| Following Highfields,
violations found at other facilities
By Gretchen Cochran & Thomas P. Morgan
July 26, 2006
Just as voters
get ready to vote Aug. 8 on whether to continue paying a tax to
support the county’s juvenile justice programs, new questions have
arisen about the quality of the facilities to which Ingham County
youths are sent.
A City Pulse
investigation shows that the problems at Highfields Inc.’s Youth
Opportunity Camp in Onondaga, which the county closed for five
months after complaints of staff abuse, may have been just the tip
of the iceberg.
(Illustration by Ben Corr)
Nine of the 14
similar programs across the state used by Ingham County logged
violations in the past three years, some receiving about the same
amount of substantiated complaints as Highfields, according to the
Michigan Family Independence Agency.
Tying
Highfields with nine violations was Turning Point Youth Center in
St. Johns, where county judges have sent five children since October
2003.
It was there
in August 2004 that a staff member was found to be making
inappropriate sexual contact via e-mail with a police officer posing
as a 14-year-old boy, according a special investigation report
conducted by the state.
In a February
2005 incident at Turning Point, a resident has his arm broken by a
staff member while being restrained.
That same
year, a state investigation revealed that a female staff member at
Turning Point had been engaging in a sexual relationship with a male
resident. The worker was subsequently fired.
The Lakeside
Treatment & Learning Center, a home for abused children in
Kalamazoo, logged eight violations, according to the state. Ingham
County Judges have sent five kids there in the last three years.
In December of
last year, a 10-year-old boy became verbally and physically abusive
to staff members, according to state reports. A supervisor grabbed
the 80-pound boy by the shirt and threw him to the ground. The boy
got back to his feet and hit a worker. The supervisor then picked
the boy up by the neck.
‘We
would never want to use a place where a kid would be at risk. That
is, in fact, why we send kids out of state.’ — Ingham County Family
Court Judge Janelle Lawless
“You’re
choking me,” the boy said in a strained voice. The supervisor let
him go and walked away. He was later suspended.
In another
incident this March at Lakeside,
a boy broke a window and held a shard of glass to another boy’s
neck. The same afternoon, another boy grabbed a fellow resident in a
headlock and repeatedly punched him in the face, giving him a bloody
nose. Both attacks occurred during an afternoon shift in which the
center had half the staff level required by the state.
Back at
Highfields, interim president Larry Miesner says 38 people have been
hired to help staff the recently re-opened camp, each receiving 80
hours of training. Supervisors have received an additional 40 hours
of training, particularly in techniques designed to de-escalate
potentially volatile situations, says Miesner, former director of
the state Bureau of Juvenile Justice
“Remember, the
kinds of youths in a program like this are typically large, angry
young men,” Miesner said.
Incidents like
these involving overzealous staff and angry young people are
happening at youth centers all across the state — not just
Highfields — yet judges continue to send kids to the residential
treatment centers.
When asked why
this was happening, presiding Family Court Judge Janelle Lawless
said: “We would never want to use a place where a kid would be at
risk. That is, in fact, why we send kids out of state.” (Judges have
sent 188 children to out-of-state residential centers since October
2003.)
The warning
County judges
continue to place children in the cited residential centers in spite
of a damning report issued in 2003 by Edward J. Latessa, Ph. D, who
leads the University of
Cincinnati’s Center for
Criminal Justice Research.
Latessa
cautioned the county against referring children to “boot camps or
programs that rely on wilderness and adventure-type activities to
change behaviors. These types of programs have been found to be
ineffective at reducing recidivism and may actually increase
recidivism rates.”
‘‘We
didn’t want to continue spending money on old patterns, throwing
good money after bad.’ — Ingham County Commissioner Tina Weatherwax
“The system
should implement a formal management system to hold the treatment
agencies accountable for the services they provide,” the report
said.
A new direction
Ingham County
taxpayers paid $56,000 for Latessa’s 89-page report out of funds
generated by the Juvenile Justice millage. The millage, approved by
Ingham County voters in 2002, has raised $11.5 million, with about
half going toward consultants, new programs, additional staff and a
youth center on Lansing’s south side. According to the county, $4.9
million remains unspent.
On Aug. 8,
voters will be asked to renew the millage for five years. At a rate
of 0.6 mills, the owner of a home with an assessed value of $75,000
would continue to pay about $45 per year to fund the juvenile
delinquent programs.
But for the
next cycle, many county officials hope to do something different.
“We didn’t
want to continue spending money on old patterns, throwing good money
after bad,” Ingham County Commissioner Tina Weatherwax-Grant says.
Members of the
county commission’s Judiciary Committee, which Weatherwax-Grant
chairs, want to keep as many kids out of the court system as
possible by identifying their problems before they ever have to face
a judge.
In February of
this year, the same month Highfields closed, the county received
another report, this one from Karen Chinn, a South Carolina
consultant who specializes in criminal justice.
The
centerpiece of Chinn’s recommendations, which cost the county
$46,000, was the establishment of an assessment and treatment center
as an alternative to the court system.
The center
would house an alternative day school, a treatment center and an
assessment center, and would serve 30 children during the day as
well as an additional 30 students in its after-school programs.
“There are a
lot of things they did with the money, but most all of it has been
expanding residential placement,” Chinn says. “Now it’s time to
create a better, community based assessment for kids.”
County
commissioners agreed with Chinn, and are scouting locations for a
new center. Officials considered the abandoned Verlinden Elementary
School, but they weren’t able to submit a bid by the May 25
deadline.
