As of Monday, the Reno County Sheriff’s Office now has Drug Abuse Peer Mentors working in the Reno County Jail. Sheriff Randy Henderson says two individuals, Michael Hill Jr and Kim Cragg, who are employees of SACK, Substance Abuse Center of Kansas, will be working approximately 10-hours-per-week in the two jail facilities.

Sack is a non-profit organization specializing in the prevention and treatment of individuals and communities affected by substance abuse. Hill and Cragg will not only be working in the county facilities but also work in the State Prison system and Wichita facilities. They also have evening recovery groups.

This program is made possible to Reno County because of a 2nd year Crime Reduction Grant. Citizens and members of the Crime Reduction Task force have identified that the biggest causes of the high crime recidivism rate in Reno County is due to drugs and mental health issues. So, money from this grant will pay for the two Peer Mentors as well as paying Sheriff’s Deputies to work overtime to deliver Civil Process papers. With Civil Process being covered through the grant, this allows Sgt Jim Potter to move back into a school, for 10-hours-per-week, to teach Life Skills to 8th grade students, on Fridays. The school will be Reno Valley Middle School.

Horizons Mental Health is also a part of this grant, but at this time there is no cost to have them monitor the jail log and communicate with the nursing staff about their patients in county facilities.

Sheriff Henderson says they are currently looking into Hippa Regulations which may make it difficult to do mental health counseling and treatment in the current facilities but says they are working on this. Once they get moved into the new Reno County Corrections Facility, they hope to have mental health staff working on site.

Following is additional information on the SACK visits and assessments.

Sack personnel will make visits only on Monday – Thursday (unless special approval from Captain Larry Dyer).

Visits will be to the entire pod due to the right of privacy for inmates. If an inmate wants to contact SACK for a personal visit, they will do so by phone . Inmates can give up their rights of privacy and meet one on one with SACK. These meetings will be set up by the inmate calling SACK and requesting it. SACK will then call the SGT in charge to request a time when they can come in.