HAMILTON COUNTY DRUG COURT

Transcription

1 HAMILTON COUNTY DRUG COURT Prepared for: Indiana Judicial Center Honorable Gail Z. Bardach Madonna Wagoner, Director of Probation Services Prepared by: Krista L. Radican, Drug Court Coordinator

2 '(.' ow,>o '"""' As of January of2012, the Hamilton County Drug Court has been in operation for fourteen (14) months. We were provisionally certified by the Indiana Judicial Center on September 2, Our program operates under the jurisdiction of Hamilton Superior Court 6 and the Honorable Gail Z. Bardach. Our program personnel includes Judge Bardach; program coordinator Krista Radican; case manager Keri Murray; deputy prosecutor Rebecca Browning; defense attorneys Stacy Amber and Jillian Keating; treatment providers Pam Dusendschon and Scott Thomas; and Hamilton County Community Corrections staff Stephanie Ruggles and Jessica Privett. We are fortunate enough to have additional teammates who are able to fill in when others are absent, including the Honorable William J. Hughes, case manager Amber Orr and assessment officer Rachelle Willman. Our program conducts a team staff meeting on Monday monrings at 11:00 a.m. and court every Monday afternoon beginning at 1:30 p.m. We continue to have committed team members and believe we have formed a group who are progressive thinkers and focused on our program goals and objectives. Our Advisory Board consists of eleven individuals from our community. They represent members of the legal community, treatment field, community corrections officials and one community representative. Our Board met on five occasions in 2011 to discuss overall program development and program goals. We are slated to meet quarterly in Our program is very proud to be a recipient of the Bureau of Justice (BJA) Adult Drug Court Discretionary Grant in October of2011. This grant awarded our program with a total of $350, over a three year reporting period. This award will be used to hire one new case manager in 2012 as well as pay for training costs, travel expenses for training, etc. In addition, an additional case manager may be hired in 2013 with this grant award. Our Chief Probation Officer, program evaluator and program coordinator continue to work on submitting progress reports per the grant requirements. The drug court program is pleased to have Brentt Lutz, our program evaluator, on staff to continue working on outcome evaluations. He began a process evaluation during the fall of2011 and anticipates the completion of this evaluation during the summer of Brentt is currently in the process of interviewing all program participants and team members as part of this evaluation. These outcomes will also be reported in the 2012 annual report. The program coordinator as well as the program evaluator, Brentt Lutz, serves on the Problem Solving Court Performance Measures Task Force with the Indiana Judicial Center. This committee convened in December for our first meeting in several years to discuss outcome measures on a statewide level. As previously noted, our program was provisionally certified to operate as an Indiana Problem Solving Court on September 2, Our program had our Initial Certification review with the Indiana Judicial Center on March 19 and 20, We were notified that our provisional certification has been extended until the final certification report is received, which will then finalize our 3-year certification process. Our drug court forms have undergone many changes over the initial fourteen (14) months of operation. We anticipate final revisions to be made by April of2012 following the Initial Certification review. From that point forward, all changes to program forms will be reported at least annually to the Indiana Judicial Center.

3 The Hamilton County Drug Court assessed a total of$ in 2011 for monthly user fees along with administration fees (as applicable effective July 1, 2011). We collected a total of $ in 2011, broken down as $ in administration fees and $ in monthly user fees. The drug court budget and expenditures for 2011 are attached for review (Attachment 1). This budget was initially created as part of the BJA grant application requirements.,., Total Cases Referred*: 58 Total Cases Assessed: 25 Total Cases Admitted*: 12 Total Cases Denied*: 53 *Please note some cases were referred in 2010 but denied in 2011 or referred in 2011 and still in "pending" status therefore numbers will not equal total referred.* Reasons for denying program admittance: Denied by prosecuting attorney* 17 *generally due to hx violent offenses, residential burglaries, offenses involving weapons or dealing substances* Denied due to pending out of county cases: 9 Denied due to age of case: 7 Denied by team staffing: 7 Determined too low risk: 6 Client declined program: 5 Denied transfer by court of origin: 1 Sentenced to DOC prior to drug ct assessment: 1 Average length of time between program referral and program admittance or denial: 47 days 2

