Update on Boys Totem Town

The Ramsey County Board of Commissioners met on January 28 to hear from their Corrections Department

about issues related to the Juvenile Justice facilities for the county. As you may remember, a report was released last year that found that Boys Totem Town, as it is currently housed, has some major inadequacies. In addition, the downtown Juvenile Detention Center has also developed some facility short-comings related to safety and environmental controls (like temperature, access to light, etc.).

At the same time, JDAI (the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative) has been examining the whole process that we use to deal with youth who get into trouble - along the whole range of what "getting into trouble" can mean. "The purpose of the Juvenile Justice System, as agreed to by Ramsey County JDAI Stakeholder Group, is to attend to public safety and foster positive youth outcomes that are fair and equitable." (This is from the JDAI website.) The county and the community recognize that the juvenile justice system is only one part of a system (including families, neighborhoods, institutions, etc) that looks to the well-being of our young people. But they also recognize that there is a preponderance of young people of color (particularly African American youth) who actually end up entangled with the juvenile justice system. Consequently, we all need to be addressing the factors that create that reality. (For example - 70% of youth in the system are African American, 70% have substance use or abuse issues, 50% have mental health issues, and 75-90% have experienced significant trauma in their lives.)

But to start with, looking at the continuity of services that the Ramsey County Juvenile Justice System provides means assessing the programming at the Juvenile Detention Center and Boys Totem Town. And once that programming is assessed, do the facilities allow for the effective range of programming that we know helps youth and their families address past actions and prepare for positive participation in our society?

Over the last months, the Corrections staff has identified three potential approaches to assuring that facilities and programming are aligned for most effective work with troubled youth. They are:

• Have a new BTT facility co-located with a new JDC
• Have a new BTT facility and a JDC that is either renovated or not at the current location
• Develop a partnership with Hennepin County's Home School (BTT equivalent)

The meeting this week focused on discussing the merits and difficulties of the third option. It is important to understand that at this point in the discussions, the County Commissioners are collecting information on all the options so that a decision can be made as to which will provide the best possible outcomes for Ramsey County youth and their families.

The partnership with Hennepin County is being explored because it could potentially provide expanded services for Ramsey County youth - currently BTT is for boys only, girls who have problems are not being addressed in other ways; and currently Ramsey County contracts out work with sex offenders to other agencies. Hennepin County has successful programs for both girls and for sex offenders.

Discussion focused on whether there is philosophic alignment among the programming approaches for the two counties and where the two complement each other. There was discussion on the variety of ownership models that exist for joint programming as this approach suggests. There was discussion of the implications for human resources (how would staffs be merged, how would contracts be established, seniority be dealt with, etc. etc...) and for the governance of such a joined program and facility.

There was NO discussion of where such a potential joint facility would be located. There was NO decision about whether this was a preferred option among the three or not. There was ONLY a decision that the option should continue to be explored; that elected and court officials from both counties should meet, be brought up to speed on discussions so far, and that the implications of such a choice on everyone involved be further explored.

The hope is that there will be another meeting of the Ramsey County Commissioners in March at which time there MAY be a decision made as to which of the three options - new, co-located BTT and JDC (Ramsey County only); new BTT built and JDC at downtown location either renovated or not (Ramsey County only); or new joint venture between Ramsey and Hennepin County initiated - which of these three best meets the objective of an effective, fair and equitable juvenile justice continuum of services for our youth.

Stay tuned for how the community can be involved in all this...