(a) Pursuant to Section 3073, the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation shall provide a supportive housing program that provides wraparound services to mentally ill parolees who are at risk of homelessness using funding appropriated by the Legislature for that purpose.

(b) Providers participating in this program shall comply with all of the following:

(1) Provide services and treatment based on best practices.

(2) Demonstrate that the program reduces recidivism and homelessness among program participants.

(3)  Have prior experience working with county or regional mental health programs.

(c) (1) An inmate or parolee is eligible for participation in this program if all of the following are applicable:

(A) He or she has a serious mental disorder as defined in Section 5600.3 of the Welfare and Institutions Code and as identified by the department, and he or she has a history of mental health treatment in the prison’s mental health services delivery system or in a parole outpatient clinic.

(B) The inmate or parolee voluntarily chooses to participate.

(C) Either of the following applies:

(i) He or she has been assigned a date of release within 60 to 180 days and is likely to become homeless upon release.

(ii) He or she is currently a homeless parolee.

(2) First priority for the program shall be given to the lowest functioning offenders in prison, as identified by the department, who are likely to become homeless upon release.

(3) For purposes of this subdivision, a person is “likely to become homeless upon release” if he or she has a history of “homelessness” as that term is used in Section 11302(a) of Title 42 of the United States Code and if he or she satisfies both of the following criteria:

(A) He or she has not identified a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence for release.

(B) His or her only identified nighttime residence for release includes a supervised publicly or privately operated shelter designed to provide temporary living accommodations, or a public or private place not designed for, or is not ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings.

(Added by Stats. 2012, Ch. 41, Sec. 70. (SB 1021) Effective June 27, 2012.)