Response to 2 Discussions - w6 - 2

Discussion: Policy Proposals

In your reading for this week, you meet Jose and Iris, two individuals who are in situations that require assistance and guidance from a professional social worker and policy advocate.

Respond by Day 5 to a colleague with another approach to address the problem they identified. What is the responsibility of the social workers working with Jose and/or Iris to advocate for a change in the social policy? The 2 colleagues discussions are below. Each response should be in APA format and include intext citations and references to support your information.

Discussion #1 to respond to

Celette Marshall 

RE: Discussion - Week 6

Top of Form

The Case of Jose

 In the case of Jose. Jose has been charged for vagrancy three times in the last 2 months and has also been arrested six other times over the past 10 years for various minor offenses (Plummer, Makris, Brocksen, 2014).

  Policy Proposal

Incarceration has been a stratgey to address the issues of substance use. A examination of in 15 states found that one-quarter of individuals released returned to prison within 3 years for technical violations that included, among other things, testing positive for drug use” (Chandler, Fletcher, & Volkow, 2009).  On release from prison or jail, addicted persons will experience challenges to their sobriety through multiple stressors that increase their risk of relapsing to drug use (Chandler, Fletcher, & Volkow). These challenges can include, just like in the case of Jose, the issue to secure employment and facing homelessness when released from prison; which can lead to returning to substance use.

Trade-off

I believe that there should be an  increased funding to continue supporting community based substance use treatment programs and propose that these programs also have a bridge from treatment to community. Bridge from treatment-to-community goals to offer supportive services for applicants to reduce stressors that increase the risk of relapse when entering back into the community. These services include: community support (church), job training programs, partnerships with local companies to create jobs, housing, continuum and access to care (physical health/mental health), including access to support groups (AA/NA) can assist in combating recidivism related to substance use.

Trade-off refers to assessing the comparative advantages of policy options (Jansson, 2018). The pros of the policy are that they are community based programs that would be able to reach people who would possibly not use services before and are directed to reduce substance use (Jansson). The cons that it narrows the focus to only assisting people who have been incarcerated or have been released from prison; and can possibly exclude others who have a substance use issues that could benefit from the bridge treatment-to-community services.