The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Office of Justice Programs (OJP), Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) seeks applications for funding to improve outcomes for adults on community supervision.
Donor Name: Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA)
State: All States
County: All Counties
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 03/20/2023
Size of the Grant: $850,000
Grant Duration: 36 months
Details:
This program furthers DOJ’s mission by providing resources to support states and units of local government in planning, implementing, or expanding effective supervision capacity to address individuals’ needs and reduce recidivism.
The Smart Supervision Program is part of the Second Chance Act suite of program in FY 2023. This year, a range of programs for states, local government units, tribal governments, and nonprofit organizations are being competed, including:
- Community Reentry
- Improving Adult and Juvenile Crisis Stabilization and Community Reentry Improving Adult Reentry,
- Education, and Employment Outcomes
- Improving Substance Use Disorder Treatment and Recovery Outcomes for Adults in Reentry
- Pay for Success
- Smart Supervision Swift, Certain, and Fair Supervision and HOPE Institute.
Goals
The FY 2023 Smart Supervision Program’s goal is to increase the capacity and increase the ability of probation and parole agencies to improve supervision success rates by more effectively addressing individuals’ risk and needs and reducing recidivism, thereby increasing community safety and reducing crime. Successful efforts not only reduce crime, they also reduce unnecessary admissions to prisons and jails.
Objectives
An applicant should address the objectives listed below in the Goals, Objectives, Deliverables and Timeline web-based form.
Agencies are invited to propose grant projects that will improve supervision outcomes for all adults on supervision in their jurisdiction or for a specific subgroup (“target population”) (e.g., females, young adults, a specific geographic area). Applicants may propose one or more of the following:
- Provide training and other skill building opportunities to staff members to be change agents.
- For example, train in core correctional practices; develop comprehensive case plans in collaboration with people on supervision; learn and apply principles of cognitive behavioral therapy; ensure appropriate and consistent use of graduated sanctions.
- Adopt technology or tools to facilitate more effective supervision by staff.
- For example, use risk and needs assessment results to tailor supervision and treatment decisions; improve officer accountability; use data analytics to help predict and prevent failures in supervision or predict violent recidivism; share information with criminal justice partners.
- Improve the quality and increase the capacity of programs and services to meet the identified needs of adults under supervision.
- For example, conduct gap analyses to compare the target population’s needs with relevant program and service availability and accessibility; establish performance-based contracts with providers; train providers to more effectively engage with a justice-involved population.
- Examine and revise policies and practices to align with best and promising practices, and implement changes.
- For example, ensure that the conditions of supervision are individualized and reasonable; incorporate incentive and sanction systems to encourage positive behavior change; ensure drug testing is used to detect incremental progress and inform treatment-focused interventions rather than as a blunt instrument to punish adults for a behavioral health need; use culturally competent, trauma-, and gender-informed approaches.
- Focus resources where they can have the greatest impact.
- For example, prioritize services for people who are most likely to recidivate based on the results using validated risk and needs assessment tools and match service delivery to the times when people are most at risk of recidivism by frontloading supervision contacts and services.
- Strengthen the organization’s culture to reduce recidivism through committed leadership and staff engagement.
- For example, align recruitment, retention, and performance assessment with the skills necessary to carry out supervision duties; consider building staff soft skills (empathy, communication, critical thinking, problem solving) that are effective to influence positive behavior change.
- Improve supervision officer health and wellness.
- For example, curate resources and training to identify and respond to burnout and vicarious trauma.
- Promote and increase collaboration among justice and other agencies relevant to the supervision population.
- For example, implement standard operating procedures for referring adults to treatment that include upfront and ongoing activities to encourage and understand engagement; communicate with judges on the general and individual goals of supervision to provide consistent responses to the target population’s behavior.
- Document and assess the efficacy of the grant-funded intervention or change as part of the practitioner–researcher partnership.
Funding Information
Anticipated Maximum Dollar Amount of Awards $850,000
Period of Performance
36 months
Eligible Applicants
- Special district governments
- County governments
- Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized)
- City or township governments
- State governments
Additional Information on Eligibility
Other: For the purposes of this solicitation, “other” refers to an organizing body or association of supervision agencies that may submit a single application for a Smart Supervision project engaging more than one supervision office, district, or agency (“entity”). The applicant must have capacity to administer the award and include a Memorandum of Understanding or Letter of Intent from each entity& rsquo;s chief executive.
For more information, visit Grants.gov.
