Buncombe County planning group adopts two-year criminal-justice strategic plan

A Buncombe County criminal-justice planning group on an unspecified date voted to adopt a two-year strategic plan that sets priorities across behavioral health, alternative response coordination, court case-processing guidance, domestic-violence and sexual-assault protocols, law-enforcement diversion options and juvenile-detention review.

Lee Creighton, a county staff member who said he had been working with the group on the plan, told members the document is organized by high-level focus areas with assigned work groups, a member chair and a staff lead for each area. "We're talking about a 2 year strategic plan," Creighton said, describing the structure that pairs goals with measurable outcomes.

The plan’s behavioral-health priorities include identifying barriers and recommending ways to expand law-enforcement utilization of behavioral-health urgent care and reviewing inpatient-bed utilization by facility with the goal of addressing access barriers. Members agreed to keep the scope broad — reviewing all community inpatient beds while working toward the ability to disaggregate data about people who are justice-involved if agencies can share…