Committee Name: Pretrial Services Advisory Committee

Chairpersons/County: Anita Mendenhall/Macon, Keith Cooprider/Lake

Total Committee Members: Twenty-eight

Results of Prior Objectives for 2004

1. The committee continued, in conjunction with the Administrative Office of Illinois Courts, to further identify pretrial training needs. With the assistance of the AOIC, the Pretrial Committee initiated a Pretrial specific training event at the Fall 2004 IPCSA conference at Chicago.

2. The committee was reminded of the availability of the National Association of Pretrial Services Agencies (NAPSA) website. Information was routinely disseminated to committee members advocating NAPSA membership and conference attendance. Co-Chair, Keith Cooprider with the economic support of Lake County Court Services, was able to attend the 2004 NAPSA Conference in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

3. The AOIC provided the committee with pending legislation and potential effects on Pretrial Services around the state. AOIC representative, Dave Hitchcock, provided information about pending probation-related legislation.

Summary of 0bjectives for 2005

1. The committee will continue to focus and draw on the latest research utilizing the services of the Administrative Office of Illinois Courts. The committee will rely on the AOIC to provide relevant legislative updates and developments as they occur within the state government. A representative of the AOIC will participate with and attend Pretrial Committee meetings.

2. The committee will continue to advocate for full financial support from the IPCSA Executive Board enabling committee representatives’ attendance at NAPSA conferences on an annual basis.

3. In order to ensure compliance with the AOIC Pretrial Procedural Standards, the committee will begin by gathering program information from the various Pretrial Services Programs throughout the state. Ultimately, the plan is to identify, from each jurisdiction, areas of compliance with standards as well as areas that may not be in compliance and then assist with improvement in the identified areas of concern.

4. The committee will work to establish a Pretrial Services link with the IPCSA website wherein messages and relevant information may be posted in order to establish an additional mechanism to foster and improve communication with our peers.

The committee met in March 2004 at Springfield, in July 2004 at ISU, and in September in Chicago.

Item :	Amount:
Meeting Expense	$50.00
Miscellaneous	$50.00
NAPSA Affiliation Fee	$120.00
NAPSA travel/conference expense for affiliate representative	$365.00 Registration $125.00 Meals $350.00 Lodging $300.00 Travel
Total	$1295.00

IPCSA FALL CONFERENCE MEETING—2004

SEPTEMBER 1, 2004

Present: Anita Mendenhall (Macon); Keith Cooprider (Lake); Mark Fellenzer (Rock Island); Tim McGavin (DuPage).

Meeting called to order; minutes from the last meeting (7/23/04) were reviewed and approved.

In relation to a Pretrial Services link with the IPCSA website, Keith will contact Mike Hughes of Coles County (thanks Mark) to start looking into this project.

The idea of the Advisory Committee having a mission statement was proposed; some literature was handed out on “how to” write a mission statement, what it should consist of, etc. If anyone has any ideas for a mission statement, please forward them to Anita or Keith (or bring them with you to the next meeting). Putting together a mission statement will be the focus of our next meeting.

The 2005 Annual Plan needs to put together; any ideas please forward them to Anita or Keith. Right now some items/objectives for the Annual Plan include (1) development of a Pretrial Services link with the IPCSA website, (2) development of a mission statement for the Advisory Council, and (3) update the Pretrial Services Committee list.

Tim McGavin of DuPage County was interested in the different functions and structures of different pretrial programs across the state. Mark and Keith explained that there are a variety of different programs with different functions across the state; some programs just doing bond reports; some with supervision; some combined with traditional probation duties, etc. As an afterthought, perhaps when we update the Committee list, we can also ask for a brief description of the type of program operations the respective jurisdictions implement. For example, (1) bond reports/investigations—yes/no; (2) what does the investigation consist of—interview, verification, criminal history check, bond recommendation; (3) supervision—yes/no; (4) type of supervision—phone, office-based, home visits. Or we could do this as a separate entity—maybe construct a small survey (there are some national surveys done in which we could perhaps model from) and send it out—does IPCSA have any money for our Committee to conduct a survey? It seems worthy that our committee should know the extent and kind of pretrial operations that are going on in the state and we could also compile this data into a “Pretrial Program Directory.” Maybe this too can be part of the 2005 Annual Plan?

Next Meeting: maybe December or January; we will advise.

Minutes submitted by Keith Cooprider 9/13/2004.