4 Total participant terminations in 2011: 5 Reasons for participant terminations: Fte-arrest: 2 ( 1- Ftesidential Entry; 1- Criminal Trespass) Violation ofhccc: 2 (general non-compliance and substance use) Absconded: 1 TOTAL ACTIVE PARTICIPANTS AS OF 111/2012: 10 ( + 1 awaiting admission in DOC) Participants by phase: Phase I: 6 Phase II: 4 Phase III: 0 Demographics: Age: Count: % Count: and over 2 10% Caucasian 10 50% 20% 20% 100% Gender: Count: % Marital Status: Count: % Male 4 Female 6 40% Single 6 60% Divorced 4 60% 40% Education level: Count: % Drng of Choice: Count: % Bachelor's degree Some college HS diploma/qed II th grade educ % Alcohol 5 50% Opiates 3 20% Amphetamines 2 10% 50% 30% 20% The Hamilton County Drug Court has not yet had a graduate as the program has only been in operation for 14 months as of the end of the 2011 reporting period. 3

5 As we move through the first quarter of2012 we are focusing on five primary goals. Our team will be meeting in the near future to discuss how to shorten the length of time between a potential client's arrest and/or violation date aud their admittauce (or at a minimum their referral) into our program. There appear to be several factors slowing this process down and we piau to re-evaluate our original goal of program admittance within thirty (30 days) of arrest/violation. Secondly, the drug court team is in the process of developing a Relapse Prevention Piau at the present time. This is being done by combining the efforts of our two treatment providers aud their expertise, with examples of similar plans from other dmg court programs which have been in operation for some time. We hope this plan will be completed aud distributed to participauts within the next few weeks. Thirdly, we are plamung to restructure our program fees within the next month, which includes exploring creative ways for indigent clients to pay off high balauces in a timelier marmer. In addition, our program is in the process of researching other drug screening options (i.e. instant tests) to help reduce costs for our participauts. These chauges will result in slight policy modifications. Our longer term goals for 2012 are to continue to increase our active population aud to piau our first program graduation. As of early Jauuary, 2012 there are several cases that are in the screening process aud therefore we hope to admit several new participauts soon. Our goal would be to have thirty (30) active participauts by the end of2012. The drug court team is hopeful a graduation could be scheduled in late 2012 or early 2013 for at least 2-3 of our active program participauts. As a result, the program coordinator aud the case mauager(s) will be traveling to other jurisdictions to observe their graduation activities in the near future. ~e:::: Krista~ R~icau, BS, CSAMS Drug Court Coordinator 4

6 2011/2012 HAMILTON COUNTY DRUG COURT BUDGET EXPENSE AMOUNT FUNDING SOURCE Drug Court Judge salary $122, 406/year In-kind/State Court Administration Drug Court Coordinator salary $55,880/year In-kind!C.A.R.E. Program budget Drug Court Case Manager salary $56,206/year In-kind/county general funds Drug Court Case Manager salary (new $3 7,406/year BJA grant funds position) Criminal defense attorney salary $28,320.00/year In-kind/Court Administration budget Deputy Prosecuting Attorney salary $35,000.00/year Funded by Hamilton County Council on Alcohol and Other Drugs thru first Yz of2012; same proposed for remainder of2012 Drug Court Program Evaluator 50% of$42,469/year In-kind/probation department budget Drug court office supplies $ /year In-kind/probation department budget Drug court laptop computer $ In-kind/probation department budget Drug Court staff training $10,000/year In-kind/probation department budget to date; 2012-funded by Hamilton County Council on Alcohol and Other Drugs Incentives for drug court participants $ /year Probation department budget and funded by Hamilton County Council on Alcohol and Other Drugs in 2012 I