Model and Strategy
In this project, Options Recovery Services will provide 40 or more "lifers" who will be released in the coming year with housing and supportive services to ease the transition to a new life. This will help break the cycle of incarceration by meeting both their survival needs and therapeutic needs. Options' core re-entry services are substance abuse and mental health/behavioral health treatment, incorporating proven therapies to facilitate long term, sustained lifestyle change. Many residents go on to become addiction counselors and mentors themselves.
Options works with partners to deliver curriculum to lifers in San Quentin and other state prisons. Currently incarcerated people who receive training will begin work in the San Quentin addiction treatment center. Eventually, many of these men will be released and share their skills. If they are released, Options will welcome them with re-entry support. In the meantime, they will be helping men pre-release with behavioral health therapy and counseling. Both the counselors and inmates preparing for release will have the benefit of knowing that Options (a familiar face) is ready to pick them up at the gate.
Impact
Increase the number of individuals who receive grant-funded services; the number who are trained pre-release, the number placed in a clean and sober bed, bed-days utilized, the number receiving peer navigator services, computer training, mental health/trauma treatment, transportation vouchers, a welcome home kit, and the numbers who participate in "lifer" support groups.
Improve follow-up support and recovery, measured using the Addiction Severity Index, a semi-structured assessment interview that covers 7 areas of functioning: medical status, employment and support, drug use, alcohol use, legal status, family/social status, and psychiatric status to gauge level of need and functioning. A follow up at one year will report change/improvements.
Leadership
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Tom Gorham
Executive Director