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In this Juvenile Justice Front Burner:
DJJ PROPOSAL CUTS AT BLUEPRINT Blueprint Commission members included in their report a recommendation that they be reconvened annually for up to three years in order to shepherd and monitor the reform progress. They would be well advised to request a joint meeting with the Secretary and his new executive management team. Which recommendations are supported by the new DJJ leadership? What is the specific timeframe and manner for going forward? This discourse is important as the first test has come not in DJJ comments at community briefings or in presentations by Commission members to legislative committees, but within the body of the DJJ budget recommendations on funding cutbacks as requested by the Florida Senate and Florida House. The assignment by the Legislature to DJJ was complex and large in scope – identify and prioritize $49-million in reductions in an agency whose budget had been reduced already in previous years. Service reductions in an exercise of this magnitude are unavoidable. But would priorities be established to manage the cuts that would follow the vision set by the Commission to “get smart” by “…investing in a continuum of services that address the needs of low-risk offenders outside of secure and residential placements, while continuing to provide appropriate sanctions for youth involved in serious and violent crime”? To DJJ’s credit, the recommendations include the closure of two under-utilized detention centers (St. Johns and Monroe Counties) and shifts funds when appropriate between Trusts and General Revenue totaling $3.7-million to mitigate even further cuts to services. In addition, DJJ did move to reduce hits – from their own internal first draft - to gender specific services to girls and CINS/FINS, an action consistent with the focus of the Blueprint Commission recommendations. That is where adherence to the Blueprint Commission recommendations appears to end. For example, the Blueprint Commission recommended that every circuit should have a fully functioning Juvenile Assessment Center (JAC) to divert youth who pose little risk or threat to public safety away from detention and into diversion programs. This recommendation would have a major beneficial impact on restricting the flow of children into the system and the huge costs to follow. However, the DJJ budget reduction plan eliminates state funding of the Juvenile Assessment Centers. According to the impact statement which accompanied the $7-million proposed cut, approximately 55,000 youth are processed through JACs annually. In Miami-Dade, which clearly has the model in place, youth are diverted successfully without compromising public safety. Other low risk and moderate risk cuts proposed include nearly $3-million in reductions to day treatment, $3.7-million in low risk beds, $5.6-million in moderate risk beds, and $1.7-million in moderate beds in a wilderness therapeutic environment. With $49-million to be reduced by cutting back on services and programs and eliminating others, corresponding administrative cuts would be expected. Legislative staffers have estimated DJJ administrative overhead to be between 5 and 10%. But according to TaxWatch, in a recent report - Complete and Accurate Costing of Residential and Detention Juvenile Justice Programs is Needed to Properly Evaluate State – and Privately Operated Facilities, Jan 2008 – an indirect cost methodology has not been developed or utilized by DJJ. In its report, TaxWatch provided both a minimum and a maximum indirect cost estimate in order to arrive at calculations relevant to that study. Using those percentages here, DJJ indirect costs associated with a $49-million reduction in services and programs would range, in real dollars, between $5.3-million up to as much as $9.6-million. The DJJ budget plan, however, reduces its own overhead by only 3 administrative positions, totaling $283,000. (Note: DJJ is reducing the number of detention employees related to the closing of two centers, but those are not administrative overhead). Of equal concern is the target of residential bed cuts of $16-million. While the impact statement is not specific, it appears that the largest if not the full brunt of the cuts are aimed at private sector providers. If true, it raises questions. TaxWatch pointed out in their report that DJJ under-reports the operating costs of state-run programs and that their costs are actually much higher than the private sector. Provider groups point out that DJJ programs aren’t generating higher quality ratings than their private sector peers even with the higher per diem rates. The DJJ rationale for the private bed reductions as explained in a conference call with the Children’s Campaign is that “unobligated / empty beds were targeted first”. DJJ is in charge of placement decisions and, according to observers, DJJ run programs appear to be filled to capacity while referrals to the private sector have dropped off significantly. DJJ has come forward with a budget reduction plan that offers up $49-million in service cuts with, essentially, no corresponding administrative reductions. View the DJJ budget reduction plan. Here are some ideas for DJJ to consider:
DJJ EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT TEAM UPDATE Gus Barreiro, former Chairman of the House Juvenile Justice Committee, will begin next week at DJJ as a chief official in the Residential Services arm of DJJ. Barreiro while in the legislature initiated oversight hearings into the abuse and neglect of children in juvenile justice facilities and was outspoken in the call for reform in the aftermath of the deaths of Omar Paisley and Martin Lee Anderson. Other changes in DJJ since the last Front Burner include the appointment of Rod Love as Deputy Director and Greg Johnson as Asst. Secretary of Prevention. Both Love and Johnson had served previously on the Executive Management Team. HB 273 moved out of the House Policy and Budget Council on Tuesday afternoon, after it was amended to leave as is the length of time a child could be locked up in detention. The original bill included the expansion of the number of days a youth could be held in detention from 21 to 30, which would have created a significant fiscal impact in a year when fiscal impact is, generally, a deal breaker. The bill in its current form still widens the net of children being held in detention and will push up costs. As was pointed out by Blueprint members and