Author: Matt Davis

A new national report from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation highlights that Native people are disproportionately incarcerated in the United States.

The report, commissioned as part of the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC), shows that in states with higher Native populations, incarceration rates are up to seven times that of White people, and that Native people are sentenced more harshly than White, African American, and Hispanic individuals. Moreover, American Indians and Alaska Natives (AI/AN) were incarcerated at a rate 38 percent higher than the national average and were overrepresented in the prison population in 19 states compared to any other race and ethnicity.

The full report can be read here. A variety of media covered the report’s launch including Montana Public Radio,Wisconsin Gannett, Native News Online, the Lakota Times and Cheyenne Arapaho Tribal Tribune.

“Like many modern challenges in Indian Country, over-incarceration of Indigenous people is intimately tied to colonial violence and upheld by policies throughout the years,” said Dr. Ciara Hansen, currently a clinical psychologist in the Iina’ Counseling Services department at Northern Navajo Medical Center and author of the report. “Paternalistic solutions applied to Native communities often miss the important step of seeking to understand the issue from the community’s perspective. This report offers a starting point for discussion and knowledge sharing.”

“The report not only highlights the painful and unacceptable treatment of Native people in the criminal justice system, but also underscores the overreliance on incarceration to solve community issues,” said Bria Gillum, a senior program officer at MacArthur.  “It is our hope that the report contributes to the growing conversation about racial disparities in this broken system, sparks deeper collaboration between state and tribal agencies, and leads to investments in diversion services that can end this devastating cycle.”

The national report is authored by Dr. Desiree L. Fox (Bitterroot Salish), Dr. Ciara D. Hansen, (Shawnee/Cherokee), and Ann Miller, an attorney with the Tribal Defenders Office of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes on the Flathead Reservation in Montana.

Additional key findings in the report include:

• According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 45 percent of people incarcerated in tribal jails were being held pretrial, and pretrial detention rose by at least by 80 percent since 1999. The average length of stay doubled from 2002 to 2018.
  • Additionally, the most serious offense for 16 percent of people held in tribal jails was public intoxication and 15 percent were held for drug related or DUI charges.
  • Native youth are more likely to face conviction in adult court, especially for drug-related crimes.
• The number of jails in Indian Country has increased by 25 percent since 2000, which has led to filling them with more people charged and held with petty crimes for longer periods of time.
• The 2020 Bureau of Justice Statistics report showed tribal jail incarceration rates steadily increased by 60 percent since 2000. The most recent report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, however, has shown a significant reduction of incarceration in tribal jails during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The report demonstrates the need for ongoing research to decrease the rates of arrests and incarcerations of Native people. More research is particularly needed to better understand the experiences of Native people and the systemic change necessary to meaningfully improve outcomes.

The recommendations put forth by the authors of the report include:

• Empower tribal justice systems which are better positioned to intervene because they offer services that are culturally relevant, restorative, and fair.
• Change the trajectory before, or even after, Native people are pulled into state and federal systems by addressing the underlying issues that bring people into the criminal justice system and the collateral consequences that pull them back in.
• Provide funding to appoint counsel to the indigent, tribally based public defender offices to support positive change that are most congruent with traditional, restorative practices.
• Encourage tribal public defenders to work with their clients in the context of their community—their families, their elders, their values, and their definitions of success.

The report is based on data from several surveys and sources, including the Indian Law and Order Commission, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, and others. The full list of sources can be found at the end of the report.

Jurisdictions across the country can learn from efforts to study probation violations in-depth. A new report on probation violations as a driver of jail time in St. Louis County, Missouri shows that expediated probation programs have much to offer and can work to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in the system.

Probation matters. More people are under probation supervision in America than any other correctional sanction. One in 84 adult U.S. residents is on probation right now, which increases the risk for later imprisonment. As an initiative of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) is seeking to reduce jail populations. So, looking at probation violations is an important step toward doing that. Most of the current research on jail reform has considered the pretrial population, but we know less about individuals returned to jail for a probation technical violation, which includes failure to meet the conditions of probation supervision (e.g., maintaining employment, regular office visits, and routine drug tests).

