1/15/2024 0 Comments Poughkeepsie journal want ads![]() "These are folks that suffer from extreme poverty, serious mental illness, really serious substance use disorder, perhaps they're street homeless," said Jean-Marie Niebuhr, deputy commissioner for the county's mental health services. The program requires a significant amount of follow up by the case managers and differs from traditional case management in that it is street based, meaning a LEAD team member will go out to where the individual is located, be it on a street corner or under a bridge. "We're looking at the data to drive our decision making around where the next team might begin," Manzi said. The team managing the LEAD program believes the program could expand to other municipalities. Burglary and robbery are the only two categories that have gone down significantly. In Dutchess County as a whole, most of the violent and non-violent crimes have either increased or stayed the same compared with numbers from before the pandemic. In Beacon, reported crime has gone up between 20. In the town of Poughkeepsie, which holds the largest population in the county, there has been a decrease in reported property crimes since 2021, while violent crime has stayed about the same. In Dutchess County, Black people made up 27% of arrests last year. In 2019, Black people accounted for 64% of arrests, whereas in 2022 they accounted for 56% of arrests. "As the criminal legal system has had a disparate impact on people of color, especially in the area of drug policy and enforcement, LEAD can help reduce these disparities by diverting at point of arrest (or referral) and thus reducing the disparities within the system,” according to Brendan Cox, director of policing strategies for the national LEAD Support Bureau. Arrests and crime cannot be correlated on a one-to-one basis because one arrest can include multiple incidents of reported crime. "A huge part of why crime is down is because we are applying crime analysis data supplied to us by our crime analysts, we're using that for intelligent policing basically, doing patrols in hotspot areas, where we've been told crime is occuring," said Minard.Īrrests have also decreased since before the pandemic, dropping 32% in the city of Poughkeepsie between 20. What the city has seen is a decrease in violent crimes, which has gone down 16% between 20. The number of motor vehicle thefts doubled in that time, going from 27 incidents to 50, following nationwide trends. Larceny, theft of personal property, made up a bulk of those incidents. The city of Poughkeepsie has seen a 15% increase in property crime - 516 incidents reported in 2019 and 594 in 2022. They want to see lives changed," stated Public Defender Thomas Angell, whose department is part of the workgroup that oversees the program. "This is very intense, and they do not want large caseloads, they want quality involvement, not quantity in large numbers. Most of the referrals were not arrest related. Officers are also allowed to refer individuals to the program when no crime has occurred. The program has given out 23 referrals as of May 2 and 17 individuals have entered the program since it started in the city in February. ![]() It's modeled after a nationwide initiative which was founded in Seattle and is said to be successful at reducing the number of arrests and reducing racial disparities within arrests. The LEAD program is a partnership between Dutchess County of Behavioral & Community Health, People USA and the City of Poughkeepsie Police Department. While those familiar with law enforcement believe this may be due to officers choosing to make less arrests because of the reforms, there is no supporting evidence. The number of arrests in the city of Poughkeepsie has decreased between 20, for both felonies and misdemeanors. "This program is more people based depending on what the police officers on the street know from past or present encounters with the people they meet or from calls they respond to," explained Matthew Weishaupt, chief assistant district attorney.ĭue to bail reform, many low-level offenders of non-violent crimes would receive an appearance ticket, which some police officers believe results in repeat offenders. The county's district attorney's office was not able to provide a list of crimes that would be eligible for LEAD, only to say "the one clear disqualification would be any crime of violence at any level." Not all larcenies or drug possession offenses would be eligible. The individual does not need to be in a mental health crisis, just facing a criminal charge that is considered a 'quality of life crime,'" said Betsy Manzi, LEAD project manager. "In order for a officer to make a LEAD diversion referral, the participant could be struggling with a mental health, substance use, poverty, or homelessness issue or concern. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |