Workers are skipping out on L.A. County’s juvenile halls. Here’s how to improve conditions — for everyone.
We must shift focus to prioritize healing, for the sake of youth and the adults whose job is to care for them
By Willis Jacobson, National Center for Youth Law Media Relations Manager
According to a recent report from the L.A. Times, Los Angeles County Probation Department officers — overseers of the largest juvenile justice system in the U.S. — are skipping work at alarming rates. That’s incredibly distressing.
It’s also understandable.
The only way to fix this mess of a problem — which is wasting taxpayer dollars, denying youth critical services and supports to which they’re entitled, and, worse, putting children and staff in harm’s way daily — is to shift the entire system. We must move away from the punitive and dehumanizing qualities that define our current juvenile justice systems and instead create programs that prioritize healing and positive youth development rooted in communities. We’ve seen these programs work and we know they can succeed.
We also know the status quo isn’t working.
From the L.A. Times, which reports that dozens of officers within the L.A. County Probation Department fail to show up for work each day:
The problem, some staffers say, stems from violence inside the juvenile halls — fights among the youths, which staffers are supposed to break up, as well as aggression directed at staffers — which makes many dread coming to work. The county’s leave policy is generous, giving many staffers a large reserve of sick days they can use to skip a shift.
It’s a vicious cycle. With fewer staffers, the halls become even more dangerous — and the reasons to call out more compelling. … To fill the gaps, the county paid tens of millions in overtime last year.
Given these conditions, it’s easy to see why these officers would rather not be at work. Everyone suffers when in abusive environments. The youth in these facilities can’t go home after a shift or simply call out and avoid it altogether, however. They must live in this environment — one that even the adults in charge would rather not endure.
It’s impossible to make the work of jailing children more pleasant. Locking up a child has been shown to exacerbate underlying traumas, as well as unmet health and development needs, leading to that child having an increased likelihood of future arrest and incarceration.
The critically-needed, major shift would be to significantly redirect funding to support programs and community-based organizations that actually improve the lives of young people, rather than punish them for responding in developmentally appropriate ways to the horrific conditions around them. If L.A. County took this approach, it could solve two critical issues: improve the safety and future prospects of children in its care, and motivate its staff to feel like their work is worth doing.
The negative impacts of incarceration on youth and their development, as well as general public safety, are significant and well known. NCYL has long supported efforts to move away from this harmful practice. Diversion programs supported by NCYL and public and private partners in Santa Clara County, as an example, recently helped cut the youth incarceration rate there in half and allowed many young people to improve their lives rather than endure added trauma.
Every child deserves the opportunity to grow, learn from mistakes, and receive guidance and support. It’s critical that both young people and the adults whose job it is to assist and care for them are set up for success.
Willis Jacobson is the Media Relations Manager at the National Center for Youth Law. A member of NCYL’s Communications team, Willis strives to elevate NCYL’s work in the media and ensure that coverage involving NCYL’s focus areas — or any topics involving young people — is accurate, respectful and shared through an appropriate cultural and racial-justice lens.
