The Partner | February 2021
In October 2019, a group of Lake County justice system stakeholders, organization leaders, and community advocates convened to form an Equity Team and define racial equity for Lake County as "a community approach to provide equitable treatment and opportunities to criminaljustice-involved persons regardless of race and ethnicity." This led to a renewed commitment by members of the Equity Team to address racial and ethnic disparities through data and community engagement.
Since then, the Equity Team has been hard at work undergoing trainings, grappling with data, and laying the groundwork by establishing group norms and shared values in preparation for the next big step, which is YOU.
Image: Equity Team Key Benchmarks (above)
Meaningful community engagement doesn't happen overnight, but it can start through a series of monthly newsletters, including updates and opportunities for participation. To begin, this newsletter provides a brief overview of Lake County and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) grant. Upcoming newsletters will offer more details on specific strategies made possible by the SJC grant. Read-on and stay subscribed to learn more and participate.
Lake County and the Safety and Justice Challenge
In 2018, Lake County was awarded $700,000.00 by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Safety and Justice Challenge to implement strategies that address the main drivers of the local jail population, including unfair and ineffective practices that take a particularly heavy toll on people with mental health and substance abuse issues. To reduce the jail population safely, strategies were implemented at addressing: system inefficiencies, racial and ethnic disparities, and meeting the needs of those with behavioral health and substance abuse issues.
Image: Lake County Safety and Justice Challenge Strategies, 2020 (above)
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office is the lead agency for Lake County's SJC grant, coordinating with stakeholders across the justice system on strategies to safely reduce the jail population. As mentioned above, one overarching strategy of this grant-funded initiative is the Sheriff’s education and training on racial and ethnic disparities strategy, the Equity Team. At the core of this strategy is the recognition that Lake County cannot reduce its jail population effectively without directly addressing issues of disparity and equity in the criminal justice system, thus making equity a key tenet of each strategy.
Now you know!
Now you know that Lake County is an SJC site working on local criminal justice reform efforts. There is more to share, and a lot of work ahead. The Equity Team strategy is a good place to start, so next month we'll dedicate our newsletter to information about that strategy!
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In the meantime, you can help inform and engage the community about this work by forwarding this newsletter to three friends and encouraging them to sign for our newsletter.
The Safety and Justice Challenge strategies at Lake County, IL are proudly led and supported by: Lake County Sheriff's Office Lake County State's Attorney Office 19th Judicial Circuit Court Lake County Public Defender's Office Nicasa Behavioral Health Services
This project was created with support from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation as part of the Safety and Justice Challenge, which seeks to reduce over-incarceration by changing the way America thinks about and uses jails.