Institute to Hold Press Call on Release of Report – Bring Our Children Home: Building Up Kids Through New Jersey’s Youth Services Commissions
Institute to Hold Press Call on Release of Report – Bring Our Children Home: Building Up Kids Through New Jersey’s Youth Services Commissions
Legislators and Community Advocate Will Join Institute to Discuss Report and Policy Recommendations for Improving Youth Services Commissions
Newark – On Wednesday, August 7 at 11 am, the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice will host a media teleconference to discuss the release of its new report, Bring Our Children Home: Building Up Kids Through New Jersey’s Youth Services Commissions.
The report sheds light on New Jersey’s Youth Services Commissions and proposes that by strengthening our state’s current structure through increased funding, community engagement, transparency, and accountability, we can help create a system that builds up our young people, instead of one built on incarcerating them.
CALL: Dial 800.356.8278; Code: 567841
WHEN: August 7, 2019, 11 AM ET
WHO:
- Andrea McChristian, Institute Director of the Criminal Justice Reform Initiative, primary author of the report
- Sandra B. Cunningham, New Jersey Senator for the 31st legislative district, sponsor of S3701/New Jersey Youth Justice Transformation Act
- Nellie Pou, New Jersey Senator for the 35th legislative district, co-sponsor of S3701/New Jersey Youth Justice Transformation Act
- Shavonda E. Sumter, New Jersey Assemblywoman for the 35th legislative district, sponsor of A5365/New Jersey Youth Justice Transformation Act
- Britnee Timberlake, New Jersey Assemblywoman for the 34th legislative district, sponsor of A5365/New Jersey Youth Justice Transformation Act
- Juanita Ashby, 150 Years is Enough Campaign member and Campaign to End the New Jim Crow advocate who has attended Youth Services Commission meetings
Background:
The youth justice system in New Jersey is broken. A Black child is 30 times more likely to be locked up than a white child, even though they commit most offenses at similar rates. The state’s youth facilities are half-empty, yet New Jersey plans to build three new youth prisons.
The Institute believes that the State should instead invest in community-based programming on the front end that keeps kids out of the system and in their communities. Yet, our state has failed to prioritize Youth Services Commissions (YSCs)—the county bodies responsible for planning youth services ranging from prevention to reentry services—that are tasked with keeping kids from youth incarceration. Indeed, while the State has increased the amount it spends to incarcerate our young people by a shocking 370 percent in the last two decades, it has increased funding for YSCs by only 50 percent. Further undermining YSC effectiveness, YSCs have been plagued for years by a lack of community engagement, transparency, and accountability. Our report argues that, through the implementation of policy reforms, YSCs can play a significant role in building up our kids instead of incarcerating them.
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