01.31.11 The Case for A Diversion Division: Court Reform is Cost Reform
New Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle has called for substantial budget cuts to combat a budget deficit of nearly 500 million dollars. Chicago Appleseed Fund for Justice and the Chicago Council of Lawyers have been working with Chief Judge Tim Evans, the Cook County Sheriff, the Cook County Public Defender's Office, the Cook County State's Attorney's Office, Cook County Adult Probation, and Cook County Commissioner Bridget Gainer and her staff to develop a proposed Diversion Court System which is projected to provide meaningful financial benefits to the Criminal Division of the Circuit Court and related agencies.
The Diversion Court proposal involves diverting selected non-violent defendants with underlying drug addition and mental health-related issues from Central Bond Court to an assessment center. After a treatment assessment, they will be diverted to a courtroom where a judge and staff will be devoted to diversion. The program seeks to transform the Criminal Division into a more efficient and effective process.
If the criminal justice system can identify defendants and arrestees who need drug, mental health and other non-traditional services, it can divert them into appropriate treatment programs prior to commencement of their case. This approach better utilizes our courts to coordinate existing services, to add more treatment services to the remedies available to Cook County judges, and to monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of both the programs and the new approach linking defendants with these programs.
Diverting these arrestees out of the traditional courtroom allows courts to focus better on more serious cases and can reduce costs in the court system. Once a defendant completes the treatment program, his or her record would be expunged.
While we support the existing special drug and mental health court calls, they provide services to too few defendants. The diversion division we propose is a reallocation of resources. We are asking criminal division judges to use their discretion to apply existing resources to selected defendants and to hold probation calls so that progress or lack of progress can be monitored. A diversion courtroom would use existing staff, but those staff would be selected to implement diversion and monitor progress. Money is needed to inventory existing treatment services so that judges and staff know what is really available and what works. In the meantime, however, diversion courts will be able to focus on providing services so that defendants can make progress.
In light of costs and the thousands of defendants who need diversion services each year, we recognize that there will be practical limitations on the availability of treatment. But this proposed program is designed to utilize judicial discretion and court services more effectively so that many defendants will receive appropriate services and avoid unnecessary incarceration.
Chicago Appleseed's research indicates that the estimated baseline cost of processing a diversion eligible felony in Cook County through the traditional court process is $6,550 per arrestee. This cost represents the costs of the State's Attorney, County Clerk, Sheriff's Office and other agencies through the felony adjudication process. Under the Diversion Court proposal, the estimated cost to process a diversion eligible case through a diversion court is $4,700 per case, a savings of $1,850. This cost savings comes primarily through a reduction in the number of days that the defendant spends in jail, partially offset by an increase in the number of court appearances and the cost of treatment services. If only half of the eligible diversion court defendants accept diversion and pass initial screening, Cook County stands to save nearly $7.5 million in felony processing costs per year.
Beyond these savings, there are cost savings associated with improved outcome results like higher employment rates and reduced recidivism. The Court, too, would benefit from improved caseloads and better outcomes.