Individuals returning to the community from jail often face difficulties accessing the varied health, social, and other services required to improve reentry and reduce recidivism. This report describes a pilot study, the Co-Design of Services for Health and Reentry (CO-SHARE), that used an innovative, evidence-based method known as Experience-Based Co-Design (EBCD) for returning individuals and service providers to collaboratively identify priority needs and recommendations for improving health and reentry services in Los Angeles County.
CO-SHARE is the first pilot study of EBCD in the United States. Results of the project focused on both the feasibility of applying EBCD in a community-wide service system in the United States and the recommendations concerning promising solutions and key design principles generated by study participants for improving services for the reentry population in Los Angeles County.
The findings should be of value to policymakers, funding organizations, service providers, and community advocates interested in new methods for meaningfully engaging reentry and other vulnerable populations in improving the safety net systems they rely on.