Southwest Georgia elected officials, law enforcement participate in Stepping Up Summit

ALBANY — A team of criminal justice and behavioral health professionals from Southwest Georgia attended a two-day summit last week that brought together teams from communities of all sizes across the United States as part of an initiative to address the mental health crisis in the nation’s jails.

The Stepping Up Summit, which convened jail administrators, law enforcement officials, county elected officials, psychiatrists and other stakeholders from 50 jurisdictions across the country, was designed to give attendees an understanding of what constitutes a comprehensive, system-level plan to reduce the number of people with mental illnesses in jail, officials say.

The team from Southwest Georgia included Dougherty Superior Court Judge Stephen Goss, who oversees the circuit’s mental health court; Judge Joe Bishop from the Pataula Circuit Drug Court; Dougherty County Commission Chair Christopher Cohilas; ASPIRE Behavioral Health Executive Director Kay Brooks; Pataula Circuit Drug Court Coordinator Beau Leyse, and Dougherty County Jail Director Col. John Ostrander.

“It is a sad fact that jails have become the leading treatment facilities for the mentally ill,” Ostrander said. “I am very inspired to see this problem gain national attention. We now have people from across many disciplines working together to find better methods to get people the treatment they deserve.”

The jurisdictions selected to attend consist of a cross-section of urban, suburban and rural counties representing 37 states. Each team included policymakers and stakeholders prepared to enhance efforts and take action to address the crisis.

Stepping Up was launched in May 2015 as a partnership of the Council of State Governments Justice Center, the National Association of Counties and the American Psychiatric Association Foundation. Officials say the initiative is designed to rally leaders around the goal of achieving a reduction in the number of people with mental illnesses and substance use disorders in jail.

Over the past year, more than 250 counties, representing nearly 30 percent of the U.S. population, have passed resolutions to advance the goals of Stepping Up, officials say.

One reality the campaign is centered on is the improper use of jails as psychiatric facilities. Budgets are strained by jails spending two to three times more on people with mental illnesses than they do on people without those needs. The cost to taxpayers to arrest, adjudicate, segregate and supervise these individuals is having little-to-no impact in terms of the public’s safety or health.

At the summit, county teams took stock of work already under way in their counties and chart a path forward. The Southwest Georgia team engaged with criminal justice and behavioral health experts, along with fellow county representatives from across the country, to consider the latest research and strategies and learn from the challenges and approaches other jurisdictions have experienced. Officials say team members worked on-site to develop and evaluate plans to reduce mental illness in the jail and walked away with a set of priorities to take action and measure progress on their plans.