Underwood Secures Funding to Support Innovative Public Safety and Mental Health Initiative; Provides $1.2 Million in Funding to Kane County State's Attorney's Office

WEST CHICAGO – Today, Congresswoman Lauren Underwood (IL-14) announced that the Kane County State's Attorney's Office will receive $1.2 million in funding to establish a new pre-arrest diversion program. Although substance use disorder and other mental health issues are medical conditions, individuals with these conditions often get caught in the criminal legal system instead of getting the health care and services they need. The Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) program model seeks to address these issues as the public health challenges they are by creating a new system that provides access to necessary care outside of the criminal legal system. The funding has been made available by the Department of Justice to support collaboration between the State's Attorney's Office, agencies, and mental health service providers throughout Kane County, in addition to the Elgin Police Department. The Kane County State's Attorney's Office worked with the Elgin Police Department to create a Collaborative Crisis Services Unit (CCSU) to pilot an early version of the pre-arrest diversion program.

"Through this funding, we take a crucial step toward strengthening our justice system and ensuring those who are most vulnerable in our community are being cared for, not criminalized," said Underwood.

Objectives of LEAD model pre-arrest diversion are to: improve public safety, reduce the number of people entering the criminal legal system, eliminate racial disparities in the system, create sustainability by reinvesting systems savings, and improve police-community relations. The core activity is effective, harm-reducing, non-coercive case management of participants. This model relies on well-established and ongoing collaboration between a broad spectrum of community-based agencies and mental health service providers. Evaluations of the LEAD model have demonstrated a dramatic reduction in recidivism for participants as well as significant system cost savings.

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