CRANSTON, R.I.  June 28, 2012  After an extensive selection process, Corrections Director Ashbel T. Wall II has announced the appointment of Elizabeth Earls of South Kingstown, R.I., as Assistant Director of Rehabilitative Services. She replaces 33-year Department veteran Roberta Richman, who retired at the end of June.


For over two decades, Earls has served as President and CEO of The Rhode Island Council of Community Mental Health Organization, a non-profit association with annual budget of $.7 million, representing 11 non-profit community behavioral healthcare organizations. During her tenure there, she has, according to Director Wall, garnered enormous respect for her knowledge of the field, collaborative philosophy, integrity and skill in working through complicated and sensitive issues. Director Wall goes on, Liz possesses a sophisticated and comprehensive understanding of the ways in which mental illness and involvement with the criminal justice system intersect.


From 1994 to 1997, Earls was also CEO of Community Treatment Affiliates, Inc., where she was responsible for all aspects of management and development of the managed behavioral healthcare company, including contract implementation, business development, and network development.


Ms. Earls professional affiliations are too numerous to name but include serving as Board Chair of the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Council for Community Behavioral Health, and the Rhode Island Coalition on Mental Health. She is an appointee to the Governors Advisory Council on Health, the Governors Council on Behavioral Health, and the Governors Commission on Healthcare Reform. She is a founding member of the Rhode Island Childrens Policy Coalition, and the Closing the Addiction Treatment Gap Coalition. She is a past Board of Directors member of the Womens Development Corporation and Women in Transition  a non-profit dedicated to developing community correction alternatives for women. She is a member of the Rhode Island Housing, Mortgage and Financing Corporations Thresholds Advisory Board. For five years during the 1990s, she was a mentor with the RIDOCs Womens Mentoring Program.


Ms. Earls received her B.S. in Psychology from Georgetown University and her M.A. in Pastoral Ministry from Boston College Institute of Religious Studies. She was a member of Leadership Rhode Islands 1993 class. She will join the Corrections Departments ranks in late July.

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