Children’s Village Division – Improving reading skills of incarcerated juveniles. Sheriff Office Marine/Search and Rescue Team equipment. Prosecutor Office - Case management technology equipment

Project: Oakland County Sheriff’s Office (OCSO)Marine/Search and Rescue Team Equipment
The Oakland County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue Team is requesting grant funding to purchase essential equipment to facilitate the rescue or recovery of drowning victims. Technology plays a crucial role in successful search and recovery operations. Sonar equipment is critical to quickly enable the rescue of drowning victims when every second counts. The equipment can also aid in locating potential evidence and objects underwater. Although a side scan sonar is the best option for search and rescue operations because it allows large areas to be searched quickly, the cost is prohibitive and not within the constraints of the available grant funding.
The AquaEye and Humminbird APEX are good alternatives to the side scan sonar but scan smaller areas. The Humminbird APEX provides a clear sonar image on a multifunction display. The AquaEye is a handheld sonar device that offers advanced underwater scanning to quickly locate and identify human-shaped objects using the latest ultrasound and artificial intelligence technologies to search nearly an acre of water in under a minute.
Divers use wrist dive computers during underwater search/rescue/recovery operations. However, the existing devices are reaching the end of their life cycle.
The current buoyancy control devices (BCDs) and personal floatation devices (PFDs) are reaching the end of their life cycle and require replacement.
Emergency/Search and Rescue operations frequently occur during inclement weather conditions and at night. The generators will power rescue equipment and emergency lighting, as well as rescue trailers with heaters to keep personnel warm during cold weather operations.

Project: County of Oakland – Children’s Village Division– Project Identifiers: – Improving reading skills of incarcerated juveniles by increasing access and diversifying choices of books and audio books.
85 percent of all juveniles who interface with the juvenile court system are functionally low literate. Low literacy rates are associated with higher rates of crime, but they also make it difficult for individuals to break the cycle of poverty and dependence on welfare. Illiteracy and crime are connected. The Department of Justice states, The link between academic failure and delinquency, violence, and crime is welded to reading failure.
Children’s Village is working to break that trend amongst those detained by offering tutoring programs and increasing reading opportunities by providing expanded resources. Enlarging the selection and variety of books in the detention library at Children’s Village will assist in the goal of improving literacy. Book library carts are also needed to support the additional book request. As part of the literacy program, Children’s Village currently has an audio book program that plays downloaded books, approved by a Librarian, on an intercom system, so residents can listen to books nightly. Children’s Village would also like to increase the audio book library to include a more diverse selection.
Children that read and/or listen to audio books at least 20 minutes each day get exposure to just under 2 million words each year. Students who read 20 minutes each day are more likely to score better on standardized tests than 90 percent of peers who are not reading. Reading fictional books are shown to increase better decision making by 50 – 100 percent.

Project: County of Oakland – Prosecuting Attorney’s Office – Case Management
The Oakland County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office continues to implement change toward a paperless case management system. This process includes the processing and storage of digital evidence. We are requesting grant funding to allow our Assistant Prosecutor’s to access their digital case files and evidence remotely via tablet. This will allow for the consistent and effective organization of files. Additionally, we are requesting grant funding to store and disseminate discovery including reports, documents, photographs, videos and the like via external drives.