We looked at the probation revocation process in St. Louis County, an SJC site. Before joining the SJC, the county’s jail population had been either near or over capacity for over a decade. But it has reduced average jail populations by 30% since 2016 through a series of measures.

We looked at how long people who violated probation in St. Louis County were detained in jail, and race differences in jail admission and length of stay trends. We also used a racial equity framework for the study to see if jail reform efforts harmed or helped people of color. As part of this work, we evaluated the county’s Expedited Probation Program (EPP). This program was implemented as part of the SJC reform efforts and is designed to speed up case processing and provide services for people detained on a probation violation.

We found that individuals who are booked into jail for probation violations represent a small part of the total jail population in St. Louis County, but they have substantially longer lengths of stay than other groups. The length of stay for people on probation declined by 33% from 2016 to 2019, from 44 to 30 days. In comparison, the average length of stay for the total jail population remained stable at 23 days in 2016 and 2019.

While Black individuals on probation had longer lengths of stay than White individuals, we found that some racial disparities in length of stay have declined over time. Still, racial disparities remain in the jail population. While the county population is about two-thirds White and one-fourth Black, the 2016 and 2019 jail probation population was made up of about 54% Black individuals compared to about 45% White individuals.

Meanwhile, the EPP program provides evidence that reforms can reduce the length of time people on probation are in jail and an opportunity to learn about potential best practices. Broadly, the program is designed to expedite the revocation process to divert individuals from jail to community-based treatment. Unlike most correctional interventions, the primary aim of the project is to change how individuals are processed in jail instead of solely expecting individuals in the program to reform based on service provision. Specifically, the goal of the EPP is to have individuals evaluated by a judge and released within 10-12 days of incarceration.

The EPP model integrates evidence-based interventions including: 1) detailed coordination with members of the supervision team such as probation officers, jail case managers, and community treatment staff to ensure a continuum of care; 2) case coordination with a probation officer embedded in the jail; 3) treatment plans presented to judges for approval (reducing delays in the hearing process); and 4) warm handoffs and linkages to services.

The Expedited Probation Program (EPP) achieved its goal of reducing the number of days individuals admitted to the program were detained in jail, and these reductions were substantial. On average, participants spent 28 days in jail compared to 65 days among people in a comparisons group who were not in the program. Further, the processing time continued to decline as the program progressed.

In addition, the implementation of the program led to a larger decline in the length of stay for Black individuals in the program. Although this effect needs to be explored in more detail, there is potential evidence that this type of change to case processing may be able to attenuate some of the racial disparities inherent in this part of the criminal legal system.

While the program was successful in reducing the number of days people were detained in jail, the recidivism rates were higher for the EPP group than for the comparison group. Interviews with program staff suggest that there is substantial stress and barriers to compliance with the court-mandated programming associated with the intervention, which may have led to higher rates of technical violations, like failure to meet conditions of substance abuse treatment or missing appointments, among the intervention group. Emerging from our interviews with stakeholders and system-involved people also indicated that people on probation have substantial unmet needs, many of which were related to substance use disorders and poverty. COVID-19 also has changed how the probation office Interacts with clients, shifting to a community-based model in which probation officers meet clients in the community or over Zoom. There is general support for these changes. In addition, many of the participants appreciated the ability to interact with the court virtually for probation violation hearings.

Overall, the results of the EPP program suggest that collaborative processes can be instituted to reduce the time spent in jail for a probation violation. That noted, to reduce the rates of recidivism among this group, more work needs to be conducted to better understand the needs of people released and how to best provide services to this group that facilitates long-term integration.

December 3 is International Day of Persons with Disabilities. So, we spoke to leaders working in the area involved with the MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) about what needs to change, and where there has been progress.

(From left to right: Chris Huff, Supreet Minhas, Candace Coleman and Jalyn Radzminski).

Chris Huff (he/him) is Diversion and Reentry Policy Analyst at Access Living—a center of service, advocacy, and social change for people with all kinds of disabilities, based in Chicago. In this role, Chris leads policy efforts centered on supporting people with disabilities impacted by the criminal justice system.

“I think we’re at an all-time high, right now, in terms of putting people with lived experience of disability and the justice system in the position to advocate for the changes that we need,” he said. “And I’m encouraged by that.”

