Santa Barbara County Grand Jury • 2020-2021 • Agency Response
Response to: JAIL DIVERSION IN SANTA BARBARA COUNTY: Criminal Justice Partners Are Finding Common Ground

Santa Barbara County Stations Bill Brown Sheriff - Coroner Headquarters Buellton*

Published: February 22, 2022 3 pages
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Note: Missing finding numbers detected: F3, F4, F5, F6

Findings and Recommendations 3 findings

F1
The Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office, Santa Barbara County District Attorney, Santa Barbara County Public Defender, Santa Barbara County Behavioral Wellness, and Santa Barbara County Probation Department need a consolidated criminal justice data system. SBSO Response: Disagree The Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office is currently a partner agency on the County's Criminal Justice Data Committee (CJDC) which includes the Santa Barbara County District Attorney, Santa Barbara County Public Defender, Santa Barbara County Behavioral Wellness and Santa Barbara County Probation Department. Through this committee the agencies have developed the Integrated Justice Information System (IJIS). The IJIS is a platform that allows data sharing amongst the partnering agencies. Each agency mentioned in this report have their own highly specialized, proprietary data management systems that fit the unique needs of each agency. To implement and develop a consolidated criminal justice data system that fits the needs of each agency would take many years to develop and would be cost prohibitive. The existing IJIS is already in place and being used by partnering agencies in the CJDC to share data when necessary.
No recommendations for this finding
F2
The Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office, Santa Barbara County District Attorney, Santa Barbara County Public Defender, Santa Barbara County Behavioral Wellness, and Santa Barbara County Probation Department need a data analyst to organize and retrieve data for a consolidated criminal justice data system. SBSO Response: Disagree partially with an explanation The Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office believes a data analyst is important to coordinate data requests and identify variances in data sets provided by the contributing agencies. A data analyst position has already been created and funded by the Community Corrections Partnership (CCP) using Public Safety Realignment Act (AB109) funding. Like many other information technology positions, within the county, this position has not been filled.
No recommendations for this finding
F7
The Santa Barbara County Main Jail needs dedicated discharge planners to coordinate post- incarceration programs. SBSO Response: Disagree partially with an explanation. The Sheriff's Office believes this Finding is misleading. The Custody Operations Branch has a team of discharge planners at both the Main Jail and the Northern Branch Jail who have been actively engaged in coordinated planning through weekly multi-agency meetings. These meetings include members of the Sheriff's Office, Public Defender, Probation Department, and Behavioral Wellness. This process has been informal and self-directed but has improved the efficiency and assisted in the coordination of reentry services for several years. The Sheriff's Office recognizes there is a need to further organize and formalize our collective processes and have undertaken measures to select and assign a Multi-agency Discharge Planning Coordinator.
Related Recommendations (1)
R7
That the Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office allocate funding for dedicated discharge planners to coordinate post-incarceration programs. <b>SBSO Response:</b> Will be Implemented, with an implementation plan. As mentioned above, the Sheriff's Office currently employs discharge planners and has for some time. The Sheriff's Office and their Justice System partners have identified the need for more formally coordinated discharge planning. Recently, the Community Corrections Partnership (CCP) Workgroup included funding for a Discharge Planning Coordinator and additional operational funding. The funding received final approval by the full CCP on February 4, 2022 and will become available July 1, 2022. In the meantime, plenary meetings are being held amongst the partners to put together a plan for implementation and a Memorandum of Understanding between the parties. Full implementation would be expected sometime in the third quarter of FY2022/2023.

* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.