Training Pretrial Staff in San Francisco

Project Context: 

• The San Francisco Pretrial Diversion Project (SF Pretrial) provides community-based programs for recently arrested people, managing an average daily caseload of 1,800 clients. It provides case management, in-house services such as clinical social workers, referrals to stabilization housing, and connections to external treatment providers. 
• Judges in the San Francisco District Court requested that SF Pretrial share more nuanced data, such as side-by-side visualizations of safety rates and risk scores, which could help inform release decisions. 
• Judges also requested more consistent data on pretrial outcomes to track the public safety and court appearance impacts of pretrial supervision decisions.
• SF Pretrial routinely collects and analyzes client data, but did not have a sustainable pipeline of data visualizations for judges to review. 
• The GPL provided a tailored training series on data-driven performance management to SF Pretrial staff in 2024 and then began providing more robust technical assistance through our 2024 Pretrial Initiative. 

How the GPL is Supporting: 

• Training pretrial staff on data-driven performance management, including measuring output indicators (i.e., program activities) and outcome indicators (i.e., program results). 
• Coaching pretrial staff on communicating key data points to help judges and other pretrial stakeholders better understand pretrial outcomes, such as developing a data dashboard and creating a plan to disseminate it.