The most discouraging part of his work is the lack of engagement and support from the law enforcement community to address the issue of working with people with disabilities. Oftentimes contact with law enforcement is a person’s first entry into the criminal justice system.

“To me, the root of these issues is that the system is not designed or intended to support people, but rather punish them,” he said. “Two thirds of survivors of crime say they prefer a system focused on rehabilitation than punishment, but we continue to run the system with that outdated mindset.”

When bringing up the idea of working to make the system more supportive of people with disabilities, Chris says he has been frustrated with responses that do not see that as part of the role of the criminal justice system.

“Even collecting data on people requires a level of clinical or social work-type training to be able to ask the questions in a proper way, to identify disabilities without being invasive or intrusive,” he said. “But to make that happen we need to have a sincere and aggressive interest in making it happen by law enforcement. And we’re not there yet.”

It matters to Chris to focus on more support and rehabilitation for people with disabilities in the criminal justice system because it is about unleashing more potential. Instead of focusing on people as potential risks, we should focus on their potential strengths, Chris said.

“To me this is really about helping America reach its full potential and living up to the high ideals we set forth at the creation of this country,” he said. “Without addressing the inequities created from the criminal justice system, there’s no way we can have a society where folks are fully free and have equal opportunity.”

Supreet Minhas (she/her) is a Senior Program Associate with Activating Change—a national nonprofit working to end victimization and incarceration of people with disabilities and Deaf people in the United States. Activating Change launched in 2022, but its work began in 2005 as a project of the Vera Institute of Justice. Activating Change launched as an independent nonprofit to increase the visibility of the justice issues people with disabilities and Deaf people face and to have a greater impact on ending those injustices. The organization is a Strategic Ally in the Safety and Justice Challenge.

“Criminal justice reform cannot take place equitably without accounting for the millions of people with disabilities ensnared in the system,” Supreet said. “Centering disability justice is essential to understanding and eliminating mass incarceration.”

Supreet helps organizations to understand how ableism and racism intersect. For example, 30-50% of people killed by police are people of color with disabilities. 40% of people in jail have at least one disability.

“The most vexing part of this work is continually being confronted with ableism and its pervasiveness in our society,” she said. “The Americans with Disabilities Act was passed 32 years ago but people with disabilities and Deaf people continue to be routinely denied access to accommodations like sign language interpretation.”

The criminal justice movement is decades behind in addressing ableism, especially in comparison to progress being made toward tackling sexism or racism, Supreet said. The omission of disability in the broader equity framework, has upheld and perpetuated structural barriers. People with disabilities are systematically excluded from having a part in crafting policies or making decisions—from being “at the table.” And there are myriad barriers for someone with a disability to even be at the table, from not being deemed worthy enough to warrant an invitation to the table itself being inaccessible. The impact of these challenges is borne out by the data on disability disparities, which shows that people with disabilities and Deaf people make up disproportionately high percentages of justice-involved individuals.

The “invisibilization” of people with disabilities has always been one of the most formidable challenges facing us, going all the way back to people with disabilities being excluded from ancient societies (e.g., leper colonies), then institutionalization in the modern era, and present-day mass incarceration. Most people do not want to talk or think about disability issues unless they are directly impacted—it’s a ‘problem’ for “others,” Supreet said.

“Even within the criminal justice reform field, the majority of organizations working to advance equity in the criminal legal system are not even considering disability justice in their approach, much less centering it,” Supreet said. “Disability is perceived as a complex, thorny issue best left to be worked on by disability-specific organizations in silos. However, until we all realize that justice and fairness for all cannot be achieved without intentionally considering people with disabilities and including them at policymaking tables, disability disparities will worsen, and we will have two separate, unequal tiers of justice.”

One of the biggest hurdles to improving outcomes for people with disabilities and Deaf people and achieving an equitable criminal legal system is that these two goals have been disconnected from one another, Supreet said. “The movements and organizations striving for these respective goals have been working in silos. This must change.”

Candace Coleman (she/her) is a Black disabled woman from the South Side of Chicago. As a Racial Justice Organizer at Access Living she works closely with disabled people affected by the justice system to organize around racial justice and disability. Candace’s most notable work involves organizing around mental and behavioral health emergency response. She played an integral in passing the Community Emergency Services and Supports Act in 2021—paving the way for Chicago’s 988 service. She continues to work diligently to implement non-police alternatives to emergency response in these situations.

