA and new arrests of these, • Number detained pretrial, • Recommendations made by RPTS that follow the PSA recommendations (level of concurrence), • Judicial concurrence rates with the PSA and with PTS Regional Pretrial Services: • Bail: Amounts ordered, amounts posted and correlation to case outcomes, • Diversion: 6 Number and percent of eligible cases identified, by type of diversion program, level of charge, o number and percent offered diversion, by type of diversion program, level of charge, o number and percent accepted, o Amount of restitution and fees collected, o number and percent of outcomes (success vs. unsuccessful completions). • Number and percent of defendants by type of release, supervision levels and risk scores, including: o Those released who: ▪ attended all scheduled court and office appearances (vs. those who do not), ▪ were not charged with new offenses during the pendency of their case, ▪ were not revoked for technical violations during release. o In addition to those metrics, those released on 5177 Jail Mental Health Diversion (Social worker): ▪ Number of cases referred, ▪ Number of cases screened/assessed for needed services, ▪ Number of community based referrals completed, broken down by type, ▪ Court outcome for participants, ▪ Twelve-month recidivism for participants. ▪ Number of cases identified and reviewed by Second Look program; Judicial concurrence rates with recommendations. 5c. Spokane is committed to reducing RE disparities across the law and justice system. Based on the preliminary results in Yakima, WA, Spokane administrators anticipate that the PSA implementation will significantly assist in the reduction of racial disparities in Spokane’s pre-trial population without significantly increasing recidivism.3 As noted in other sections of this narrative (namely, see, 9c), we are implementing Implicit Bias trainings county-wide, piloting a racial equity toolkit, and investing in the work of the RE Committee to further reduce disparities. Through SJC, the Burns Institute (BI) provided technical assistance for our racial equity efforts, including a presentation to explain local data as it pertains to racial disparities in the law and justice system. The BI presentation, together with the underlying data provided by ISLG, reveal racial disparities across the criminal justice system. However, more data need to be collected and analyzed to better understand where and why these disparities begin to grow. We are adopting BI’s recommendations, including adding a commitment to racial equity in the bylaws of the SRLJC, adapting the BI’s data collection template to assist racial disparity analysis, and regularly reviewing and analyzing the resulting data. The RE Committee has been instrumental in identifying an appropriate toolkit that incorporates GARE’s recommendations and advocating for its implementation. They identified an appropriate Racial Equity Toolkit and are exploring opportunities to assist in its implementation. Spokane County will pilot a racial equity toolkit in collaboration with the RE Committee through this grant. We are also improving data collection to consistently include race and ethnicity across a variety of departments. Currently, law enforcement and Detention Services already collect race and ethnic data (along with other demographic information) directly from the individual. Municipal court tracks charges by race and ethnicity. District and Superior Court are both exploring ways in which o 3 BROOKER, CLAIRE M.B., YAKIMA COUNTY, WASHINGTON PRETRIAL JUSTICE SYSTEM IMPROVEMENTS: PRE-AND POST- IMPLEMENTATION ANALYSIS (NOV. 2017), https://justicesystempartners.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/2017-Yakima-Pretrial-PrePost-Implementation-Study-FINAL-111517.pdf. 7 their court software can disaggregate case information by race and ethnicity. District Court is considering adoption of the same software that Municipal Court is using. Superior Court is in the process of transitioning to Odyssey, the new case management system being implemented throughout the State of Washington. Odyssey is designed to allow statistical reports, and Superior Court anticipates the ability to track cases disaggregated by race and ethnicity. 