Supporting Statement B

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Supporting Statement B for the Information Collection Tools for the State of Georgia’s Criminal Justice Coordinating Council’s (CJCC) Evaluation of the Implementation  of the SSI/SSDI Outreach, Access, and Recovery (SOAR) Model in Georgia County Jails Pilot
OMB No. 0960-0866

B.	Collections of Information Employing Statistical Methods
    1.  	Statistical Methodology
    • The potential respondent universe for the above information collection instruments are all inmates with serious and persistent mental illness (SPMI) across the state of Georgia in county jails within the State of Georgia.  The updated project’s enrollment goal is approximately 60 individuals over the full duration of the initiative.  To date, we have enrolled 50 participants.  We therefore anticipate enrolling the remaining 10 participants during the final year of project activities.  Since our respondent universe is so small, we consider this a limited minimal intervention to test an idea on a small scale to determine if it is worth pursuing on a larger scale.

    • SSA makes multiple attempts to collect survey data from all of the participants, but it is unlikely that we will achieve a 100 percent response rate due to the nature of the project.

    2. Procedures for Collecting the Information
    • SSA intends to collect information from all participants, rather than only a sample of the participants.

    • As mentioned above, this is a minimal, limited project, the nature of which is to test an idea on a small scale, to determine if it is worth pursuing on a larger scale.  Therefore, since we are implementing this limited project with only a handful of sites in a single state, we do not expect to generalize the results of this project to other populations.  Rather, we only expect to examine the outcomes of this intervention, to help determine if the intervention merits a wider scale deployment and more rigorous examination.

    • As we noted in Supporting Statement A, we began with a recruitment phase where the SOAR team identified and enrolled individuals with SPMI in four participating jails in Georgia.  During the recruitment phase, hired Medicaid Eligibility Specialists (MES) inform the potential respondents about the SOAR intervention and evaluation, recruit them to participate in the project, and administer an informed consent form and the initial enrollment survey.  The MES then helps participants enroll in Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI).  The next phase is the follow-up survey phase, which the CJCC research analyst administers once, six months after participants receive benefits.
    3. Methods to Maximize Response Rates
    • The MES administers the initial enrollment survey at the time of consent and enrollment, therefore; we the response rate is 100 percent.  The MES also works with participants on their applications for various federal and state benefit programs and administers the initial survey instrument.  If the MES does not complete the survey during the first visit, the MES has additional opportunities to administer the initial survey.

    • The CJCC research analyst administers the initial survey to participants once for evaluation purposes.  The analyst uses the same survey tool for the follow‑up surveys, scheduled at 6 months after participants receive benefits.  The CJCC research analyst contacts the participants about completing the survey online.  If the participant does not respond within three weeks, the CJCC research analyst contacts the participant by phone to complete the survey.  Any participants with ongoing contact with their MESs or forensic peer mentors also receive encouragement from them to complete the follow-up surveys. 

    • SSA will not be sampling our participant pool,  but we will attempt to collect information from the entire universe of participants for each phase of this project.
    4. Tests of Procedures
SSA has not undertaken any tests of procedures or methods for the information collection for this limited, small-scale project.
    5. Statistical Agency Contact for Statistical Information
The following individuals provided input on issues discussed in this information clearance request:
NaShandra Blake, Statistical Analysis Center Program Manager
Telephone:  404-654-1825
Email:  [email protected].

John Speir, President of Applied Research Services
Telephone:  678-777-7854
Email:  [email protected].