TRENTON
- The New Jersey Juvenile Justice Commission
(JJC) has released the Juvenile Detention
Alternatives Initiative (JDAI) Annual Data
Report for 2009, which shows that the joint
initiative of the JJC, New Jersey Judiciary,
and numerous county agencies is safely reducing
the unnecessary use of secure detention
for New Jersey’s youth. The report
documents annual trends in the use of county-operated
juvenile detention centers. Currently, 12
counties are participating in JDAI in New
Jersey including: Atlantic, Camden, Essex,
Hudson, Monmouth, Bergen, Burlington, Mercer,
Ocean, Union, Passaic and Somerset. The
JDAI Annual Data Report presents information
for the 11 New Jersey JDAI sites that were
active throughout 2009.
“Due to the Juvenile Detention Alternatives
Initiative, New Jersey continues to make
great strides in reducing the unnecessary
use of juvenile detention, while maintaining
community safety,” said Veleria N.
Lawson, the executive director of the Juvenile
Justice Commission. “JDAI is a partnership.
By working together, we will continue to
examine and improve our juvenile justice
system and expand the reach of JDAI.’’
Judge
Glenn A. Grant, acting administrative director
of the New Jersey Courts, said, “JDAI
has been tremendously successful by keeping
troubled youth out of detention facilities
and in their communities, where they can
receive the support and services necessary
to help them avoid further trouble with
the law.”
"New
Jersey's 2009 annual report on its detention
reform efforts underscores the very impressive
results this state has achieved through
the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative.
The inappropriate or unnecessary use of
secure detention has been dramatically and
safely reduced, saving taxpayer dollars
and improving the odds that delinquent youth
can be redirected to productive behavior,"
said Bart Lubow, the director of programs
for high risk youth at the Annie E. Casey
Foundation.
In
April 2004, New Jersey was selected as an
official replication site for the Annie
E. Casey Foundation’s Juvenile Detention
Alternatives Initiative and awarded $200,000
by the foundation. As the lead agency, the
JJC worked in partnership with the Judiciary
and other state and local agencies through
the Council on Juvenile Justice System Improvement,
which guides the statewide initiative. Each
participating county also has a local county
council that relies on collaboration, leadership,
and data to make improvements in the county
juvenile detention system.
Juvenile
detention is a temporary placement of a
youth accused of a delinquent act, while
awaiting the final outcome of his or her
case in court. The purpose of detention
is to house youths who, by virtue of their
alleged offenses or documented prior histories,
pose a serious public safety or flight risk.
A
primary goal of JDAI is to make sure that
secure detention is used only to ensure
that serious and chronic youthful offenders
are detained, and that effective alternatives
are available for other youth who can be
safely supervised in the community while
awaiting final court disposition. The initiative
provides a framework of strategies that
help reduce the inappropriate use of secure
juvenile detention, while maintaining public
safety and court appearance rates. A major
focus of the work is reducing the disparate
use of detention for minority youth.
-
Comparing the year prior to JDAI in each
site to the current year, across all eleven
sites average daily population has decreased
by -42.9%. On any given day, there were
288 fewer youth in secure detention, with
youth of color accounting for 88.7% of
this drop.
-
Across all eleven JDAI sites, more than
four-thousand (4,091) fewer youth were
admitted to detention in 2009, as compared
to each site’s last year prior to
JDAI, a decrease of -47.5%.
-
Over the past year alone, all JDAI sites
reduced the total number of kids admitted
to detention for a technical violation
of probation, for a combined reduction
of -21.0%.
- In
2009, across the eight sites reporting
detention alternative outcome data, the
success rate averaged 79.0%.
- Across
these sites an average of just 3.7% of
youth were discharged from a detention
alternative program as the result of a
new delinquency charge.
- Finally,
the number of girls in detention on any
given day has decreased by -60.0% across
the eleven sites.
In
November 2008, New Jersey was named by the
Casey Foundation as the first JDAI state
model site. With this designation, New Jersey
provides jurisdictions with an example of
how to implement juvenile justice system
reform successfully. Through funding from
the Annie E. Casey Foundation, two states,
Missouri and Minnesota, have sent delegations
to New Jersey to learn about statewide JDAI
implementation.
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