In some jurisdictions, the greatest challenge to initiating successful cross-system collaboration is simply getting prospective partners to the table. Often, successfully assembling key leaders in the jurisdiction depends on the stakeholders appreciating what the improved collaboration can produce.

Benefits likely to appeal to key leaders in the mental health and criminal justice system include the following:

• Improve the lives of people with mental illness and reduce the frequency of their contact with the criminal justice system
• Enhance public safety
• Use criminal justice resources more efficiently
• Improve the safety of line staff and of the environment in which they work
• Reduce taxpayer expenditures
• Increase public confidence in the justice system
• Gain access to resources
• Enlist allies capable of attracting support from policymakers previously unmoved by the need to bolster the mental health system

In addition to these gains, collaborative discussions will themselves increase understanding and reduce the assignment of blame. Tight budgets and growing problems have led to friction among criminal justice practitioners, mental health professionals, and advocates in many communities. Bringing all parties together to address the problems can be painful, but it is the only way to engage in problem solving effectively.

There are concrete means of eliciting commitments from stakeholders to work together. Making funding support contingent on such cooperation is one way. For example, in California, the legislature sought to foster a collaborative response to the inappropriate involvement of individuals with mental illness with the criminal justice system by establishing crime reduction grants. To receive these grants, counties must create a diverse strategy committee to develop a comprehensive plan of cost-effective measures to reduce crime and the criminal justice costs associated with individuals with mental illness.[1]

Legislation also can prompt joint ventures through the establishment of task forces, which bring together all relevant stakeholders and develop a foundation for future cross-system partnerships to improve the criminal justice system's response to people with mental illness. An increasing number of state legislatures (and in some cases governors) have taken such steps.[2]

For example, in Colorado, following several independent studies of mental illness in the criminal justice population, the state general assembly created a task force to examine how people with mental illness in the criminal justice system are treated. This task force consisted of more than two dozen members, including representatives from the judicial system, the corrections system, local law enforcement, mental health services, the legal community, consumers, and family members of consumers. The general assembly also established a six-member legislative oversight committee that monitors the work of the task force and submits annual reports, including legislative proposals.[3]

Sometimes opportunities to engage potential partners and to form a core group of prospective partners emerge from a high-visibility incident. A well-publicized tragedy involving a person with a mental illness and the criminal justice system often generates an atmosphere of crisis, in which elected officials feel pressured to promote quick solutions, which are likely to overlook complex, effective responses. Accordingly, decision makers should use such incidents to stimulate follow-up responses that are long term and thoughtful. To that end, in the wake of such tragedies, community and government leaders should ensure that organizations begin discussions about working together more closely.

A tragedy in Seminole County, Florida, in 1998 prompted such a response. A deputy in the sheriff's office was shot and killed as he approached the residence of Alan Singletary, who had a history of mental illness and whose family had for years sought help for him. After a 13-hour standoff, Singletary was also killed. This tragic incident highlighted many of the deficiencies of Seminole County's mental health delivery systems that are common to many communities: inadequate coordination of services, lack of resources, and insufficient information available to officers in the field and at the scene of a crisis. In response, the sheriff established a task force that meets monthly to discuss system coordination issues as well as potential legislative proposals. The task force includes the state attorney, the public defender, probation officials, the Seminole Community Mental Health Center, representatives of the judiciary and the County Commission, and other various stakeholders. The slain deputy's widow, Linda Gregory, and Alan Singletary's sister, Alice Petree, also serve on this task force.