The Downtown Community Court

The Downtown Community Court

The Downtown Community Court in Vancouver identified in this paper as DCC was established in September 2008.it is located in the eastside downtown of Canada’s Vancouver. This area has a high drug concentration and mental illness. It was established as a partner to the ministry of justice, provincial court of British Columbia, and other justice health and social service agencies. The DCC handles criminal cases that were being handled by the provincial court before it as established. Efficiency evaluation of the DCC was conducted to determine the impact of the court, no efficiency outcomes.

The study analysis covered the Vancouver provincial court efficiency measure before the establishment of DCC comparing with the efficacy trends during the existence of the two courts. Efficiency evaluation was a month the three research streams used to conduct the final assessment of the court. This research was I line with the DCC objectives. The other two streams were recidivism and community engagement. Community courts are usually different from other court models in the way they use community, social services, businesses, and residents as stakeholders of the court processes. Foundational principals of the court were outlined in the British Columbia criminal justice reform website as timelines, integration, and connection to the community. This evolution therefore sought to know how far this efficiency had been achieved towards the achievement of these goals.

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The establishment of Vancouver DCC created a promise of change and hope. Cases would be handled fats, and the community would participate in solving crime issues that affect them. The development of the court has, however, raised concerns for the effectiveness of similar courts in the rest of Canada. The evaluations of such problems solving courts must be thoroughly scrutinized.

This evaluation was conducted by the DCC evaluation working group, together with critical stakeholders and representatives. The establishment of DCC was an act of testing the effectiveness of an integrated service delivery model for justice, health, and social services. The evaluation of the efficiency achievement of through courts would help in determining whether other outcomes were achieved direct from traditional justice system solutions.

Before the formation of Vancouver DCC, the idea of such a community court in this community was written in the

working group’s official report known titled Beyond the Revolving Door: A Newresponse to Chronic Offenders(BC Justice Review Task Force, 2005).evalutre the actual outcomes

The focus if this evaluation just like many other evaluations o Canadian courts

creates a challenge in getting a clear understanding of their efficacy. The assessment has done a great job of outlining the process. However, it fails to consider actual outcomes. Steadman (2005) talks about the importance of process description in describing how particular evaluation models are successful. The information obtained cannot have much use if it lacks a secure connection to the specific outcomes of the court.

One of the issues addressed in the evaluation report is the voluntariness of this type of court system. Participation in this system of the court is viewed as voluntary because the defendant has the right to choose to leave the program and continue in the traditional stream of the court at any given time (Poythress et al., 2002). Researchers have done research on this voluntary admittance process and the level of competence of offenders selecting this stream. Low ratings were found by the evaluation of the Broward County mental Health court in 2002. The participant had low scores characterized by high feelings of autonomy and freedom of choice. (Poythress et al., 2002)This evaluation fails to show how this issue is addressed. Many court participants report a lack of any information on the freedom of their choice of this court system. They only become aware of this choice to choose to participate in, not mostly after they have agreed to participate.

The target population of DCC, like many their similar problem solving court systems, often lack legal knowledge; they are among the disadvantaged group in their communities and sufferer addiction or mental illness. The affiliation to the criminal justice system is lengthened by problem solving court participation, which involves a check of hearing and treatment disorders which take a considerable amount of time than what would have been the case In a traditional court system. (Slate, 2003).This potentially lengthy court period is usually, in most cases, not common knowledge by offenders. This, in the end, affects the efficacy of these courts negatively.

Another issue arising from the evolution is the actual linkage participants receive to treatment and services within their community. This is an essential avenue for evaluation due to the connection of these services being the forefront of this type of court model. Finding the differences between mental health court participants and not mental health participants in access to health services is not statistically significant in this evaluation. Research indicates that t no differences in the clinical outcomes of the participants. The review has failed to utilize comparison groups leading to a lack of insight into what might have been available through the traditional system

Overall this evaluation, just like the other exiting evaluations, is more similar to the description of practices of the DCC rather than the actual assessment of effectiveness. It has provided a site-specific account of processes employed by this model. With the existence of assessments used my various models, it is crucial to determine which particular element is most strongly associated with DCC relevant outcomes. When outcomes are addressed within evolutions as in the case with this specific evaluation, the report is limited to a particular model. It fails to generalize to the broader spectrum of court systems. The outcome is

associated with the overall system without attention to the specific component of the DCC. In this evolution, the approach used to limit the ability to determine overall efficacy in meeting a wider variety of initiatives.