Under the proposals, a named social worker for a person with learning disabilities or autism would be in charge of ensuring that their plan of care is based on the "least restrictive, least institutional setting" possible, and considering all community-based options.
Other states use community-based options for parolees who miss appointments or fail routine drug tests.
Nursing home care will represent a diminishing amount of long-term care over all, with retirement communities, assisted living and home- and community-based options becoming more attractive alternatives.
Jenny Earle, a director at PRT, says not only are many women doing time unnecessarily for minor offences when community-based options are proven to work, but where mothers are incarcerated it typically leads to poor outcomes for kids in the long term.
David Strang said the evidence was clear that such sentences did not cut crime and called for a "more creative approach" to community-based options.
According to Alexander, the state was able to put 100percentt of its Medicaid population in a medical home, reduce emergency room visits by 30percentt, increase community-based options, and significantly improve preventive care, among other things precisely what the Obama people claim they wanted from health care reform.
Alternative, community-based options cost anywhere from $3,000 to $10,000 per youth per year.
One key part of this reform involved state funding to build and expand community-based options for youthful offenders.
In the meantime, Child Youth and Family (soon to be Ministry for Vulnerable Children) is considering other "community-based options" for youth rehabilitation.
These unique challenges led to reforms, including assessment tools designed to help judges determine the risk levels of juvenile offenders; providing judges with greater discretion in sentencing juveniles; and expanding community-based options across the state, an objective pursued in part through the creation of an incentive-grant program.
