County Responds to Grand Jury Report

The Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors responded to the 2011 Grand Jury report “Homeless Mentally Ill Recidivism: This Recycling is Not Good for the County” on Tuesday and advocates are bound to be underwhelmed. The five supervisors approved a response letter in which they decline to enact 90 percent of the Grand Jury¹s recommendations for fixing the problem of mentally ill homeless people cycling in and out of the County Jail with no improvement in either their health or circumstances.

The Board didn¹t walk away from problem however. Dennis Bozanich, assistant to County Executive Officer (CEO) Chandra Waller, has been tasked with preparing a comparison of the costs of maintaining the status quo with the costs of providing the homeless mentally ill indigent with enough services to keep them off the arrest, re-arrest merry-go-round. To read more, see homelessinsb.org.