The City of Kansas City, MO, has not had a jail since 2017, and as officials weighed the cost of building a new jail, they also decided to weigh the downstream costs of incarcerating individuals for low-level, non-violent municipal crimes.
With that in mind, in June 2023, the Kansas City Council formed an Alternatives to Incarceration Commission originally tasked with evaluating how many beds might be needed in a new city jail. However, they were also charged with looking at alternative approaches to incarceration as a way to reduce the city’s jail population while still keeping the community safe.
By July, the 10-member commission had decided not to make a recommendation on the number of jail beds but to put their full focus on studying ways to connect lower-level municipal offenders with resources and to target a holistic approach to reduce the number of people the city incarcerates.
The commission identified four areas that they say are the root causes of the majority of crimes committed in KC: poverty, substance use, mental health issues, and lack of housing.
With those four areas in mind, the commission sought the advice of subject-matter experts and examined what other cities have done to both reduce crime and incarceration.
Alternatives to Incarceration Commission Members
Megan Case (Co-Chair): KC Administrator of Corrections
Melesa Johnson (Co-Chair): Mayor’s Office, Director of Public Safety
Katheryn Shields: Former 4th District At-Large Councilwoman
Darrell Curls: 5th District At-Large Councilman
Courtney Wachal: Municipal Court Judge
Eric Wesson: The Next Page
Amaia Cook: Decarcerate KC
Annie Struby: Rose Brooks Center
Connor Swanton: Legal Aid of Western Missouri – Municipal Criminal Defense Division
Johnny Waller: UMKC’s Clear My Record Expungement Project Manager
After months of work, the Alternatives to Incarceration Commission discussed what their recommendations would be during a Jan. 16 special committee meeting. While details are still being ironed out, and the full city council has not scheduled a vote on the initiatives, here’s a preview of what the commission hopes the city will enact.
Non-Arrest Community Centered Response & Hotline
A large number of the commission’s recommendations are based on Atlanta’s Policing Alternatives Diversion (PAD) initiative. Just like the Atlanta initiative, the commission hopes to see a non-emergency line established that would be used to call harm reduction workers to help individuals experiencing quality-of-life issues.
Instead of calling 911, a citizen would call 311 for non-crisis situations. In Atlanta, for example, if a business owner has a houseless person sleeping in front of their business, they call 311, and “harm reduction leaders” come out and engage with them. The harm reduction workers then connect the person with the services they might need, including shelter, food, transportation, mental health or substance use treatment, and/or other needed services.
“Members of KCPD aren’t social workers or therapists,” said commission member Amaia Cook. “PAD connects people in need with resources.”
Atlanta PAD sends harm reduction workers in lieu of police in the following types of cases:
- Disturbances – such as someone yelling outside a business or blocking traffic.
- Public indecency – such as someone naked or bathing in a public place.
- Welfare – such as someone asking for food or help.
- Mental health – such as someone who appears disoriented, erratic, or is talking to themselves.
- Substance use – such as someone using drugs in public.
- Basic needs – such as someone in need of shelter and sleeping outside.
- Public health – such as someone getting food from a dumpster or using the bathroom in a public place.
The KC Alternatives to Incarceration Commission sees implementing a PAD program to respond in these areas as a great starting place for Kansas City, with the potential of expanding or adjusting the list on specific local needs.
Over a period of three months in 2023, Atlanta’s PAD engaged with 570 people. Of them, 98% had not been subject to arrest in the following three months, indicating that with stabilizing services, individuals are not prone to repeat criminal actions.
Diversion & Harm Reduction Center
The commission proposes building a diversion center to house, largely under one roof, the services the PAD initiative offers. The proposed center would also function as a pre-arrest deterrent.
Here’s how it would work: If an officer has probable cause to arrest someone but sees the person is suffering quality of life issues related to housing, substance use, mental health issues, or extreme poverty, they can offer diversion services instead of arrest. With their consent, the officer would then drop the person off at the diversion center, and no arrest is made.
“Jailing people for violations related to poverty, substance addiction, and mental illness exacerbates quality of life issues, rather than solving them,” reads a statement from Atlanta PAD. “It pushes people even further to the margins, away from the connections and resources that support stability and wellness.”
Once at the diversion center, the person is met by specialists who will work to address their immediate needs. From there, the person can get a range of services, including a hot meal, showers, clean clothes, health screenings, connections to housing, health care, and other stabilizing services like case management or legal aid.
Cook says instituting a diversion center and a program like Atlanta’s PAD initiative would also work to alleviate a shortage of 911 dispatchers and police officers in the city.
“A crucial aspect of PAD is that it’s taking away the burden from law enforcement and even places like the [hospital] emergency department, ” says Cook.
Pre-Trial Supervision
Many cities, including Wichita and Lawrence, have a pretrial supervision program put in place in lieu of holding people in jail, but Kansas City does not.
For example, Douglas County, KS, evaluates the risk of those awaiting trial and releases low-to-moderate-risk individuals and keeps tabs on them through the end of their trial by calling or texting reminders, requiring in-person meetings and/or electrical device monitoring.
When Kansas City commissioned a study on the need for a city jail, it was projected that implementing a pretrial supervision program could reduce the number of people they incarcerate by 19%.
“That percentage is not a drop in the bucket, that’s fairly substantial,” said Director of Public Safety Melesa Johnson.
For the pretrial supervision program, the commission recommends using a risk-assessment tool developed and tested by the Center for Court Innovation in New York. The tool, called CCAT, consists of 30 questions that have been proven to accurately predict a re-offense and if someone will appear for their court date. The CCAT assessment also helps identify trauma and mental health issues.
Johnson says the city would hire someone to administer the CCAT, which takes about 15 minutes to complete. Johnson also says individuals accused of crimes that have a human victim and those who pose a danger to the public would not be eligible for the pretrial supervision program.
Take a Housing First Approach
Atlanta PAD includes a provision for immediate shelter, food, and transportation for up to three months for those in need. The KC Alternatives to Incarceration Commission will look for similar support to help with housing concerns.
The commission’s recommendations are similar to the “Zero KC” recommendations proposed by the Kansas City Houseless Task Force in fall 2022. Instead of treating the person’s issues first, the city’s plan focuses on a housing first approach — get the individual housed first, then begin to work on the problems that have led to their houselessness.
Studies have found that providing housing to people experiencing homelessness reduces the individual’s probability of committing a crime by 80%.
Fill Gaps in Funding
The KC Alternatives to Incarceration Commission also found areas where the city offers help or support but also found that some key areas are underfunded.
Areas where they’d like to see better funding:
- Mental Health Court
- Affordable Housing
- Small Business Safety Support
- Resources for Domestic Violence Victims
According to city-commissioned studies, two out of three people incarcerated by Kansas City experience mental health issues. The Alternatives to Incarceration Commission met with University Health, who said that the number may be higher, indicating a dire need for mental health services and increased funding to the diversionary mental health court.
The commission also highlighted a plan to reimburse businesses that make under a certain amount of money for the purchase and installation of security equipment.
What’s Next?
A city statistician is looking into the local impact of implementing these programs. They’ll look at how much a hotline will ease the burden on 911, how many KCPD working hours will be reduced, and how many fewer people would end up in jail.
The commission is expected to make formal recommendations to the full city council soon, and the council would then need to draft legislation to implement any or all of the initiatives outlined by the commission.
