Westchester County Jail Wins Award for Inmate Mental Heath Services
Selected from more 500 jails, prisons and other correctional facilities nationwide, Westchester county jail won “Program of the Year” honors from the National Commission on Correctional Health Care for its Community Oriented Re-Entry (CORE) program, which provides mental health services to inmates.
The award was presented on Nov. 6, in Chicago.
The CORE program follows the key principles of Westchester’s ‘Safer Communities’ initiative to reduce recidivism by addressing root causes and then marshaling a coordinated response. Launched in November of 2014, CORE is a partnership among the county’s Department of Correction, Department of Community Mental Health, and New York Correct Care Solutions, the inmate health services provider at the jail. The program also relies upon several community partners that specialize in the needs of inmates with mental health issues, as well as from volunteers, such as clergy, musicians, artists and former prisoners committed to recovery.
The CORE facility is housed on the fourth floor of the jail and provides intensive daily programs for inmate-patients who have been diagnosed with serious mental illnesses. CORE participants, which include men, women and minors, are screened by qualified mental health professionals and the jail’s administrative team.
Emphasizing the principle that “discharge planning begins at intake,” a key goal of CORE is to link inmate-patients with critical services in their home communities. CORE offers both individual and group-based therapy and focuses on improving participants’ life skills, job readiness, family reintegration, spirituality and substance abuse recovery. Through the use of art and music therapy, guest speakers and other workshops, participants are able to discuss their fears, anxieties and other struggles in an interactive and productive manner not customarily seen in jail settings.
“The reasons for CORE’s success are easy to see,” County Executive Rob Astorino said in a press statement. “Issues are addressed rather than ignored and relationships are created so that individuals leave the county jail with a network of experiences and services that will help them.”
Astorino added, “For too long, far too many of our nation’s jails and prisons have been filled with the people struggling with mental illness. The feedback we have received on CORE from everyone – from correction officers to inmates to mental health clinicians – has been truly remarkable. Ensuring that this population receives critically needed services while in jail directly enhances public safety when they return to their home communities, both in Westchester and beyond.”
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