Ex-offenders with mental illness are staying out of jail thanks to a pilot reentry program in Iowa. Initial statistics suggest that program participants are 8 percent more likely to successfully reenter the community than those who do not go through the program. What is the key to this success? Community Accountability Boards (CABs) that secure an effective support system.
Mental illness is a heavy burden that ex-offenders returning to the community often have to bear alone. With rising prison populations and tighter budgets, more and more inmates with mental illness are not getting the support they need when they leave prison. Without adequate services and community supervision, many of these individuals become homeless and quickly return to crime and, subsequently, prison. Iowa's pilot program is working to correct this problem.
Mental illness among ex-offenders is a significant problem. According to the Iowa Department of Corrections, the state housed 8,578 prisoners in 2005, and more than one-third of them suffered from chronic mental illness. Because these individuals typically serve longer portions of their sentences than other inmates, they often receive less time for community supervision when they reenter the community. In Iowa, inmates who serve their entire prison sentence are returned to their communities with $100 and, in principle, a 30-day supply of medication or a prescription for that amount.
Iowa's mental health reentry program targets offenders who have mental health disorders, many of whom struggle with multiple mental illnesses and a history of substance abuse. The program strives to provide the support these individuals need to successfully transition back into the community upon their release from prison. This support includes providing mental health treatment and advocacy, substance abuse treatment, housing, employment, family therapy, spiritual guidance when appropriate, support from local law enforcement agencies, and other community services.
The following three programs serve ex-offenders with mental health disorders in Iowa:
- The Sixth Judicial District of Iowa Department of Correctional Services, which serves Benton, Iowa, Johnson, Jones, Linn, and Tama counties, encompassing Cedar Rapids and the surrounding area.
- The First Judicial District Department of Correctional Services, which serves Allamakee, Black Hawk, Buchanan, Clayton, Chickasaw, Delaware, Dubuque, Fayette, Grundy, Howard, and Winneshiek counties, including Waterloo and the surrounding area.
- The Black Hawk-Grundy Mental Health Center, which also serves Black Hawk County.
Individuals served by any of the programs listed above must have a diagnosed mental illness, such as a DSM IV Axis I diagnosis, and must be from the program's county or plan to settle there after they are released from prison. Typically, sex offenders and those with an extensive history of violent crime are not accepted into these programs. People with level of supervision inventory (or LSI) scores—which measure the level of criminal risk—higher than 40 are also not eligible for the program. Ideally, program participants should spend at least 6 months under community supervision to give reentry program staff adequate time to work with the participant.
At the heart of this program is the CAB, which serves as a support system for returning prisoners with mental illness. CAB is composed of volunteers representing private and public organizations that have an interest in assisting ex-offenders who have a diagnosed mental illness. The role of CAB members is to link program participants with community services, to encourage and praise participants when they are doing well, and to offer suggestions when they are not complying with the requirements of the reentry program. These members have specialized knowledge about the resources available in each community and can help program participants identify the community services they need and explain how they access those services.
Services and support provided by CAB members include—
- Linking with mental health service providers who will monitor the participant's medication.
- Applying for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Medicaid, food stamps, and other programs that can help participants pay for medication and food.
- Finding housing and applying for public housing programs.
- Providing monetary assistance for rental deposits, rent, medications, transportation, psychiatric appointments, and individual therapy.
- Finding transportation to appointments or obtaining bus passes.
- Linking with other community services.
- Enrolling in education or job training programs.
- Providing emotional support and guidance.
- Providing correctional supervision and urinalysis (First and Sixth District programs only).
CAB members meet regularly with participants to guide, support, and help them. At each meeting, members learn about participants' progress and any setbacks they may have had.
The program has seen much success. Recent evaluations show that ex-offenders who have a mental illness and participate in the mental health reentry programs are more likely to be successfully discharged from the program and remain in the community rather than reoffending and returning to jail or prison than those with a mental illness who work with a traditional parole officer. Only 24 percent of the participants were unsuccessfully discharged from the program, compared with 39 percent of the comparison group who were reincarcerated. Sixty-nine percent of participants in mental health reentry programs successfully completed those programs, versus 61 percent of the comparison group members.
In addition, participants in the mental health reentry programs were less likely to return to prison within 3 years than the general population of Iowa's ex-offenders with a mental illness. For instance, the felony rearrest rate for participants in the mental health reentry programs—9 percent—is lower than the felony rearrest rate for Iowa parolees with a mental illness who did not participate in a mental health reentry program—12 percent.
The following is a partial list of the mental health reentry programs' successes:
- The housing stability of program participants improves over the course of the program.
- Participants are applying for SSDI and SSI and more participants are receiving these benefits than had been at the beginning of the program.
- The percentage of those who continue with their mental health therapy increases over the course of the program. Similarly, the percentage who continue with substance abuse treatment also increases.
- The frequency of psychiatric hospitalizations decreases over the course of the program.
- The percentage of those who attended all of their psychiatric and medical appointments starts out high—72 percent during the first reassessment period—and increases over the course of the program.
- The employment rates of reentry program participants are similar to, and in some cases better than, the employment rates of other groups with similar disabilities.
All statistics were derived from An Evaluation of Three Transitional Mental Health Re-entry Programs in Iowa: Fourth Annual Evaluation Report, Prepared by the Institute for Social and Economic Development, February 15, 2007.
For more information, contact:Alyssa Kupka
Americorps VISTA Leader
Central Cedar Rapids Weed and Seed Operation