Officials are
considering four buildings, said Travis Faulds, director of youth
programs for the Ingham County Family Court: the former Lansing
Board of Realtors building on the city’s west side, the old Sparrow
Hospital Professional building on South Pennsylvania Avenue, the
shuttered Holmes Street School and an office building at 3001 W.
Main St.
If an existing
building cannot be found, it would take about $2 million to build a
new one, according to officials. Operating costs are estimated to be
about $1.1 million per year. All of it would be funded through the
millage.
But the
potential project is not without conflict. In what comes down to a
power struggle, the Family Court Judges chafe at the idea of having
the county commission directing their mission, even though the
commission controls the court’s budget.
Circuit Judge
Laura Baird, one of four judges in the Family Court division, told
Chinn in February, “We will not support an assessment center if it
is not in our control.”
Despite
concerns of control, both the judicial and legislative branches of
county government are behind the idea of an assessment and treatment
center.
In some cases,
kids are doing well in school but have no after-school supervision
and are flirting with gangs or criminal behavior. There is no place
to send those kids now, except to residential programs, says Faulds,
who sits on a committee that issues recommends to judges where kids
are sent. That committee also includes a juvenile court officer and
the court psychologist.
“We don’t want
another incident of shutting down a program,” Faulds says. “It’s a
new trend in juvenile justice. Punishing and shaming doesn’t work.”
Or as Circuit
Judge James Giddings, who presides over the county’s Truancy Court
program, puts it, “It’s pay me now or pay me much more later.”
Proponents of
the assessment and treatment center say it could lead to fewer
children appearing in Giddings’ courtroom.
Frequent flyers
It’s a sunny
afternoon in late June. Fifteen middle school students traipse into
Truancy Court to face Giddings. Most of the kids are frowning, some
taking their seats with their arms grumpily folded across their
midsections. All are accompanied by an adult, either a mother or an
aunt. The kids are in trouble for not attending school and not
responding to programs set up to help them.
But before
Giddings can get to the truants, he has to finish with a 15-year-old
boy who just returned from the Muncie Reception and Diagnostic
Center in Muncie,
Ind., a tough place where inmates
clean toilets with toothbrushes.
County judges
have sent 57 children to Muncie since October 2003. One of Chinn’s
major criticisms of Ingham County’s juvenile justice system is that
far too many kids are being sent out of state.
In the last
three years, county judges have sent 188 children to out-of-state
residential facilities, with the Muncie Reception and Diagnostic
Center being their favorite. Twenty-nine girls were sent as far away
the Mingus Mountain Academy in Prescott Valley, Ariz., nearly 1,600
miles from Lansing.
Ingham
County’s out-of-state placement rate is nearly seven times the
national average, according to a survey conducted by the Council of
Juvenile Correctional Administrators.
Chinn says
moving children away from their families doesn’t help rehabilitate
them, but instead, only makes it more difficult for troubled
children to reintegrate upon returning.
“National
studies will show that a greater impact on changing long-term
behavior and really intervening in a kid’s life is going to involve
working with the family of the unit,” Chinn says. “That’s not going
to happen when you place the kid out of state or wherever the judges
decide.”
But keeping
kids close to their families requires having better local programs,
Faulds says.
“From the
judges’ point of view, the quality of programs and services we’re
seeing out of state are far superior to in-state providers,” Faulds
says.
Nervy Oliver,
deputy administrator for the juvenile court, concurs: “The judges
need options here so they don’t have to place kids out of the
community.”
Even though
the county commissioners and the judges are trying to enhance local,
community-based programs, there are still going to be children that
need intensive, residential care, Lawless says.
Kids’ court
The boy who
just returned from Muncie stands shyly before Giddings. His hands
are clasped, secured with handcuffs. Two chains hang from them,
connecting to manacles around his ankles.
The court
officer explains that the boy wasn’t responding to the restrictive
environment in Muncie, racking up two or three violations each day.
Instead of sending him back to Muncie, Giddings places him in the
custody of his father and grandmother. He will be under intense
probation, with follow-ups three times per week. He’ll have to
perform 100 hours of community service, face intensive family
guidance, and will be tested regularly for drugs.
“You will
return in October to report,” Giddings tells the boy. “I want you
doing your best. If you don’t, you’re going back to Muncie.”
The boy, still
bound in chains, shuffles out of the courtroom and into the waiting
arms of his grandmother. For the first time, his face cracks a
slight smile, revealing a dimple in each cheek.
Then Giddings
proceeds with the truancy cases, of which there are about 400 each
year.
“So have you
been using drugs?” Giddings asks another boy. The boy shakes his
head “no,” but his mother, standing beside him, nods “yes.” He has
not been reporting for drug tests, but even when he was, he tested
positive five times in a two-month period, according to the court
officer.
“You will go
to the county’s Youth Center for the weekend, to get your
attention,” Giddings says, “and then report to Child and Family
Services and an Alcoholics Anonymous program for teens.”
The boy
doesn’t flinch. With an I-don’t-care stare and a fixed jaw, he
swaggers out of the courtroom, his mother trailing behind, to
prepare for his visit to the Youth Center, a short-term detention
center operated by the county.
It might be
too late for this boy, but Faulds and others hope the county’s new
approach will spare many others.
“Kids and
families are falling through the cracks now,” Faulds says. “They
don’t get help until they get into the court system. They shouldn’t
have to wait until then.”
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