6. LEADERSHIP (4,000 character limit): a. What other agencies, organizations, or individuals will participate in implementation? How would you describe their level of commitment to the implementation of your jurisdiction’s plan? b. Do you currently have a dedicated project manager for your Safety and Justice Challenge work? If not, what is your jurisdiction’s plan to hire one? 6a. The depth of our leadership highlights the extremely strong level of commitment to the implementation of criminal justice reform. The SRLJC meetings consistently have 90% or greater attendance, with full participation while respecting differences of opinion. The SJC project director is also the SRLJA, a joint position funded equally by the City and County, demonstrating not only commitment to these efforts, but strong jurisdictional collaboration as well. The dedicated individuals and groups include: Regional: Spokane Regional Law and Justice Administrator Maggie Yates City of Spokane: Mayor D. Condon City Council President B. Stuckart Municipal Court: The Honorable T. Staab Prosecutor: J. Bingham PD: K. Knox Director of Multicultural Affairs: G. Ochoa Spokane Police Department Chief C. Meidl IT: E. Finch Spokane County: Board of County Commissioners: A. French, J. Kerns COO J. Dickson SRLJC RE Committee Superior Court: The Honorable M. Moreno District Court: The Honorable V. Petersen Prosecutor: L. Haskell PD: T. Krzyminski Detention Services: J. McGrath Pre-trial Services; C. Tofsrud Sheriff’s Office: O. Knezovich Information Systems: S. Nelson Community Agencies: Better Health Together (the region’s Accountable Community of Health) Spokane County Behavioral Health Organization Smart Justice Spokane Spokane Alliance NAACP, local chapter Lutheran Community Services North West (LCSNW) 8 6b. Ms. Maggie Yates, a Spokane native, was hired in August 2018 as the SRLJA for the region, and as the full-time SJC dedicated project manager. Ms. Yates has spent nearly a decade advocating for, and studying issues related to, criminal justice reform. From 2010-2014, Ms. Yates served as the senior investigator with the Southern Poverty Law Center, and later with the MacArthur Justice Center, on a class action lawsuit against the New Orleans jail that ultimately resulted in a federal consent decree. In this role, Ms. Yates interviewed over a thousand incarcerated individuals, assisted with strategic decisions, supervised a team of investigators and cultivated relationships with impacted communities, attorneys, social service providers and law enforcement. Ms. Yates graduated from the UCLA School of Law in 2017 with a David J. Epstein Public Interest & Policy Specialization. Her studies focused on Critical Race Theory and Criminal Justice reform. Upon graduation, Ms. Yates worked on issues related to criminal justice reform in Richmond, Virginia. Ms. Yates is skilled at managing a demanding and diverse caseload, working with a myriad of stakeholders, and ensuring that the voice of the community is included in decision making. As SRLJA, Ms. Yates is committed to deepening and expanding relationships with community members and organizations, and strengthening community collaboration. Within her first month, she attended a Spokane Community Against Racism meeting, two RE community meetings, the Spokane City Human Rights Commission meeting, addressed the State Commission on African American Affairs, and met with multiple service providers, organizations, and residents around the community. At the RE Committee’s request, Ms. Yates has provided support in the development of the SCE grant. In addition to developing community partnership, Ms. Yates has convened and facilitated multiple meetings with stakeholders across the criminal justice system to develop this grant with broad and meaningful support. Ms. Yates will continue holding bi-weekly meetings with the Core Team, track progress and provide continued support to stakeholders. Moreover, she will review the implementation plan with the core team on a quarterly basis to ensure meaningful and measured progress. Spokane County is confident that Ms. Yates will successfully harness the energy around the SJC and guide reforms forward. 7. LEARNING AND EVALUATION (6,000 character limit – up to one and a half pages): a. Do you believe any of the strategies you have already implemented, or new ones proposed in this application, have the potential to be held up as model programs and be replicated by other jurisdictions? Please explain. b. What activities, if any, has your jurisdiction participated in over the last two years to share information about your work and involvement with the Safety and Justice Challenge? c. Is your jurisdiction involved in any other criminal justice reform efforts? If so, how would you describe the level of collaboration between the efforts? 7a. Pretrial Monitored Release (PMR) and Improved Case Processing have the potential to be model programs. The PMR is unique: there is no financial burden to the participant; it is a strong collaboration between prosecution and PD; and early results demonstrate the program’s effectiveness in reducing recidivism and BWs for FTAs. Case processing is a struggle for many jurisdictions; continued collaboration with NCSC to implement its recommendations will provide Spokane with the opportunity to be a replicable program for case processing reform. The fact that the Washington State (WA) Committee on Pretrial Justice has already requested training from Spokane for its innovative approaches highlights the potential for this strategy to become a model program. 