Candace said a major area of her focus, right now, is the absence of accurate data about people with disabilities in the jail system.

“I’m encouraged by the work we’ve done over recent years to put people with lived experience at the center of decision-making, but if anything that has highlighted how little we did it in the past, and we’re really building the lane for people to participate,” she said. “Meanwhile, we’re doing that with very little data collection about people with disabilities who are in the system. If we don’t even have accurate numbers to reflect the scale of the issue, how can we move forward to help solve it?”

Recent focus on behavioral health and mental health issues has continued to marginalize other disabilities from the criminal justice reform conversation, Candace said.

“We’re not tracking people with cognitive disabilities, we’re not tracking people who are visually impaired, people who are Deaf, people who require physical accommodations and accessibility,” she said. “It’s just not been a priority to track such people. And without it being a priority, we can’t make progress.”

“We need to move towards supporting people as they come out of the system,” she said. “It means we need to identify people with disabilities who come into the system so that we can provide the programs and support they need when they come out of jail, or we fail.”

Jalyn Radziminski (they/she) is a Black and Japanese Disability activist from Indiana. Jalyn is the Communications Manager & Lived Experience Advocate at Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law and an Evening Student at Fordham School of Law. Jalyn builds coalitions to support the work of other peers with lived experiences of Jalyn also works on campaigns that promote community-based mental health supports.

“We’re trying to reduce the chances of people going through involuntary commitment and police response to a mental health crisis,” Jalyn said. “A lot of grassroots leaders and legal advocates are starting to understand that the mental health system and the criminal legal system are intertwined. I’m working to keep people out of both.”

“One of the major challenges of the new 988 numbers around the country, is how they can lead to these undesired outcomes. People may call these sort of hotlines in distress, and before they know it, the police might show up at their door. People are scared that if they say the wrong thing, then the police will come,” they said. “It’s surprisingly easy for people to fall into a loophole of a police encounter and then before long, there’s involuntary commitment or incarceration”

Despite community-based models operating successfully since at least the 1970s, the majority of mental health research cites involuntary psychiatric-based treatment and response methods. There are many barriers for people of color with disabilities to have their work funded and published. The data from community-based perspectives is often lacking and this feeds into the lack of published research on community-based models of mental health treatment, Jalyn said.

“I’m working to push academia to bring these alternative models into the research field,” they said. “One of my proudest moments is recently receiving a competitive research grant for a joint-research project between the Bazelon Center, Mental Health America, and the University of Pittsburgh to help study the disparities of that research while uplifting peer voices.” Projects like these are just the start of a larger push to better collect and analyze data on community-based models and compare their success rates to the mainstream involuntary, incarceral responses.

“Investment is a major challenge, too,” they said. “A lot of the time policymakers think simple reform will fix some of the issues but you’ve got to invest in peer-led models. Underinvestment can lead to short-staffing, and there’s a domino effect.”

Jalyn cited the Kiva Center’s Karaya Peer Respite as a great example of successful peer-led respite program with a mobile team. They also pointed to the Promise Resource Center in North Carolina. “These home-like models give people somewhere to go where they can get rest and reflection when they’re experiencing emotional distress,” Jalyn said. “They support people through crisis to find healing.”

“The more we uplift peer networks and lived-experience-led approaches, and the more we push back in our voices from the policy to on-the-ground level, we’ll start to have better ways of preventing these issues from happening over and over again,” they said. “It’s long overdue to move away from these models and on to something new.”

November is Native American Heritage month. It gives a platform for Native people in the United States of America to share our culture, traditions, music, crafts, dance, and ways and concepts of life. It’s also an appropriate time to highlight the overrepresentation of Indigenous people in jails across the country while actively pursuing solutions. Some estimates suggest that Indigenous people are jailed at twice the rate of White people in the U.S. In the past, people in communities participating in the MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) have spoken about how to address the disparity.

This blog is about a recent trip I took to Pima County, Arizona, from Minnehaha County in South Dakota to see how Pima County’s SJC initiative is working with the community to reduce incarceration and improve health outcomes.

