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We Welcome lcome to to Be Beyond yond th the e Ta Talking lking Po Points: nts: Pa Part rt 2 We will begin promptly at 11:00 a.m. Do: Click for audio Choose the option Make sure the call in

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Make sure the call in button turns red like this: Click for audio Choose the option To pose a question please use the function

We Welcome lcome to to Be Beyond yond th the e Ta Talking lking Po Points: nts: Pa Part rt 2

Do: Don’t:

Click any other buttons before or during the webinar

We will begin promptly at 11:00 a.m.

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Wel elco come me to to Bey eyon

  • nd

d th the Tal e Talki king ng Poi

  • int

nts: s: Par art t 2

Top Solutions for Florida’s Families

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  • Equity for Girls – The massive inequity in the treatment of girls and young women in
  • Florida. Presented by: Dr. Lawanda Ravoira, D.P.A., President & CEO, Delores Barr
Weaver Policy Center
  • Keeping Foster Children Safe and Ensuring their Well-being – The treatment of
children in the child welfare system. Presented by: Alan Abramowitz, Executive Director, Florida Statewide Guardian ad Litem Program
  • Direct File – The key points and timelines for getting children off to a healthy start.
Presented by: Scott McCoy, Senior Policy Counsel, Southern Poverty Law Center

Today’s Agenda

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Th Than ank k Yo You for u for You Your r Pa Partici rticipati pation!

  • n!
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Key Key Par Partners tners

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Ho Hous usekeeping ekeeping De Deta tail ils

YOUR MIC HAS BEEN MUTED USE THE CHAT FUNCTION TO POSE A QUESTION
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Eq Equit uity y fo for Gir r Girls ls

Girls remain the fastest growing population in Florida’s juvenile justice system. What does the evidence show Florida must do to ensure girls’ unique needs are addressed?

  • Dr. Lawanda Ravoira, D.P.A.

President & CEO Delores Barr Weaver Policy Center

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We engage communities, organizations and individuals through quality research, community

  • rganizing, advocacy, training and model

programming to advance the rights of girls and young women and youth who identify as female, especially those in the justice system.

www.seethegirl.org

A Bold New Direction Mission

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See the Girl

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1 in 3 Referrals to the Juvenile Justice System is a Girl

  • This trend has remained the same over the last decade.
  • There has been a decrease in the number of girls

arrested/referred and incarcerated in the juvenile justice system over the last 10 years.

  • In spite of the reduction seen in the number of girls arrested

and incarcerated in Florida, disparities for girls continue.

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Girls are Entering the System for Less Serious Offenses

Girls rls Boy

  • ys
Felony 36% Misdemea nor 56% Other 8% Felony Misdemeanor Other Felony 58% Other 8% Felony Misdemeanor Other Misdemeanor 34%

2016-2017

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Warrants Attention: Incarcerated for Less Serious Offenses

2016 2016-20 2017

Felony 50% Non-Law VOP 30% Other 4% Felony Misdemeanor Non-Law VOP Other Felony 77% Non-Law VOP 10% Other 3% Felony Misdemeanor Non-Law VOP Other Misdemeanor 16% Misdemeanor 11%

Girls ls Bo Boys

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Youth Needs by Gender at Incarceration

2014-15- PACT assessment at Commitment Girls Boys PACT Assessments N=341 N=2,272 Not Enrolled in School 20% 20% Dependency/CINS-FINS Petitions 31% 15% Parent/Household Member Jail/Prison History 68% 60% Parent w/ Mental Health/Drug Problem 36% 30% Placed Out of Home 33% 21% Suspension History 85% 88% Neglect 20% 11% Physical Abuse History 40% 16% Sexual Abuse History 38% 4% Trauma 40% 19% Witnessed Violence 82% 73% Diagnosed Mental Health Problem 57% 33% Self-Mutilation History 5% 1% Suicide Attempted 6% 1% Suicide Ideation 46% 33% Somatic Problems 27% 18% Drug Problem 84% 85% Alcohol Problem 64% 54% Source: Data extract provided by DJJ Research Department, January 2016
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Disparities, Gendered Response by Society & JJ System Toward Girls’ Behaviors

  • Lower risk of recidivism and lower public risk
  • More likely to enter the system for more minor offenses
  • Detained for longer periods of time
  • Probation violations – return to detention or placement without committing

a crime

  • Charges inside the system (assault on LEO, acting out in detention or program)
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Immediate Call to Action

  • Invest community-based girl-centered alternatives to

incarceration aligned with NEED

  • Provide interventions that address intergenerational

trauma vs. investing in lock-up that further traumatizes

  • Reform probation and reduce overuse of TVOP (1:3 girls

for TVOP) (Washington State Opportunity-based model)

  • Reduce overuse of detention and length of stay
  • Expand Open Doors Outreach Network to address needs
  • f victims/survivors of trafficking
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Moving Forward Justice for Girls Movement

  • In 2019, the JFG Statewide reform movement will launch.
  • Actively create the future by aligning leading edge research, sophisticated

techniques rooted in political science and expert strategic communication.

