Alternatives to Incarceration (ATI) Workgroup
On January 25, 2022, the Board of Supervisors approved a referral from Supervisor Ellenberg related to improving public safety and justice within Santa Clara County through providing more comprehensive behavioral health care and expanding community-based alternatives to pre-trial incarceration. Included as part of this referral was a workplan for a series of special sessions with the goal to develop recommendations for community-based alternatives to incarceration in an effort to reduce the jail population. The special meeting series was to include representatives from government agencies, community advocates, and directly impacted individuals as members of the Alternatives to Incarceration (ATI) Workgroup to collaborate, share knowledge, and review current alternatives to incarceration for efficacy and/or expansion as well as new options (e.g., community support, housing options, alternative forms of accountability through transformative justice).
The Community-Based Alternatives to Incarceration Workplan established three workgroups: Intervention at the Start, Criminal-Legal Process, and Re-Entry. The ATI workgroups correspond to “key intercept points of engagement with the criminal-legal system” and were established to identify opportunities at each of the intercept points to safely divert people from incarceration and/or reduce the need for incarceration in the first place. After eight months of regular meetings and discussion, the workgroups collectively identified 37 separate potential strategies to consider, organized under eight broad recommendations, which were presented to the Board of Supervisors on June 6, 2023. The ATI Workgroup Recommendations Implementation Plan was presented to the Board of Supervisors on October 3, 2023.
Links to the following Board reports:
- May 11, 2023 Public Safety and Justice Committee meeting: Receive report from Resource Development Associates relating to the Public Safety and Justice Committee Alternatives to Incarceration Workgroups Recommendations Final Report.
- June 6, 2023 Board of Supervisors meeting: Receive report from the Office of the County Executive relating to the Alternatives to Incarceration recommendations.
- October 3, 2023 Board of Supervisors meeting: Held from September 19, 2023 (Item No. 18): Receive report from the Office of the County Executive relating to the implementation of the Alternatives to Incarceration Workgroup Recommendations.
- April 11, 2024 Public Safety and Justice Committee meeting: Receive report from the from the Office of the County Executive and Office of the County Counsel relating to the implementation status of the recommendations developed by the Alternatives to Incarceration and Bail and Release Work Groups.
- October 24, 2024 Public Safety and Justice Committee meeting: Receive report from the from the Office of the County Counsel and Office of the County Executive relating to bail reform efforts and implementation of the Bail and Release Work Group and Alternatives to Incarceration Work Group recommendations.