A recent report by the Annie E. Casey Foundation heralds a "sea change" in how the U.S. addresses youthful lawbreakers, pointing to a 41 percent decline in the rate of youth incarceration in the past 15 years.
This is heartening news for youth advocates and policy makers who, in New York and elsewhere, have fought to close facilities and fund alternative programs closer to young people's communities. Their successes were possible, in part, because the falling juvenile crime rate has allayed public safety concerns.
Reform has also been spurred by high-profile incidents, such the 2006 death of 15-year-old Darryl Thompson inside Tryon Boys Residential Facility in Fulton County. Thompson died after being physically restrained by staff in response to his repeated questions about his recreational privileges; his family has since been awarded $3.5 million.
While I share the optimism generated by the Casey report, it would be a mistake to celebrate too soon. Much work still lies ahead:
The U.S. still holds the dubious distinction of incarcerating a larger share of its youth than any other developed country, with over 70,000 young people in juvenile facilities and almost 10,000 in adult jails and prisons.
Only one-quarter of confined youth are held for violent offenses and almost 40 percent for non-serious offenses such as technical violations of probation, public order offenses (loitering, for example), or status offenses (behaviors that are considered unlawful only by minors).
The conditions of confinement too often lead to physical and psychological harm. The Survey of Youth in Residential Placement found that 47 percent reported being strip-searched by staff, 35 percent said that staff used unnecessary force, 24 percent had been placed in solitary confinement, and 38 percent were fearful of physical attacks.
Incarcerated youth are substantially more likely than their peers to be racial/ethnic minorities, have special education needs, and to have mental health and/or substance abuse problems.
Residential facilities cost on average $240.99 per day per youth, or $5.7 billion annually.
Failure after release is high. One study found that two-thirds of youth released from New York's juvenile facilities were re-arrested and almost half were reconvicted within two years.
Moreover, the Casey report notes that reductions in youth confinement are not the result of systematic national reform, but rather have been "driven by diverse influences and idiosyncratic policy changes within states, often prompted by lawsuits, mounting budget pressures or shifts in leadership."
The fundamental problem with using confinement to address non-serious youth crime is that juvenile institutions by definition cannot address the social causes of delinquency, such as poverty, social isolation, failing schools, lack of employment opportunities, or exposure to violence. As a result, counselors at youth facilities must reframe the cause of delinquency as poor choices made by young people.
My own research with incarcerated youth finds that even highly regarded therapeutic facilities can stigmatize youth by telling them they have criminal personalities and will likely always be that way. Then, after a course of "treatment" designed to encourage better decision-making, young people are returned to the same crime-ridden, impoverished communities from which they came.
Youth advocates must continue to relentlessly pursue what sociologist Victor Rios calls a "youth support complex," a network of adults and resources designed to support high-risk youth, and continue to divert non-serious youthful offenders into community-based programs that address the real causes of delinquency.
Jamie J. Fader teaches in the School of Criminal Justice at the University at Albany and is author of "Falling Back: Incarceration and Transitions to Adulthood among Urban Youth."
