Continuing their successful collaboration to accelerate reform of juvenile justice system responses to youth with behavioral health needs, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation (MacArthur Foundation) announce the launch of their 2015-16 Improving Diversion Policies and Programs for Justice-Involved Youth with Behavioral Health Disorders: An Integrated Policy Academy-Action Network Initiative.
Up to four states will be selected to participate in this opportunity to improve policies and practices for these youth – an opportunity proven very successful for the 12 previous Policy Academy participants.
“This initiative is about helping youth with behavioral health needs who interact with the juvenile justice system find a path forward and the support they need to lead a healthy, productive, and lawful life,” said SAMHSA Administrator Pam Hyde. “Thanks to the work of the Policy Academy-Action Network, meaningful reforms have happened in juvenile justice programs across the country, allowing the youth in contact with the juvenile justice system a greater hope for a better outcome. I look forward to seeing the innovative reform approaches this next group of participants can bring to ensuring that we are providing our youth with opportunity for success.”
Most youth in contact with the juvenile justice system in this country have a diagnosable behavioral health disorder. Prevalence studies have found that up to 70 percent of youth in the juvenile justice system meet criteria for a mental disorder. A survey of juvenile detainees in 2000 found that about 56 percent of the boys and 40 percent of the girls tested positive for drug use at the time of their arrest. About 60 percent of youth involved with the juvenile justice system diagnosed with a mental disorder or substance use disorder have both.
Many of these youth end up in the juvenile justice system, not because of the seriousness of their crime, but because there is a lack of appropriate community-based treatments and services to address their specific needs, behavioral health conditions go unrecognized, or systems are not coordinating effectively.
“Through this collaboration, more states will have access to the leading experts and latest research on best practices for addressing the needs of at-risk youth,” said Laurie Garduque, MacArthur’s Director of Justice Reform. “It is our hope that as these proven strategies spread and are more widely adopted, fewer youth with behavioral and mental health needs will be detained in justice systems without the resources or expertise to properly care for them.”
Policy Academy-Action Network initiatives bring together SAMHSA’s Policy Academy mechanism and the MacArthur Foundation’s Models for Change Action Network strategy to allow participating states to a) learn about effective interventions and the latest research and b) work on similar innovations in policy and practice in a cross-site effort. This combination of resources facilitates development and implementation of policies and programs that divert youth, as early as possible, from the juvenile justice system to appropriate community based behavioral health services. Throughout the initiative, special attention will be devoted to the following:
- Integrated responses to co-occurring mental and substance use disorders
- Research-based screening and assessment
- Evidence-based and promising-practice approaches
- Disparity in treatment of youth of color within the juvenile justice system
- The role of trauma in lives of youth in contact with the juvenile justice system
- Deliberate coordination among youth-serving systems to improve outcomes for youth with behavioral disorders who are involved in the juvenile justice system
This project will be coordinated by the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice at Policy Research Associates, Inc. and the Technical Assistance Collaborative, Inc. For more information or for an application, please contact Karli Keator at [email protected] or 866-962-6455.
