Incarceration

Study: To Reduce Jail Populations, Increase Mental Health Services in Communities

Andrew J Schappert — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 19:21:05 +0000

Study: To Reduce Jail Populations, Increase Mental Health Services in Communities Andrew J Schappert Thu, 08/25/2022 - 15:21

Faye Taxman: ‘This study is important because it illustrates the interconnection between mental health services in the community and the size of the jail population…’

A new study by Schar School of Policy and Government researchers concludes that U.S. jails are de facto mental health institutions, with nearly 10 times as many individuals with serious mental illness in prisons and jails than in state psychiatric hospitals.

The study also found that access to affordable healthcare services and behavioral health treatment in the community changes how the jail is used and reduces the size of the jail population.

“This study is important because it illustrates the interconnection between mental health services in the community and the size of the jail population—that is, if counties invest in expanding local health services, then they can reduce how they use their local jail,” said Faye S. Taxman, founding director of the Center for Advancing Correctional Excellence (ACE!) at ��ӽ紫ý and the principal investigator of the study.

The data is relevant “to policy makers at federal, state, and local government agencies in terms of reducing the unnecessary use of local jails,” she said. “It also illustrates a connection that the number of services in the community is important to improve outcomes.”

Researchers included Niloofar Ramezani, a biostatistician at Mason’s College of Engineering and Computing, and collaborators from Michigan State University and the University of Central Florida. Working with $3.6 million in funding from the National Institute of Mental Health, the researchers studied the size of jail populations in 3,100 U.S. counties to explore factors contributing to the over-use of incarceration in county jails in the face of increased mental health challenges within those communities.

The study’s conclusions point to increasing mental health services—particularly in counties with smaller populations, reduced numbers of high school graduates, and fewer treatment services—to reduce prison and jail populations.

There is hope on the horizon, Taxman pointed out.

“The new Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill has funds for mental health services,” she said. “If used, that funding can help to reduce the over 11 million Americans who are processed by local jails each year.”

The complete study is here.

Probing St. Louis’s Troubled Jail

Taxman and ACE! are helping administrators at St. Louis County Justice Center in St. Louis, Missouri, develop new racial equity policies and programming to improve the jail’s culture and reduce its population. The 18-month, first-of-its-kind study, funded by a $300,000 grant from the MacArthur Foundation, will focus on rampant racism and mistreatment of inmates.

If successful, those new practices and policies could be adapted by criminal justice systems across the country.

The study team includes researchers from ACE!, the University of Missouri-St. Louis, and justice system partnerships.

In This Story

Faye S. Taxman

Learn more about the Schar School

Read the full study

Topics

Schar School News August 2022

Center for Advancing Correctional Excellence

Risk of Homelessness or Incarceration among Foster Youth Varies by Type of Disability

Mary Cunningham — Wed, 30 Mar 2022 13:53:37 +0000

Risk of Homelessness or Incarceration among Foster Youth Varies by Type of Disability Mary Cunningham Wed, 03/30/2022 - 09:53

Ages 17-21 are important transitional years as young adults learn to become adults with more responsibilities. Many youth have family members who provide social and financial support to help them during this critical time; however many transitioning out of foster care lack these supports. Without social supports, they face a greater risk of homelessness, incarceration, and other socially isolating outcomes.

A new study shows that the likelihood of a foster youth with disabilities experiencing homelessness or incarceration during the transition to adulthood varies by type of disability. Associate professor of Social Work JoAnn Lee and associate professor of Health Administration and Policy Gilbert Gimm found that youth with emotional disabilities are more likely to experience homelessness and incarceration than those with other disabilities. However, after digging a little deeper, they found that there are other factors that explain the association between emotional disabilities and both homelessness and incarceration: “Our findings did not find statistical significance for an emotional disability when controlling for other variables, contrary to what we expected based on prior studies,” said Lee. “This is especially notable since emotional disability is the disability type people tend to focus on, if they differentiate the type of disability diagnosis.”