I’m Executive Director of South Dakota Urban Indian Health (SDUIH), which recently joined Minnehaha County’s SJC team in 2021. We provide support for our Native American relatives impacted by the justice system. SDUIH is one of 41 Urban Indian Health Programs that operate under a Title V contract with the Indian Health Service to provide medical, behavioral health, and cultural health services to Natives living in urban settings throughout the country. We are also a 501c3 non-profit and able to pursue initiatives, grants, and programs specific to the communities we operate within, such as joining Minnehaha County’s SJC work. South Dakota is home to nine tribal nations, which make up part of the larger Oceti Sakowin (Seven Council Fires).

Through my work with SJC, I am also part of the Wičhóyaŋke Network (WN), a convening of Indigenous leaders from both community and criminal justice systems. WN’s mission is to identify Indigenous community-led solutions and strategies that have successfully helped in lowering or eliminating racial disparities in community criminal justice systems related to the incarceration of Indigenous people, with the ultimate goal of disseminating that information for Indigenous communities nationwide to assist in Indigenous-led efforts to eliminate racial disparities.

Last week, I visited Tucson, AZ to see how Pima County’s SJC is working with the community to reduce incarceration and improve health outcomes. I was also able to visit and meet with leaders at the Tucson Indian Center during the same week, giving me the ability to see SJC work from both the systems perspective and from the perspective of the Native community in Pima County.

Tucson has two major tribal nations nearby, the Tohono O’odham and Pascua Yaqui. I visited both communities and met with tribal members to discuss the justice system. I visited the San Xavier Mission Market where local tribal food vendors set up and, of course, sampled some southwest style frybread (yum!) and browsed the jewelry vendors nearby. Both tribal communities have an abundance of programs and services available to Native relatives in the Tucson area.

During my visit, I saw an obvious desire for both the criminal justice systems players and community members to decrease jail populations and improve substance use and mental health services for Native people in their community. However, I also observed that the two groups seemed disconnected in their approaches toward their shared goals. This isn’t unique to Pima County, and it was somewhat comforting to know this problem exists beyond Minnehaha County. The criminal justice system folks were unaware of the existing programs and work within Native communities, and the Native community leaders had several questions about SJC programming. This prompted thoughts examining the root cause behind the prevalence of this problem for so many communities.

People representing and working within the courts, police departments, etc. often don’t understand why Native people aren’t represented in conversations identifying solutions for the Native community. The difficult truth is that the spaces where these conversations are taking place weren’t made for us, and often our thoughts and concerns are dismissed or met with hostility when we try to contribute.

We had a discussion within Wičhóyaŋke Network about the things we’ve all had to give up to be part of this work, and why it’s so hard to continue working with our criminal justice system counterparts. As Native leaders, we have to set aside or ignore so many pieces of ourselves to have a seat at the table of this work: the tears that come to my eyes in these meetings when I think of the hurt caused by these systems and feeling like a traitor; the endless questions I ask myself wondering whether I’m part of the problem because I’m sitting in these rooms. It’s hard to be the only one in these meetings asking, “How does this impact the Native community?” or “What does the data show for the Native community?” And while it is exhausting, I realize that if I’m not there, those questions won’t get asked—no one else will make uncomfortable statements about how we’re failing our Native relatives.

At the recent SJC convening in Atlanta, I was able to discuss these same things with relatives from San Francisco. I was comforted by the realization that many working on this project face these same feelings and have had to make these same concessions to improve the systems that have torn our communities apart. As Native people, it’s often easy to ignore the invitation or stay silent during the meetings because we don’t know where our voices fit. It’s often the safest thing to do but without our notable presence and hard questions, this work won’t lead to the change we need so our relatives can heal.

The visit to Pima County was incredibly meaningful and gave me insight into how to move forward with the Wičhóyaŋke Network, as well as a clearer vision for SDUIH’s place in Minnehaha County’s SJC work. Wopida tanka (many thanks)!

Many veterans experience substance use disorders, mental health conditions including Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and trauma, including traumatic brain injuries, all of which can lead to involvement with the criminal legal system. Fifty-five percent of veterans incarcerated in 2011–2012 reported having a mental health disorder, with mental illness diagnosis twice as high in veterans as in non-veterans. Approximately 65% to 71% of justice-involved Veterans had a reported substance use disorder before arrest.

