Expansion of Wellness Court services to the Northern Arapaho Tribal Population

The Justice Department's grant-making components have created a streamlined approach for federally recognized Tribes, Tribal consortia, Alaska Native villages and corporations, as well as authorized tribal designees to apply for Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 funding opportunities. The Coordinated Tribal Assistance Solicitation (CTAS) serves as a single solicitation for existing tribal government-specific grant programs administered by the Office of Justice Programs (OJP), the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) and the Office on Violence Against Women (OVW). The CTAS solicitation is designed to assist tribes with addressing crime and public safety issues in a comprehensive manner. The CTAS grant-application process was inspired by and developed after consultation with tribal leaders, including sessions at the Justice Department's Tribal Nations Listening Session in 2009, and has been updated based on continued tribal consultations and listening sessions. The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) provides awards under CTAS Purpose Area 8--Juvenile Healing to Wellness Courts. The overall goal of this program is to enhance the capacity of tribal courts to respond to the alcohol-related issues of youth under the age of 21. This can include the development of a new juvenile healing to wellness court or enhancements to an existing tribal healing to wellness court.

The Northern Arapaho Tribe plans to enhance the current Tribal Wellness Court for Juveniles on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. The target population is to service all juvenile substance abusing offenders as an alternative to incarceration. The current juvenile facility is 290 miles from the reservation in Busby, Montana. The proposed project would provide video conferencing equipment to include that target population nearly 30 miles away. The use of technology would be a bridge for the Wellness Court and the juvenile population in Arapahoe, Riverton, Beaver Creek, St. Stephens, Mill Creek and Ethete. Participants could talk to the judge or staff at the Wellness Court daily. There is a lack of clinicians in the area that are culturally sensitive so if needed they could do treatment groups via video conferencing. The grant funded case manager would provide services to the juveniles and also assist in the monitoring for the clients. Training would be held on site for the judges, prosecutor, clerk and probation offers to increase referrals and by in by the community. The team would participate in the NADCP annual training conference to be to date on all the best practices and build a foundation of knowledge for the current team.

CA/NCF