AUGUSTA, Maine -- A task force in Maine is recommending that the state's only juvenile-corrections facility be emptied within three years.

A group of legislators and juvenile justice experts has spent more than six months analyzing Long Creek, Maine's only juvenile facility. It also hired the Center for Children's Law and Policy, a D.C.-based nonprofit, to write a report examining the state's juvenile justice system.

This extensive report was presented at the statehouse this week, with recommendations for increasing community-based responses and limiting the number of confined youths.

Atlee Reilly is the managing attorney at Disability Rights Maine and a task force member. He was asked if he thinks Long Creek can be phased out within three years.

"Hopefully it won't take that long," says Reilly. "If a lot of these recommendations are followed, it will become even clearer than it is now that Maine does not need a facility of the type and size of Long Creek."

The facility can house more than 160 youth, but these days it usually has fifty to sixty young people there. This is also because Maine has diverted a lot of youths from Long Creek in the past decade.

The task force strongly recommends funding more community-based alternatives, including mental-health and substance-abuse treatment programs.

According to the report, more than half of the young people at Long Creek are there simply because they need care and have nowhere else to go. The report also says that 73% of those detained at Long Creek for more than thirty days were just waiting for another placement or community-based programming.

Malory Shaughnessy is the executive director of the Alliance for Addiction and Mental Health Services in Maine and a task force member. Shaughnessy says one of the biggest challenges is the low level of Medicaid reimbursement for behavioral-health treatment.

"We have empty beds in our residential treatment units because reimbursement rates have not kept up and they cannot afford to hire staff to staff those beds," says Shaughnessy.

She claims there are currently thirty-five to forty empty beds because of this workforce shortage.

Shaughnessy notes that reimbursement rates for behavioral health services from MaineCare, the state's Medicaid program, haven't changed since the minimum wage was $5 to $6 an hour. Now it's $12 an hour.

So, because these facilities can't afford to hire staff, Shaughnessy says too many youths are waiting for addiction and mental-health treatment.

"Youths that are prescribed 20 hours of intensive treatment for six months get maybe 10 hours or get none at all," says Shaughnessy. "Or we have over 500 kids at various times, of youth on waiting lists for this treatment."

Rep. Michael Brennan, D-Portland, a co-chair of the juvenile justice task force, is sponsoring a bill that would phase out Long Creek and provide $3.5 million this year for community-based therapeutic services and other youth programs.

Right now, Maine spends about $17 million a year to operate Long Creek. Brennan's bill has a public hearing next week.


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Efforts to keep young people out of the criminal justice system are working, according to a new Sentencing Project report.

Elie Zwiebel, attorney and executive director with the Transformative Justice Project of Colorado, said the vast majority of adolescents in the justice system - disproportionately children of color and other marginalized groups - have committed low-level, non-violent offenses.

He said programs that bring young people face to face with victims, and help them repair the harms they caused, send an important message.

"We are saying that we value keeping those young people in our neighborhoods," said Zwiebel, "because we recognize that they should have a chance to learn and grow, and to ensure that they can become pro-social beneficial members of their communities."

The report highlights a decade-long effort to increase diversion programs in Colorado. Today, half the state's court districts divert adolescents to restorative justice programs.

More than 90% complete the program, fewer than one in 10 commit a new offense, and 99% of victims reported being satisfied with the process.

Dick Mendel, senior research fellow for youth justice at The Sentencing Project and the report's author, said community-based programs also benefit taxpayers.

The average cost of locking up an adolescent is $588 a day, but it costs just $75 a day for programs with wraparound services.

"Diversion tends to be cheaper," said Mendel. "It's not a net cost, it's a net savings, even in the short term. And it's especially a net savings financially in the long term, because these young people are much less likely to come back."

The report challenges political rhetoric that only tough-on-crime policies can make communities safer.

Researchers found that being arrested in adolescence actually increases the likelihood of recidivism, and greatly reduces a child's chances for success in school and beyond.

Zwiebel said he believes it's time for a different approach.

"We have tried - as a nation, and as individual communities within our nation - to implement tough-on-crime policies for decades," said Zwiebel. "For decades we tried that, and it didn't work."




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A new report showed a decade after being passed, Kentucky's juvenile justice reform law is getting results.

It found 60% of juvenile cases were diverted to alternative programs in 2020, compared to 41% in 2013. Instead of being sent to in detention centers, kids in diversion programs participate in home supervision, group homes, foster care, community programs and wraparound services.

Richard Mendel, senior youth justice research fellow for The Sentencing Project, said the state has also made strides in reducing racial disparities among kids whose cases are diverted. He pointed out statewide coordinators work across counties to help youth and their families navigate the system and find alternatives to detention.

"Kentucky looked at this, the state, and they very quickly changed their process for notifying people," Mendel explained. "Instead of sending a form letter, they started calling and engaging the families, and explaining why it's better to keep your kid out of court."

According to the Kentucky Justice and Public Safety Cabinet, in 2022, 982 youths were placed in an alternative program. In the first half of last year, 726 were placed. A spokesperson for the Cabinet said the number is expected to continue to increase, year-over-year.

Mendel added the goals of alternative programs are to ensure the public remains safe and the young person is set on a positive life path to reduce the odds of reoffending in childhood or as an adult.

"Diversion tends to be cheaper," Mendel emphasized. "It's not a net cost, it's a net savings, even in the short term. And it's especially a net savings financially in the long term, because these young people are much less likely to come back."

Last year, Gov. Andy Beshear signed Senate Bill 162, which provides more than $25 million in funding for Department of Juvenile Justice staff salaries, transportation costs and expanded programming and diversion resources, such as residential psychiatric treatment for youth with severe mental health issues.


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A new report by national researchers says Iowa is making progress in reforming its juvenile justice system, and finding ways to steer kids away from crime - long term.

The state convened a task force last year to study youth crime diversion programs.

Senior Research Fellow for Youth Justice with The Sentencing Project, Dick Mendel, said Iowa is one of the states making progress on addressing juvenile justice issues, by focusing on ways to keep kids from being incarcerated - and maybe discouraging them from committing crimes in the first place.

"Diversion tends to be cheaper," said Mendel. "It's not a net cost, it's a net savings, even in the short term. And it's especially a net savings financially in the long term, because these young people are much less likely to come back."

Iowa has also implemented restorative justice programs, which engage young people in repairing the harm caused by their behavior. That can often mean face-to-face meetings with their victims.

The Sentencing Project report also shows that Black youth in Iowa tend to be arrested for disorderly conduct more than white youth by a factor of 8 to 1, despite comprising a much smaller percentage of the state's population.

Mendel said while Iowa and other U.S. states are starting to bolster diversion programs, the idea of finding ways to rehabilitate young people and keep them from offending again is not new.

"When you look at other nations, 75 to 80% of the young people who are identified as possibly being fit for prosecution, are diverted," said Mendel. "Other countries have seen this research, and they've responded."

Iowa, Florida, Georgia, Kansas and Utah now track results of their diversion programs, which Mendel sais helps those states to make them more effective.




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