In recognition of Veterans Day on November 11^th, we would like to highlight several relevant resources and opportunities. A focus on specific populations, such as Veterans, aligns with the commitment Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) communities have to diversion and deflection, as well as meeting the behavioral health needs of individuals who are or may become involved with the criminal legal system.

• Many SJC cities and counties, which receive support from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, operate Veterans Treatment Courts, including Harris County, TX, Cook County, IL, Ada County, ID, and Palm Beach County, FL. Unlike traditional criminal courts, the primary purpose of a Veterans Treatment Courts is not to determine whether an individual is guilty of an offense, but rather to ensure that they receive treatment to address unmet clinical needs. There are over 600 Veterans Treatment Courts across the U.S.
• With the integration of the new three-digit National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline (988), people can now dial 988 and press 1 to access the Veterans Crisis Line. There are also options to chat online or text at 838255. Responders are trained in crisis intervention and military culture.
• One program from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that allow entities to identify whether an individual has prior military service is the Veterans Re-Entry Search Service. This web-based system allows prison, jail, and court staff to identify Veterans quickly and accurately among their populations. The VA makes this service available to facilitate its own direct outreach to these Veterans, and to inform the development of Veteran-specific programs in the criminal legal system.
• Veterans Justice Outreach specialists provide a range of services to assist justice-involved Veterans, including outreach to Veterans across the possible span of their interactions with the criminal legal system, such as law enforcement encounters, courts, jails, and prisons. The aim of the Veteran Justice Outreach program is to avoid the unnecessary criminalization of mental illness and extended incarceration among Veterans by ensuring that eligible, justice-involved Veterans have timely access to Veterans Health Administration services. Each state has one or more Veteran Justice Outreach specialists who can provide additional information on the program.
• The Peer Specialist Toolkit helps Veterans Health Administration medical centers hire and deploy peer specialists who help other Veterans get treatment for mental and substance use disorders.
• The Rural Veteran Outreach Toolkitassists VA personnel in collaborating with community partners to reach rural Veterans through education and outreach.
• The National Institute of Corrections’ Veterans Reentry Programming: Supporting Transition to Civilian Life Across the Sequential Intercept Model outlines Veteran-specific reentry approaches.

We also operate SAMHSA’s Service Members, Veterans, and their Families Technical Assistance (SMVF TA) Center, which serves as a national resource to support states, territories, and local communities in strengthening their capacity to address the behavioral health needs of military-connected individuals and families. The SMVF TA Center supports specific initiatives like the VA/SAMHSA Governor’s and Mayor’s Challenges to Prevent Suicide among SMVF as well as the public at large through a variety of technical assistance efforts including needs assessments, virtual and onsite consultation, Policy and Implementation Academies, interagency collaboration and support, and dissemination of educational resources including a monthly e-newsletter.

One offering from the SMVF TA Center is the Crisis Intercept Mapping (CIM) for SMVF Suicide Prevention. The Crisis Intercept Mapping is a tool that helps community stakeholders visualize how SMVF flow through the crisis care system. The Crisis Intercept Mapping has some parallels to our Sequential Intercept Model and is designed to help communities strengthen the delivery of evidence-based suicide prevention policies and practices for SMVF before, during, and after a time of crisis.

As identified on the model below, within a community crisis system there are four key “intercept points” that provide opportunities for diverting at-risk SMVF to appropriate and effective prevention and support services:

1. First Contact
2. Acute Care
3. Care Transitions
4. Ongoing Treatment and Recovery Support

In 2022, the White House released a report, Reducing Military and Veteran Suicide: Advancing a Comprehensive, Cross-Sector, Evidence-Informed Public Health Strategy, directly calling for the “expansion of SAMHSA’s crisis mapping initiative to assist cities and counties in identifying gaps and incorporating best practices in suicide prevention for veterans interacting with community crisis systems” (Priority Goal 2 on page 13). Crisis Intercept Mapping is designed to bring together an interagency group of key stakeholders from the community to identify barriers and gaps in the community’s crisis system serving SMVF and discuss ways in which best practices and partnerships can be implemented to close those gaps and reduce service member and Veteran suicide through the development of integrated local strategic action plans.