stakeholders in touch this week with the Children’s Campaign, the increased and unnecessary use of secure detention exposes troubled youth to an environment that more closely resembles prisons and jails than the kind of community and family-based intervention proven to be most effective. There is credible and significant research that suggests that being locked up in detention increases the likelihood that the youth will continue to engage in delinquent behavior and the detention experience will increase the odds that the youth will recidivate, further compromising public safety. Advocates for systemic reform for girls point out that the legislation “widens the net” by specifying circumstances that automatically trigger secure detention (including running away); eliminates the required findings of fact prior to placing youth in detention; and, eliminates the requirement for conducting a risk assessment prior to placing youth in secure detention. This is a concern for all youth and it is especially troubling for girls -- given that most girls who are detained now represent a very low risk to public safety in terms of violence or further re-offending. The Department of Juvenile Justice itself has not taken a public position on HB 273 so the heavy lifting up to this point has been left to the counties, public defenders, the Children’s Campaign and other advocates to bring information forward. In an internal DJJ memorandum dated February 29, 2008 and sent to “All Detention Staff”, Mark Greenwald, with DJJ Research and Planning, presented a recent capacity report, “…one of many analyses that will be conducted as the Department prepares materials for an anticipated partnership with the Annie E. Casey Foundation to improve detention operations throughout Florida.” Annie E. Casey is known for its groundbreaking work in Detention Reform through its JDAI – Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative – and has demonstrated success in showing that the use of detention can be greatly reduced without risk to public safety. Greenwald’s report shows that only 3 detention centers did not exceed capacity at some point during FY 2006-07; that seven detention centers exceeded their capacities by 180 days or more during the same time period; and that two facilities exceeded capacity by more than 300 days! It is clear from this report that detention cannot handle more children as a result of House Bill 273. Other serious problems with the bill involve the decision making process regarding placement of youth committed to state custody and conditions for pre-adjudicatory release. Advocates for girls in Florida’s juvenile justice system point to concerns regarding how this legislation as written could negatively impact girls. Girls under the age of 18 have become the fastest growing segment of the juvenile justice population. This trend has raised concerns over the treatment of girls in a traditionally male-oriented juvenile justice system. Two major issues have surfaced. First girls may be incarcerated for behaviors that are more tolerated for boys and second, once in detention, girls may receive poorer treatment and have less opportunity for rehabilitation than do boys. In recent studies, OPPAGA found that girls already spend a longer length of time in the system as compared to boys for less violent offenses. Further, detention facilities are ill-equipped to meet the needs of girls. A recent review by OPPAGA of 90 case files of girls in juvenile justice residential programs in Florida showed that 68% have experienced physical or sexual abuse or neglect and 90% of the girls live with limited or inadequate parental control (Report # 05-13). The number of girls with mental health problems in residential programs is overwhelming where as many as 94% of girls have diagnosed mental health problems. The legislation is viewed as “widening the net” by specifying circumstances that automatically trigger secure detention (including running away); eliminates the required findings of fact prior to placing youth in detention; and, eliminates the requirement for conducting a risk assessment prior to placing youth in secure detention. While this is a serious concern for all youth, it is especially troubling for girls -- given that most girls who are detained now represent a very low risk to public safety in terms of violence or further re-offending. The types of offenses girls commit generally do not pose the same threat to public safety as those committed by boys. The OPPAGA study showed that 16% of girls were committed to residential programs for non-law violations compared with only 9% of boys; and that 36% of girls were committed for misdemeanors as compared with 25% of boys (Report No 06-13). The nature of offenses for which girls are incarcerated may reflect law enforcement practices in which behaviors that were traditionally labeled as juvenile status offenses are now treated as criminal offenses—a practice known as “bootstrapping”. It is not uncommon for girls who are placed on probation as status offenders to be subsequently detained for the offense of “violating a valid court order.” Thus a young woman that initially enters the juvenile justice system for running away may have her legal problems exacerbated if she violates a judge’s order to, for instance, to not runaway. What must be understood is that girls often are running from abusive circumstances in the home because they do not have alternatives. “Bootstrapping” is a way in which status offenders are incarcerated despite legislative barriers set up to stop exactly that. Similarly, some of the increase in girls incarcerated for violent offenses (e.g. aggravated assault and battery) may be due to the unintended effects of new policies on mandatory charging in domestic violence cases. The bottom line: advocates for girls have major concerns that more girls will be detained in secure detention who do not pose a public safety risk. These detention facilities are not equipped to address the serious mental health and gender specific needs of girls. House Juvenile Justice Chairman Mitch Needleman has come forward with a committee bill addressing three priorities of the Blueprint Commission. This bill and its contents will be covered in this week’s edition of Legislative Update (a companion publication of the Children’s Campaign, issued weekly during session).
This Juvenile Justice Front Burner is brought to you by: Roy Miller, President Dr. Lawanda Ravoira, Director - Justice for Girls Initiative |