Decriminalizing Mental Illness: A Practical Model for Building Sustainable Crisis Intervention Teams

Innovative, Inspirational, and Above All, Practical and Proven

Crisis Intervention Teams divert people living with mental illness from jail with practical alternatives. Decriminalizing Mental Illness offers effective strategies for building a permanent Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) program based on a confirmed, easy-to-follow process of capacity building. It will help you:

-Establish community networking and fundraising to support your CIT program.

-Decide the program's scope and structure given your community's unique situation.

-Implement your process with a checklist of field-proven Effective Practices.

-Create true collaboration between law enforcement and mental health professionals.

-Choose the venue, format, and personnel for training those involved.

-Take your CIT program from conception to a self-sustaining community service.

"CIT is the best idea for addressing a major problem for local municipalities-what to do with the mentally ill. Decriminalizing Mental Illness is the most powerful blueprint for getting the job done." - George F. Breedy, Captain, St. Charles Parish Sheriff's Office

James Klopovic, Major, USAF, retired, holds a Doctor of Public Policy, with concentration on service program capacity building at the organizational and community levels. After retiring from the United States Air Force, James served as a senior staffer for 25 years on the North Carolina Governor's Crime Commission, where his responsibilities encompassed strategic planning, municipal governance, financial development, federal granting, and community and organizational development, implementation, and evaluation. James is cofounder with his daughter Nicole of The Nicole and James Klopovic Family Charitable Foundation, which lends support to local social programs with funding and knowledge ofCapacity Building to encourage Permanent Solutions to Permanent Problems.

Nicole Klopovic holds a Doctor of Medical Science and is a certified Physician Associate (PA-C). Additionally, she is a captain in the U.S. Air Force Reserve Medical Corps. She pursues both her Air Force and PA-C careers while serving as the CEO of The Nicole and James Klopovic Family Charitable Foundation.