office management team has met with all of their bilingual staff in the District Attorney's
office to talk about the impact of the national environment and the people that we serve.
They are hearing from their staff that victims and witnesses are struggling to trust the
criminal justice system even more. They are needing to talk about that and the impact on
the criminal justice system that happened in the last month and will continue to be a
conversation that they have in the District Attorney's office. They are looking forward to
filling their new bilingual management position in the District Attorney's office. This is
going to be the first management position in the District Attorney's office that is specific
to bilingual services. One of the duties of this new position will be to continue to enhance
their language access program in the Victim Witness Unit and in the District Attorney's
office. They recently attended the Behavioral Health Fair. That was an opportunity to
meet with all of the different agencies that service the courthouse, and there was a lot of
collaboration that happened there. In the past month they submitted an application to
have a facility dog in the Victim Witness Unit and are on a waiting list. They have
identified their handlers, and have a team of people who have been working on this. They
are looking forward to offering the facility dog to all victims and witnesses who are
experiencing trauma.
Lt. Esser reported for Madison Police Department- Lt. Esser is the detective lieutenant
for the West District, that supervises eight detectives who specialize in domestic
violence and sensitive crimes investigations. They are in month two of their detective
reorganization. They are striving to build relationships with the community, to build that
trust, that we need to those who are observing fear in the criminal justice system. A safe
place to come to is the goal every day. They do have a centralized financial crimes unit
that works out of the City County Building, that is led by Lieutenant Tim Radke, and
they're taking a citywide approach to all financial crimes. Legislatively, vulnerable adults
who are able to get a restraining order fall into a very low tier. Legislatively they will be
looking at trying to have restraining orders for vulnerable adults be a high tier. They might
be able to potentially amend legislation that way. They have had some grant funds that
have been paused.
Statam reported for Anesis Therapy: They are encountering some significant challenges
with housing for clients. Predominantly persons that are under the poverty line receiving
Medicaid benefits. There is some concerns about how they will be able to obtain
services to meet their mental health and physical health needs. Concerns about if people
aren't having housing with that looks like when people double up and triple up. This
compromises the stable housing that the individuals that they go stay with have, such as
if they have Section 8 or Section 42 housing because of the restrictions. ANESIS
Conference will be at the Monona Terrace on August 21-22.
Supervisor Anthony Gray from PP&J – Most of their conversations have been about
provider continuation, not just the cuts that have already come, but how do they plan out
a flight of services knowing that there are more coming. How are they able to plan their
services knowing that some of the money that they're counting on is likely not to be
there? Regarding digitizing mail, when the sheriff talked about it, it was primarily a safety
mechanism, and not just for the inmates, but also for the sheriffs. He talked about the
ways that contraband gets snuck into jails and that the digitizing of files, so long as
privacy is maintained. This creates a much safer environment, according to the sheriff,
for both the inmates and for the deputies. One of the concerns they had as a criminal
defense attorney was legal privilege; was how do they send things in and out to clients
that they want to make sure that no one sees but them.
Kato reported for Rainbow - Eric Crawford is their new Program Manager at Rainbow.
They are continuing to respond to the communities and are working more with the gun
violence prevention. They have hired two new group facilitators who have lived experience.
They have been working more internally and externally around the new changes, whether
it's funding, child care cuts, the things that are so much of a foundation for the families