9 7b. Our key stakeholders have attended and given presentations at the SJC All Sites Meetings where Justin Bingham was highlighted as an “SJC Champion of Change”. We have met with the WA State Governor and his chief advisors to share information about our efforts and solicit support for future initiatives. We have hosted meetings and tours with the State’s Legislatures Public Safety Committee, Judicial Committee, Representatives, Committee on Pretrial Justice, and Department of Social and Health Services seeking their support and investment in our initiatives. Several SJC Innovation Fund Sites have requested consultation from us; some Spokane stakeholders have traveled to other SJC sites to present on our initiatives. 7c. The region’s major initiatives include the following: Spokane County was awarded a BJA Smart Reentry grant in October of 2017. The goals include increasing access to services, improving the quality of life for reentrants by increasing access to education, health, behavioral health, substance abuse treatment, vocational training, and reducing recidivism. The pilot project is expected to serve approximately 200 individuals over the course of two years by employing community health workers to assist reentrants to access services through a centralized HUB model. The grant also establishes the Regional Reentry Network Task Force to ensure collaboration between the County, City of Spokane, service providers, and other stakeholders including impacted community members. Spokane County began a “5177” jail mental health diversion program based on a WA State law in 2016. The goal is to divert low risk defendants from jail and psychiatric hospitalization directly to behavioral health services. This is a no-cost, voluntary program in which persons charged with eligible crimes, who have either SUD or co-occurring disorder (COD) that can be managed at the community level, abide by case plans that address their basic needs, including treatment. Once they complete requirements, they graduate from the program and their charge is dismissed. Since the program began, 330 participants have been released from jail and engaged in community mental health services, and 121 persons have had their charges dismissed. Although 24 participants were re-arrested during the program (some due to BWs), there has been only one arrest post-graduation. While this strategy has been supported by state funding to date, SJC will support an additional case manager to expand the program’s capacity. Through the court case known as “Trueblood”, WA State has set aside funding specifically to reduce the incidence of persons with mental illness who are incarcerated. Spokane County has been designated as a “Phase I/First Wave” recipient of the monies. Frontier Behavioral Health, the regional provider of Medicaid-eligible behavioral health services, was awarded Co-Responder funding to embed mental health responders with law enforcement response teams. Other Trueblood priorities include hiring additional forensic evaluators; diversion from inpatient to outpatient competency restoration; crisis triage and diversion support; intensive case management for high utilizers; short- and long-term housing support and stabilization; and mobile crisis diversion. The Spokane Mental Health Crisis Stabilization Facility (MHCSF) for Law Enforcement has received legislative funding. The MHCSF is a voluntary facility available to divert individuals who have been arrested for eligible misdemeanor and felony offenses. This facility will be available to those exhibiting signs of a mental illness or COD. It is anticipated that the facility will provide crisis stabilization and pre-booking processes and will promote the use and support of community service providers in diverting people from jail when appropriate as well as connecting them to community diversion resources. The City of Spokane was recently named as an EnVision Center HUD demonstration community. EnVision Centers will offer HUD-assisted families access to support services that can help them achieve self-sufficiency, thereby making scarce resources more readily available to a greater number of households. EnVision Centers will leverage public-private partnerships to connect HUD-assisted households with services that offer pathways to self-sufficiency. 10 The City has already adopted, and the County is planning to adopt, the use of the Ohio Risk Assessment System (ORAS), a validated Risk/Needs/Responsivity (RNR) tool, to assist in treatment planning for probation, with the goal of increasing probation success and limiting returns to jail. The City has already purchased and installed E-Suites software for monitoring and oversight. Both the City and County are exploring a community bail fund. The level of cooperation among the local communities’ law and justice reform efforts is high, especially with the SRLJAO as the primary overseer of most of these efforts. These efforts complement our interest in safely reducing the use of the jail by determining that the jail beds are filled with the appropriate individuals as well as impacting recidivism by addressing their individual risk and needs. 