Justice-Involved Veteran's Program

Program Overview

The Great Falls Veteran Reentry Program is a variable 90 to 270-day modified therapeutic community model program with a primary goal of guiding justice-involved veterans in their successful transition from secure correctional facilities to society. Ancillary enrollments and services may also be provided to address stabilization needs for other justice-involved veterans such as those struggling on probation, parole, or Veteran’s Justice Courts. Towards that end, GFVRP will provide a safe, clean and healthy environment for veterans as they work together, with staff and community volunteers in both therapeutic and mutual support group processes. GFVRP currently has the capacity to serve 30 adult male offenders housed separately from other State or Federal program participants in the Main West Campus. A dedicated case manager and support staff will be present in the wing which also features a separate dining area, a military-styled dormitory as well as semi-private rooms.

Program Principles

• A trauma-informed environment that realizes the widespread impact of trauma and understands potential paths of healing; recognizes the signs and symptoms of trauma in staff, residents, and others involved in program services; and responds by fully integrating knowledge about trauma into program services.
• Core Treatment to include cognitive behavioral therapy programs including Seeking Safety and MRT: Winning the Invisible War ®, medication management and coordinated case management.
• Supplemental referral services which may include Exposure therapy, Stress Inoculation Training, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Dialectical Behavior Therapy based on assessment and resident education.
• Employment: job readiness training with the Montana Job Service, Vet-to-Vet peer support, and a para-military living arrangement designed to reestablish a subculture of self-respect and self- discipline.
• Use of both staff and community volunteer veterans to ensure mutual peer support when our residents require an opportunity to speak and be heard by those who have endured similar hardships, horror or pain.

Program Eligibility

Justice-Involved Veterans must meet basic VA eligibility based upon discharge from active military service under other than dishonorable conditions. Active service means full-time service, other than active duty for training as a member of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, or as a commissioned officer of the Public Health Service, Environmental Science Services Administration, or National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or its predecessor, the Coast and Geodetic Survey. Veterans must not have any outstanding warrants.

Screening

Standard screening as per PPD Policy 4.1.100 applies. All applicants will have a recent Montana Offender Reentry Risk Assessment (MORRA -Community Supervision Tool) available for review. In addition to required application materials each applicant must provide a copy of his most recent DD Form 214 to establish both military service and potential for VA benefits or services. To obtain a copy of a DD-Form 214, the applicant must request one from the National Archives online, by fax or by mail. The request must be signed by the veteran or the next-of-kin, and the process takes up to three to four weeks to complete.
https://www.archives.gov/veterans/military-service-records