Mentally Ill Offender Crime Reduction Grant (MIOCR II)

The State of California gave grants to many counties in California to see if offering creative treatment solutions as an alternative to custody would effect a cost savings for the State. I was hired to replace a Project Manager who left the project suddenly. When I came aboard, the staff had been without immediate supervision for some time. While I was learning about the State's expectations, my departmental commitments, and other project details, I began interviewing everyone on my new staff to get their perspective. This information became tremendously helpful to me as I gradually changed the direction of the project. Fortunately, I was very conservative in utilizing any funds for the project, because our funding was cut by the State due to fiscal constraints. However, in concert with the Sheriff's Department and funding they had, we were able to continue the project for the entire timeframe of the original project proposal.

In the middle of the budget cuts, our project also experienced some significant personnel changes. However, the project came back stronger and more efficient as we adapted to an amazing group of talented people. The treatment staff were very dedicated individuals and all support staff were very invested in helping our clients. Because some of our team partners fought for a living (ie, DA/PD offices), I often had to deal with conflicting world views. This was a very successful collaboration, and I grew to respect each player's roles in creating a civil society through the work we were engaged in during the process. The Sheriff's Department was given awards by my department for their dedication to helping the mentally ill under their supervision, truly a remarkable event. Probation worked very closely with the treatment staff to provide accountability and support for all of our clients. While some of the elements of the initial proposal were not met (to decrease recidivism), it was accepted by team players that over a much longer assessment period, most likely a decrease would be realized, as well as improvement in quality of life for our clients. We certainly saw people graduate our program who had never received a certificate for anything, and proudly displayed it in their new housing. We watched as one man who rarely spoke, stood up at his graduation and gave an entire speech.

Manager, Forensic Services

During my employment with the County of Ventura, I managed several forensic mental health programs. One was the MIOCR II grant program as outlined elsewhere on this blog. The MIOCR II grant was a research grant which was a collaboration between the Sheriff's Department, Probation, Superior Court, the District Attorney's office and the Public Defender's office, as well as with Behavioral Health. The MIOCR program provided individual, group, and mobile team assessment and support. Staff included a psychiatrist, clinical psychologist, research psychologist, research assistant, addiction treatment professionals, a licensed clinical social worker, two registered nurses, and two psychiatric technicians. Vans were provided to allow the team to pick up clients upon release from jail and transport them to residential housing and services.

Another was the Forensic Alternative Community Treatment program. This program was designed to allow high functioning offenders an opportunity to receive treatment in lieu of custody, usually individual psychotherapy and psychiatric services as needed. This was a program that utilized our mental health clinic and was an outpatient treatment program, although crisis intervention was definitely an inherent part of the program.

A general Forensic Services program was developed in the wake of the end of the MIOCR grant, combining some facets of each of the two prior programs. Ultimately, our forensic mental health clinic was also closed, and we were attached to a local mental health clinic as a subset program. I was awarded the Behavioral Health Spirit Award during this time period, in large part due to the excellence of a wonderfully supportive staff.

As an offspring from the above programs, a court assessment program was developed. Superior Court provided Behavioral Health with a facility within the courts to provide on-site assessment for mental health and addiction. This was a collaboration between the Alcohol and Drug Treatment Program, a local (Prop 36) program which had been developed as an alternative to custody within that department, and the Behavioral Health mental health program. This allowed the various judges to make a ruling with the post-assessment information to guide them. Probation was also intimately involved in the collaboration for this program as well as the DA/PD offices.

Court Assessment Program

Due to massive budget changes, I was given the task of developing and managing a court assessment program, where mentally ill offenders (or those with addictions) would be assessed in the courtroom to see if treatment alternatives might be more productive than incarceration. The program would provide for a therapist and several drug treatment professionals to meet with potential clients immediately following their court hearing. The information would then be given to the judge at the defendant's next hearing, and the judge could then determine if custody or treatment would be most appropriate. The program was very successful, with a very high percentage of clients actively participating in both the assessment and treatment aspects of the program.

Hookup and Comissioning of an Offshore Platform

One of the more unique projects in my work history was being on the team that supported the hookup on an offshore oil platform. My company was providing the union labor, project support, and transportation for the startup of the platform. I was part of the onshore project support, including helicopter transport, computer functions, labor issues, and acquisition. I was able to see the entire offshore operation, provide supplies (everything from getting steel plates to toilet paper), accompany the helicopter pilots offshore, and bring injured workers to the hospital. This position required flexibility and patience as I often dealt with angry union workers or demanding employees from the company that contracted our services. The sense of teamwork helped us all to persevere during the ongoing 7 day weeks that were maintained for months at a time.

Construction Manager

When my former employer offered me the opportunity to manage an office buildout and subsequent move, I jumped at the chance - but with some trepidation. I had no experience in getting a construction team together, so I immediately began to research and contact people I knew in that industry. What resulted was such a great team that other nearby businesses contacted me to hire them for future work.

The team was amazing; they kept things on schedule, despite the usual amount of obstacles. Some of them even promised to work weekends free of charge to ensure that the project would be done on time. Watching the new office come together from an empty building was very rewarding. The day after we completed construction, the move took place smoothly and fluidly. Walking out of the office, seeing the brass lettering on the building, I was gratified to know I had kept the costs down and done a great job for my employer. The project was finished on time and under budget. It was a positive lesson in undertaking challenging assignments.

Project Analyst

I was hired to help start up an environmental engineering office to represent the west coast operations for a national engineering firm. Once the office was under way, I was given training and transitioned to the analyst group, with analysts in various offices across the country. The company provided me with a wide array of technical tasks and I became very proficient in the use of Excel as I developed estimates with many interlinking cost estimates. I was in charge of overseeing the data for an Air Force PRAC, visiting various bases and assessing environmental cleanup and subsequent costs, project estimating and scheduling, and all data compliance. The analyst group awarded me a Letter of Commendation for solving a complex financial problem within the first quarter of moving to the analyst function.

Technical Contractor

Working in collaboration with engineers has been a very positive experience in more than one setting. I worked for an engineering firm and was placed on contract to the State of California to assist them with a database problem. This required a frequent travel between the State Capitol in Sacramento and southern California as I worked between both offices. I also was placed on contract to the local Chevron USA offices, to assist their engineers with electrical studies, PCB studies, transitioning from manual to AutoCAD systems, and offering general support to their electrical engineering department.

Later, I worked for a traffic engineering firm, this time developing a database for all their historical traffic studies as well as a menu-driven database of all AutoCAD applications. There was a good deal of technical writing, editing and graphics involved as well as gathering data for traffic geometrics and interfacing with governmental entities. I helped solve a mathematical problem on one of the in-house data base programs, for which I was given a bonus and shown much appreciation by the engineers.