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State of Juvenile Crime 2002
On any given day in the United States, there are more than 100,000 young people in juvenile detention facilities. Many observers predict that number will only increase if our country's approach to juvenile justice does not change.
Juvenile facilities across the country are overcrowded and overwhelmed with troubled youth who have few other places to go. Many of them are in juvenile hall waiting for openings at group homes and drug centers. Others are serving time for status offenses or probation violations. Over the past decade, despite an overall decrease in serious and violent crime by American youth, the number of juvenile offenders transferred to criminal courts designed for adults has increased by more than 30 percent. In 2000, California voters got behind tougher penalties for juveniles and passed Proposition 21, allowing teenagers as young as 14 to be tried as adults.
Nationwide, increasingly fewer juvenile cases are being resolved informally, and alternatives to incarceration have grown scarce, leaving delinquent youth cycling through aging, cramped facilities. The juvenile halls of both San Francisco and Alameda counties are at least a half-century old and often overcrowded. But many people fear that responding to the overcrowding by building larger detention centers will fail to address the fundamental problems of troubled youth.
Californians are spending more money than ever on prisons and corrections. Yet, according to one state oversight panel, California's response to the needs of its youth calls for a major overhaul. In a report released in June 2000, the bipartisan Little Hoover Commission concluded that state efforts to curb juvenile delinquency are underfunded and mismanaged, and failing California's neediest children. The commission also charged the state with falling behind on the latest research into violence, prevention measures and brain development. But these criticisms have all been heard before. In the six years since 1996, when the commission reported similar observations, the state has implemented only one of 16 recommendations for reform of its juvenile justice system.
The detainment of a young person is a blow to any family or community, but numbers show that some are feeling the blows more profoundly than others. Children of color make up about one-third of the youth population nationwide but represent almost 70 percent of juveniles in custody. In San Francisco, more than half of detained youth are African American, and in Alameda County, African Americans constitute more than 60 percent of bookings into juvenile hall. In both instances, these rates are significantly higher than their share of the general youth population. Incarceration rates for Asian and Latino youth are similarly disproportionate. Also, while boys still make up the overwhelming majority of the delinquent population, girls are increasingly at risk, as their arrest rates have risen steadily over the past two decades.
Concerns about overcrowding, recidivism and high rates of detainment for minorities are mobilizing counties across the country to revamp their approaches to troubled youth. Citizen groups have played a big part in much of the reform. One Bay Area coalition, "Books Not Bars" -- made up of high school students, lawyers and human rights activists -- is rallying for more prevention and alternatives to juvenile hall. The coalition celebrated one victory this winter when it blocked a building plan that would have doubled the size of Alameda County's juvenile hall and created one of the country's largest youth detention centers. The facility will still be built, but it will be significantly smaller.
In a state that currently ranks first in prison spending but 43rd in education spending, calls for reform abound. But many questions remain unanswered: What is the best way to deal with juvenile offenders? How do we address the disproportionate sentencing of defendants of color? How will Bay Area and California communities and leaders respond in the future to the everyday needs of our most challenged youth?
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