Calling all Criminal Justice Services stakeholders!
The Criminal Justice Services team within the Office of Behavioral Health (OBH) has heard feedback from across the state requesting simplification, streamlining, and increased flexibility with our processes. With the help of partnering communities and criminal justice agencies, the Criminal Justice Services team is actively working on addressing this feedback right now. We'd like to invite you to walk alongside us through this improvement process.
OBH is partnering with the University of Colorado to focus first on improving Jail Based Behavioral Health Services (JBBS). Within the next month, JBBS Program Managers will prioritize outreaching communities in rural and frontier locations, to discuss their level of interest in participating in this project and facilitate connections with the University. The University will immerse itself in up to three jail sites and surrounding communities to pilot this project. The intention is to learn from the jails and communities, building on information provided by the behavioral health providers and corrections staff in your jails that was previously collected by Health Management Associates (HMA). Taking that information we will work closely with the jail and community to test an improvement process that is tailored to the jail's needs and enhance the community's options for serving JBBS-involved individuals. Input from all stakeholders is welcome and encouraged in order to develop a model that incorporates the unique aspects and attributes of each jail and community. At the end of the project, we'll have a written guide to make JBBS services and implementation more efficient, user-friendly and meaningful.
At the end of the project, a written guide to make JBBS services and implementation more efficient, user-friendly and meaningful will be provided to support JBBS service improvements and implementation based in part on your input and the findings gathered.
Feel free to outreach the JBBS team at cdhs_jbbs@state.co.us if you have questions or are interested in participating. If you prefer to speak with someone, please contact Mary Anna Sears at 303.866.7479.