8. SUSTAINABILITY / NEXT STAGES (4,000 character limit – up to one page): a. How do you plan to sustain the strategies in your proposal over the long-term, after the grant concludes? i. Do you anticipate needing any additional partners to advance this work? Which stakeholders will be most important to have on board? ii. Do you anticipate any gaps in funding once the grant concludes? If so, how do you plan to address these gaps? iii. How do you plan to track the progress and impact of your continued work? b. What challenges do you anticipate in sustaining your strategies once the grant concludes? How will you address them? c. Please describe any other funding sources you have allocated toward these activities, including the source and proposed amount. 8a. The Spokane County Board of Commissioners (BOCC), in collaboration with city legislative authorities, will strive to sustain the SJC strategies. Because the cost of incarceration exceeds the cost of the SJC strategies, sustainment may be funded by reduced jail without a need to consider raising taxes or using other revenues. The anticipated reduction in jail population should also significantly reduce the jail overtime budget as well, which could be reallocated toward further sustainment. The City and County must also continue to pursue local, state and federal funds for the law and justice system via information sharing of outcomes with our State and local legislators, as well as the Governor’s Office. 8a.i. Our regional behavioral health providers are critical stakeholders. The PRI SIM exercise highlighted the need for strong system-provider collaboration. Local government alone cannot solve all the regional challenges it faces, such as the opioid epidemic and escalating mental health crises, that may result in incarceration. Thus, regional behavioral health providers, in collaboration with Managed Care Organizations that provide Medicare funding to these organizations, are an integral part of our regional strategy going forward. The Spokane area has long had a strong behavioral health system of care. The behavioral health providers have been community partners in many law and justice system initiatives. 8a. ii. We anticipate funding gaps for operational support for these programs. Our plan to address these gaps is to better educate our regional political leaders on the outcomes of our reform efforts, with support from the Data Dashboard. With enhanced and frequent visibility of our performance outcomes, our legislative authorities may be more willing to support and fund reform efforts after Phase III concludes. 8a.iii. We will continue with the tracking of metrics, including racial and ethnic disparities (see Sec. 5b, 5c) and continue to provide monthly inputs to the SRLJC. We plan to use the Data 11 Dashboard to ensure that we are tracking progress, impact of reform efforts, and responding to trends in a timely manner. 8b. For Phase III, our core strategies are increasing pretrial releases and reducing case processing times. While the PSA will strengthen the argument for pretrial release, and NCSC will help our courts uncover opportunities to reduce case processing times, individuals including judges, prosecutors and public defenders, will need to actively change their behaviors to attain the goals. We may need to track performance measures at an individual level, not just at a court system level. This may cause some controversy. We plan to consult with other SJC sites that have already moved toward this model for ideas on how best to generate buy-in. To sustain the gains that we plan to achieve, we will need to hold departments and individuals accountable for meeting goals. This can be a challenge, especially since so many stakeholders are elected officials. We will address these issues by implementing the Data Dashboard and documenting performance outcomes. Eventually, case processing goals and corresponding performance will become a system and regional norm. 8c. In June 2018, Spokane County implemented a new Jail Tracker system to replace Detention Service’s aging Offender Management System. The initial cost was $750K to implement this new software system, which will eventually be linked to the Data Dashboard. The City and County are also exploring sharing the costs of securing ($6500) and validating ($100,000) the RNR tool, the ORAS, for post-conviction and reentry efforts. The City of Spokane will be opening its EnVision Center before the end of 2018. Spokane will continue to apply for Trueblood monies, as RFPs are issued, but critically, WA state courts and the legislature have already selected Spokane as a Phase I/First Wave site for increased mental health reforms. 