Colorado Prisoner Reentry Initiative

The Prisoner Reentry Initiative (PRI) is designed to provide funding to state units of government to develop and implement institutional and community corrections-based offender reentry programs. The PRI strengthens urban communities characterized by large numbers of returning offenders. The PRI is designed to reduce recidivism by helping returning offenders find work and assess other critical services in their communities. The PRI supports strategies to deliver pre- and post-release assessments and services, and to develop transition plans in collaboration with other justice and community-based agencies and providers for supervised and non-supervised offenders. In FY 2008, BJA will again coordinate the PRI Program with the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). The design of the FY 2008 PRI Program is structured to work in conjunction with a DOL-selected faith ' or community-based organization (FBCO).

The Colorado Division of Criminal Justice will use its FY 2008 Prisoner Reentry Initiative (PRI) grant funds to implement the Denver County Prisoner Reentry Initiative-Jail Transition Project (DCPRI-JT) to assist Denver County Jail inmates with documented mental health needs. The DCPRI-JT also will assist referred and traded inmates from the six surrounding county jail systems. The PRI grant will provide a multi-disciplinary treatment environment for inmates with serious mental health needs through pre-release assessment, transition planning, and coordination of post-release supervision and workforce readiness assistance with the Denver Inner City Parish. Within the Denver County Jail, the Treatment Unit will be expanded to include an additional 48 beds. A key component of the project is the collaborative referral arrangement between the Denver County Jail and the six other Metro Region county jails. The Denver County Jail will accept inmates deemed eligible for the DCPRI-JT from the six other jails in exchange for a general population inmate. The project will serve at least 100 offenders annually and at least 100 will be referred to the U.S. Department of Labor-funded partner for post-release services.

A multi-disciplinary advisory board, the Mental Health Committee of the Denver Crime Prevention and Control Commission, will oversee the planning, assessment, and implementation phases. A monitoring and evaluation plan will be developed and conducted in collaboration with Health Resources Consortium, and will collect Bureau of Justice Assistance data and performance measures as well as project-specific data.

CA/NCF