  • At the same time, the Policy Center and The Children’s Campaign will

release the 10 year report card on the status of reform for girls in Florida.

  • Stay tuned for more information and opportunities for involvement.
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References

  • Acoca, L. & Dedel, K. (2002) Educate or Incarcerate. Oakland, CA: National Council on Crime and Delinquency.
  • Christy, A. & Guenther, C. (2016) Report of 2015 Baker Act Data. Tampa, FL. USF.
  • Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2016) Youth Risk Behavior Survey.
  • Florida Department of Correction (2017). 2015-2016 Agency Statistics: Inmate admissions: Female offender admissions.
  • Florida Department of Juvenile Justice (2016b). Delinquency Profile, 2015-2016.
  • Inniss-Thompson, M. (2017) Summary of discipline data for girls in U.S. public schools: An analysis from the 2013-14 U.S.
Department of Education Office for Civil Rights data collection. National Black Women’s Justice Institute.
  • Office of Program Policy Analysis & Government Accountability (2017). DCF and its lead agencies have to resolved issues
related to serving commercially sexually exploited children (Report No. 15-06).
  • Patino Lydia, V. & Baker, P. (2013). A Wake-Up Call: Trends in girls’ involvement in the justice system. www.Seethegirl.org.
  • Patino Lydia, V. & Moore, A. (2015). Breaking new ground on the First Coast: Examining girls’ pathways into the juvenile
justice system. www.Seethegirl.org.
  • Patino, V. Ravoira, L., Wolf, A. (2006). A rallying cry for change: Charting a new direction in the State of Florida’s response to
girls in the juvenile justice system. Oakland, CA. National Council on Crime and Delinquency.
  • Ravoira, L. & Patino Lydia, V. (2013) Strategic training and technical assistance: A framework for reforming the juvenile justice
systems’ treatment of girls and young women. Georgetown Journal on Poverty, Law and Policy 20 (2), 297-319
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Ke Keep eping ing Fo Fost ster er Ch Chil ildre dren n Saf Safe and e and Ens Ensuring the uring their ir We Well ll-being being

Why the rapid increase in children entering foster care?

Alan F. Abramowitz Executive Director, of GAL Program

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Increases in Out-of-Home Care

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Complexity of the Issue

More children than money available to serve

  • Federal Law: Family First

 Prevention and group home funding impact

  • Florida’s Unique Challenge: Funding Formula
  • Turnover: Lack of Services
  • Opioid Problem

Limited: Unlimited:

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Decisions About Youth

How should we make these decisions?

  • Who are experts?
  • What do experts say?
  • Look at evidence and research
  • Advocacy must be unique to the child
  • Federal funding policy
  • State funding policy: formula
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Solutions and Discussions

  • Capacity issues
  • Understanding trauma informed advocacy
  • Funding formula state selects to reflect values and outcomes desired
  • Address turnover
  • Dramatic changes needed: foster home licensing
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  • Felitti, V. J. (1998). Relationship of Childhood Abuse and Household Dysfunction to Many of the Leading
Causes of Death in Adults. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14, 245-258
  • Family First Prevention and Safety Act. (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/cb/im1802.pdf
  • Florida Opioid Summary. (2018, February 28). Retrieved from https://www.drugabuse.gov/drugs-
abuse/opioids/opioid-summaries-by-state/florida-opioid-summary
  • The Force for Families. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.youthvillages.org/
  • Kaleidoscope Interventions Children's Therapy Center. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.thepiecefits.com/
  • Sarasota YMCA. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.sarasotaymca.org/safechildrencoalition-about/
  • Florida Guardian ad Litem. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.guardianadlitem.org/

Re Refe ferences rences

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Dir Direc ect File t File

Why are the numbers so high and how can it be best rectified?