9. PAST PERFORMANCE (8,000 character limit – up to two pages): a. Which of your jurisdiction’s strategies have been implemented in the last two years? Which strategies have not been fully implemented? For strategies that have not yet been fully implemented, please explain why. b. How has your jurisdiction’s jail population changed since the baseline measurement, and why? Please explain and demonstrate with data what specific strategies have contributed to changes in the jail population. (Note: baseline is defined as the 6-month average of the confined jail population from November 2015 to April 2016, excluding contracted beds.) c. What has your jurisdiction done to address racial and ethnic disparities, and how have disparities changed as a result of this work? As applicable, please use data in response to this question. d. What has your jurisdiction done to engage local communities? How successful has your community engagement work been? e. What have you learned over the past two years about what has worked and/or not worked to reduce the overuse of jail in your jurisdiction? 9a. The Regional Pretrial Services (RPTS) strategy has been implemented, apart from implementing a validated risk assessment tool. The RPTS provides opportunities for coordinated release decisions across all three courts; PMR for all defendants (not just those accused of felonies); screening for PD eligibility across all court levels; and supervision for a small felony diversion caseload. Between 2016-18, release rates increased from 38% to 46%. RPTS provided First 12 Appearance Evaluations for 2,692 District Court defendants and 6,066 Municipal Court defendants; almost 4,000 defendants were released to PMR, of which 3,296 had felony charges; and 7,848 Municipal Court defendants were screened for public defender eligibility. We are confident that the addition of the PSA risk assessment tool will amplify this success. We successfully implemented some case processing activities, including weekly felony BW recall docket and annual warrant fests. In a recent 2-month period, 52 BWs were recalled of 57 cases that appeared on the docket. The most recent warrant fest quashed 15 felony & 52 misdemeanor warrants. With Phase II funding, Spokane County contracted with NCSC consultation to improve felony case processing. The county PD’s office recently launched Uptrust, a text messaging service that allows direct communications to clients to remind them of court dates. Through our RE disparities strategy, three Implicit Bias trainings were held across the law and justice system, and a “Train the Trainer” event is scheduled next month. The RE Committee has worked to identify and advocate for the piloting of an appropriate RE toolkit. We previously lacked a comprehensive data strategy, despite an understanding that data are critical to our efforts. Thus, we are adding the new strategy to have a fully functional Data Dashboard that directly addresses our need to collect, measure, track, analyze and interpret metrics. We were unable to implement the RNR strategy for myriad reasons: we lacked project management, due to both the SRLJA vacancy and limited researcher/designer engagement; SAFER’s scoring was flawed, despite five attempts to fix flaws and the SAFER software was not user friendly. Consequently, buy-in from all stakeholders waned. Moreover, other strategies dependent upon SAFER’s implementation were unable to progress, such as creating the RPTS release/monitoring matrix and comprehensive Quality Improvement and Fidelity systems. Our plan to have a portability team never materialized because we did not realize the incredible complexity of scheduling across three different courts, various attorneys and defendants. Further analysis revealed that this strategy would have little impact on the ADP. 9b. The jail population has remained relatively static. In 2016 there was a 3% drop, a 1% increase in 2017 and 2018 is currently at baseline. Measure Baseline 2016 2017 2018* Arrests 1,794 819 5,887 of 6,011 of 4,989 of  Felony 19,473 18,923 15,027 976 13,586 of 12,912 of 10,038 of  Misdemeanor 19,473 18,923 15,027 Admissions 19,152 19,473 18,923 15,027 ADP (non-contracted) 909 882 896 854 -- 785 of 981 732 of 915 733 of 986 o Warrants -- 565 of 878 369 of 732 455 of 733 o Other -- 313 of 878 363 of 732 278 of 733  Sentenced** -- 136 of 981 105 of 915 95 of 986  Pretrial** 13  Contract/ICE** 60 of 981 78/0 of 915 154/1 of 986 LOS 16.7 16.4 17.6 17 *2018 averages annualized. ** Snapshots from midnight on August 31, annually. Our focus was heavily weighted toward the customized pretrial risk tool. Since it was unsuccessful, we did not achieve expected outcomes. Additionally, other strategies were partially reliant on the customized pretrial risk tool implementation. 9c. The RE committee recommended both the Racial Equity Toolkit and Implicit Bias training. We held Implicit Bias 101 training in January 2018, attended by over 325 city and county law and justice personnel. Also in 2018, GARE conducted an in-person training on the use and need for a Racial Equity Toolkit. In November 2018, Spokane County will host an Implicit Bias and Social Cognition “Train the Trainer” event. The training will focus on city and county employees as well as community members. Tracking disparities has been difficult due to previously identified data gathering challenges, but we are working to address those challenges with data enhancements. 