"San Francisco Ahead of Curve on Realignment"

"About 350 more people are in San Francisco Jail because of realignment, California's shifting of state prisoners to county supervision. But unlike in some places, there's no fevered talk of building more jails, outsourcing inmates or releasing them early.

"In fact, San Francisco wants a few more inmates.

"Under realignment, lower-level state prisoners are released to the supervision of county probation officers rather than state parole agents. San Francisco wants its jails to take custody of these inmates two months before their discharge date."

Click here for the full article.

New Mental Health Courts Around the Country

The efficacy of Mental Health Courts is evident and it is exciting to see that various counties across the country are joining in this movement. Here are a few related articles.

Sheriff's program to ID mentally ill inmates
By Gary Pinnell
Highlands Today
September 9, 2010

New Alameda County court aims to help mentally ill
By Chris Metinko
Oakland Tribune
September 7, 2010

Shelby County starts mental health court
By Malcomb Daniels
The Birmingham News
September 7, 2010

Mental Health Court keeping people out of jail, saving money
WQOW TV- News Channel 18 (Eau Claire, WI)
August 18, 2010

News Roundup

Drug Courts
• Drug Courts Repair Lives - Saratoga Post-Star
• Straw confirms expansion of dedicated drugs courts - United Kingdom eGov Monitor
• Drug Court will be Strophy’s legacy - The Olympian

Mental Health Courts
• From a jog to "Law and Order," Genesee County mental health court uses lots of tactics to oversee mentally ill - The Flint Journal
• Mental-health court in jeopardy - The Jackson Citizen-Patriot

Policy & Research
• Jailing Communities: The Impact of Jail Expansion and Effective Public Safety Strategies - Justice Policy Institute
• Improving Responses to People With Mental Illnesses: The Essential Elements of a Mental Health Court - Council of State Governments Justice Center

Offbeat & Controversial
• "Learn English or go to Jail" - CNN
(This article is generating some interesting discussion about alternative sentencing, judicial paternalism and rehabilitation vs. punishment on blogs like "Sentencing Law and Policy," "Say Anything Blog," and "PhiLAWdelphia".)

News Roundup

A new feature of this blog will be a weekly "News Roundup," where we post links to articles on Collaborative Justice programs around the United States. Feel free to provide feedback in the comments if you find any of these links helpful, if you know of an appropriate article that we might have missed, or if you have your own news that you'd like featured!

• Murder Case Focuses New Attention on Mental Illness Treatment - New York Times
• Three Finish Mental Health Court - Star Bulletin, Honolulu
• Idea for New Court gets Look - St Petersberg Times, Florida
• Lake County Mental Health Court Turns 1 Year Old - Chicago Tribune