Previous studies either grouped everyone with a disability together or focused only on emotional disability. This study found that intellectual or developmental disability, visual/hearing disability, and physical disabilities are associated with a lower likelihood of homelessness and incarceration. Out of the disabilities analyzed, those with a physical disability reported the lowest rates of homelessness and incarceration and those with an emotional disability reported the highest rates.

“This study brought to light the need to tailor social supports and policies to the specific needs of young adults with disabilities, which can reduce barriers to services and improve community participation. In turn, improved access to services and social engagement can ultimately reduce the risk of homelessness and incarceration," said Lee.

Additionally, the research revealed that youth connections to school, employment, and extended foster care support were associated with lower likelihood of experiencing homelessness and incarceration. The study also identified a smaller group of youth who had not yet been evaluated and requires more study because they appear to have the worst overall outcomes.

In the study, nearly half (46%) of youth aging out of foster care were diagnosed with a disability. The majority had an emotional disability (36.8%) and a small percentage of youth aging out were diagnosed with an intellectual/developmental disability (4.3%), visual or hearing disability (6.3%), and a physical disability (1.1%). Nine percent of the study cohort had not been evaluated for a disability.

“We recommend two important policy implications based on our findings. First, transition services for high-risk youth should be bolstered. Second, extending transition services up to age 25 can help to reduce the risk of homelessness and incarceration,” said Gimm.

The paper titled “Assessing Homelessness and Incarceration Among Youth Aging Out of Foster Care, by Type of Disability” was published online in the Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal in February 2022. Researchers did an analysis to identify associations between disability type and both homelessness and incarceration while controlling for other demographic and child welfare system characteristics.

The study merged the administrative data from the 2014 cohort of the National Youth in Transition Database (NYTD) and Adoption and Foster Care Analysis Reporting System (AFCARS). The NYTD outcomes database interviewed youth when they were 17 years old, with follow-up interviews when they reached 19 and 21 years of age, respectively, to find out how they were doing as they age out of care and transition to adulthood.

Topics

Center for Health Equity

Policy and Prisons: What Happens After Incarceration?

Andrew J Schappert — Tue, 08 Feb 2022 15:36:59 +0000

Policy and Prisons: What Happens After Incarceration? Andrew J Schappert Tue, 02/08/2022 - 10:36

In This Story

Michael K. Fauntroy

Public funds that might be spent on education, infrastructure, and health care, among other programs, are diverted into an increasingly voracious criminal justice system that, ultimately, creates a negative impact on the lives of the incarcerated, their families, and their communities, particularly for those reentering society after incarceration.

That issue and others regarding the state of the prison system in the U.S. are the topics of a conversation called “Convicted and Condemned: The Politics and Policies of Prisoner Reentry,” hosted by the Schar School’s Race, Politics, and Policy Center (RPPC) and featuring Howard University Associate Professor Keesha M. Middlemass, who published a 2017 book of the same title.

Schar School Associate Professor and RRPC Director Michael K. Fauntroy will moderate. The virtual discussion takes place Wednesday, February 23 at 7:30 p.m. ET. It’s free and open to the public but registration is required.

Studies show that two factors serve as big deterrents to crime for those formerly incarcerated. “Thousands of people reenter society every year in the state of Virginia, and to improve public safety and reduce the potential for new criminal activity, the reentering population needs to have the opportunity to access housing and employment. The negative impact when people are not provided a chance to [successfully] reenter includes increased homelessness.”

Not surprisingly, “racial disparities in who is incarcerated and who reenters disproportionately impacts Black communities,” she added. “When individuals fail to reenter, there are other costs, including re-incarceration and the negative impact on children, families, and communities.”

As for job opportunities, obstacles abound.

“Employment restrictions are numerous and are across all employment sectors,” she said. “Adults with a felony conviction are denied the right to work in the public sector, such as in public education, and licensing boards add administrative hurdles to get a professional or occupational license, which increases the likelihood of denial.”

This discussion, she said, is important to have amid a political climate in which “little is being done about the policies embedded in statutes outside of the criminal and sentencing statutes.

“In other words, the collateral consequences are not being changed. There is little to no appetite to reform the hidden and collateral consequences of a felony conviction, so they will continue and be added to by state legislators.”