9d. The RE committee participates in the SRLJC meetings and raises issues on behalf of the community. The RE committee’s contributions are invaluable to Spokane’s community engagement efforts. Spokane County leaders recognize that more must be done to develop RE community collaboration around law and justice system reform. Spokane is hopeful that the SCE grant will provide a meaningful county-community partnership. Additionally, the SRLJA is reaching out to individual community leaders and attending community meetings, to provide an open line of communication between the community and SJC efforts. 9e. We learned that the following strategies and activities have worked: RPTS and its PMR; other mental health diversion programs (see 7C); and a strong Core Team, comprised of city and county officials who are committed to the change process. We learned through the Stress Test exercise with Jim Austin that Spokane has a below-average jail incarceration rate and has accomplished much in the way of law and justice reform, making jail reduction a more difficult task. The Stress Test exercise illustrated how challenging it is to predict with any accuracy the outcome of cases and the resulting impact on the jail population, and the need to address long LOS and multiple continuances. The PRI facilitated site visits in 2017 and 2018, conducting a SIM exercise to identify how to improve service delivery to individuals diagnosed with co-occurring disorders. The exercise also highlighted the need to develop appropriate information sharing to improve continuity of care, ensure appropriate treatment based on levels of risk and need, improve treatment fidelity, and invest in stabilizing individuals prior to law enforcement contact. The SRLJA plans to reconvene the SIM participants to advance reforms in this area. Through SJC, BI revealed ongoingF racial disparities across the law and justice system. We plan to implement BI’s recommendations, including a statement of commitment to racial equity in the SRLJC bylaws, adapt its data collection template to assist racial and ethnic disparity analysis, pilot a local RE toolkit, and regularly review and analyze data. What has not worked: the primary strategy of implementing an RNR+f. We realized that creating and implementing a new RNR tool was extraordinarily difficult in the proposed timeframe. Problems with SAFER included a lack of project management, developer disengagement, ongoing software glitches, and launch failures. We now understand that implementing an effective RNR is not the sole panacea for addressing jail reduction goals and we must also prioritize the other strategies. We have realized the importance of timely, effective data that will enable us to monitor the health of our regional law and justice system. Through our participation in SJC, we have become 14 aware of inefficiencies in our current systems that impeded our ability to measure performance outcomes. The county invested in a new Jail Tracker system and is prioritizing a Data Dashboard and support for this application. With Jim Austin’s assistance, we have realized the critical need to address lengthy delays in case processing and we now have specific NCSC recommendations to improve this area. Finally, we realized that we needed strong, consistent leadership. We are thankful to have Maggie Yates as the new SRLJA, so that we can proceed forward with confidence. 10. BUDGET/FINANCIAL INFORMATION (to be uploaded through the portal): a. Please upload your proposed two-year grant budget. b. Please prepare and upload a budget narrative. If applicable, please include a list of other funders and a brief explanation of the scope and objective of grants that relate to your Safety and Justice Challenge work. c. If indirect costs are expressed as a percentage, please upload information on your organization’s current rate and review the Foundation’s indirect cost policy statement. d. Please upload your organizational operating budget for the current year. Section 2. Required Uploads 1. Using the template provided, please upload your jurisdiction’s Safety and Justice Challenge implementation plan with revised jail population reduction calculations. a. Please note that there are two tabs for jail population reduction impact calculations. Sites that have reached their original three-year target need only fill out the first tab titled “Impact Calculations—May 2020”; sites still working toward their original three-year target should fill out both impact calculation tabs. 2. If you are applying for a community engagement incentive grant, please upload your application. 3. Please upload the items listed in Question 10. 15