Scott McCoy, Senior Policy Counsel Southern Poverty Law Center

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Ho How w Th The e Sy System stem Wo Works: rks:

  • 1. Under FL law, a child = person under the age of 18
  • 2. Children that run afoul of the law will be held accountable in the juvenile

justice system before a juvenile judge in a delinquency proceeding

  • 3. Sanctions in juvenile court = DJJ community-based programs or various

levels of residential programs where kids are not “incarcerated” but are separated from the community

  • 4. Adult system is before the circuit court judge

Juvenile Delinquency System v. Adult Criminal Justice System

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How The System Works:

How children get transferred from the juvenile system to the adult system

  • 1. Indictment – rarely used and only for capital and life sentence crimes
  • 2. Waiver – never used anymore; State Attorney asks juvenile judge to transfer

child to adult court

  • 3. Direct File – primary means of prosecuting a child as an adult
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How The System Works:

How children get transferred from the juvenile system to the adult system

What is Direct File?

  • State Attorney has unfettered power to unilaterally transfer a child to adult court
  • No involvement of a judge
  • Age limits apply
  • i. 14- and 15-year olds may be direct filed for about two dozen felony offenses
  • ii. 16- and 17-year olds may be direct filed for any felony offense
  • 98% of all adult transfers are through direct file
  • Direct File power was given to State Attorneys in the 90s during high crime rates and some
high-profile juvenile crimes
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How Direct File Fails Our Children:

  • 1. Florida prosecutes more children as adults than any other state – even more than Texas and
California with much larger populations.
  • 2. Since 2009, more than 14,000 children – some as young as 10 years old – have been prosecuted
as adults in Florida.
  • 3. During FY2016-17 more than 1,100 children were prosecuted as adults and hundreds more were
threatened with adult prosecution.
  • 4. Most of the children tried as adults are charged with non-violent offenses.
  • 5. Fortunately the number of children being prosecuted as adults is going down but that is likely
because youth crime is at an all-time low.

The Statistics

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How Direct File Fails Our Children

  • 1. Direct Filed children must be held in the adult jail pending trial even though
adult jails are not designed or equipped to house and care for children.
  • Children held in solitary confinement
  • Adult jails are not well equipped to care for children and do a poor
job of providing children with education services that are required by state and federal law
  • 2. Children of color are more likely to be prosecuted as adults than their white
  • peers. Children of color account for 67% of children arrested in Florida, but 77%
  • f those prosecuted as adults.
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How Direct File Fails Our Children

  • 3. Children that are prosecuted as adults are more likely to reoffend than their
peers who are held accountable in the juvenile justice system.
  • 4. According to a JMI study, more than 70% of children that are direct filed
receive adult probation, not prison time—begging the question of why it was necessary to try them as adults in the first place. Adult probation is hard for kids to comply with and as a result many kids end up serving a sentence in adult prison.
  • 5. Children prosecuted as adults receive a felony conviction that burdens them
for the rest of their lives, making it harder to get housing, employment, and education and barring them from serving in the military and voting.
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How To Reform The System

1. Involve a judge in the process by creating a fitness hearing so that the child can make a case that he or she should be sent back to juvenile court. 2. Allow the judge the flexibility to determine where a child should be housed pending trial, i.e., not automatically in the adult jail. 3. Eliminate direct file for 14- and 15-year olds and reduce the number of direct file eligible offenses for 16- and 17-year olds. 4. Create an age limit of 14 years old for indictment so that it matches the other adult transfer methods.

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1. According to a 2017 Right on Crime public opinion poll, 70% of Floridians believe judges, not prosecutors, should decide whether to prosecute a child as an adult. 2. According to the same poll, 74% of Floridians believe children charged with crimes should stay in the juvenile justice system and not be transferred to the adult criminal system.

How To Reform The System:

Wh What at do does es the he pu publ blic ic thi hink nk ab abou

  • ut

t al all of

  • f thi

his? s?

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What is it?

No Place for a Child Coalition

It’s a diverse, nonpartisan coalition of organizations committed to reforming the adult transfer system in Florida www.NoPlaceForAChild.com Follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/noplaceforachild My email scott@noplaceforachild.com

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Re References ferences

  • Right on Crime, Florida registered voter survey, Oct. 23-29, 2017, available at
www.twitdoc.com/upload/bascomllc/right-on-crime-poll.pdf, (last accessed Jan. 18, 2017).
  • Jailing Juveniles (2007, November). Washington, D.C.: Campaign for Youth Justice.
  • National Prison Rape Elimination Commission, Report 18 (June 2009), available at
www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/226680.pdf.
  • The James Madison Institute. (2016). The James Madison Institute Policy Brief. Retrieved from
www.jamesmadison.org
  • No Place for a Child. (2018). No Place for a Child Social Media Mobilizing Toolkit 2018 .
  • Fabrizio Lee. (2017). Florida RV Survey. Fabrizio Lee.
  • Florida Campaign for Criminal Justice Reform. (2017). Floridians Overwhelmingly Support Criminal Justice Reform .
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Q&A