The House of Representatives approved H.R. 2578, the Commerce, Justice, Science 2016 spending bill, on June 4, 2015.  The bill funds many of the Justice programs we follow.  The House dealt with stringent spending caps that have been reinstituted for the first time since 2013.  As a result, programs suffer significant cuts, but some fare better than others.  

On the positive side, drug courts see an increase to $41 million (vs. $38 million in FY 2015), Byrne JAG gets $345 million (vs. $333 million in FY 2015), and NICS Improvement gets $73 million (the same in FY 2015).  Programs that suffer cuts include the National Institute of Justice and the Bureau of Justice Statistics.  Both these programs do not get a funding line item, but the Committee directs the Department of Justice to support them "under existing research funds."  The Legal Services Corporation is cut by $75 million to $300 million.  Overall, the Office of Justice Programs within the Department of Justice is cut by $225 million versus FY 2015 funding.  Finally, Title II funding for the Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Program is eliminated.  

Members of Congress in both chambers have been making the case that the spending caps be raised to ameliorate the cuts to the programs above.  However, no proposals have emerged yet.  

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-IA) and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) recently introduced bipartisan legislation reauthorizing and reforming the JJDPA.  The bill, S. 1169, updates longstanding programs aimed at serving and protecting youth who come into contact with the criminal justice system.

The JJDPA, which was originally passed in 1974, is designed to help states address youth who come into contact with the criminal justice system.  It also established requirements to protect children from the dangers of being jailed with adults, keep status offenders out of jail, and address the disproportionate number of minority youth in the criminal justice system.

Below are some of the highlights of S. 1169, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Reauthorization Act of 2015  (see Act 4 Juvenile Justice, A Campaign of the National Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Coalition). 

Core Protections:

• Strengthens the Deinstitutionalization of Status Offenders (DSO) core protection:  Under current law, status offenders may be held in juvenile locked facilities under the Valid Court Order (VCO) exception, which allows judges to issue detention orders.  The bill requires states to phase out the use of the VCO within three years and allows states in need to apply for one-year hardship extensions through the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP). During the transition period, it also provides extra safeguards for status offenders in locked facilities, including limits on how long status offenders may be detained. 

• Strengthens core protection requiring states to reduce Racial and Ethnic Disparities:  The bill gives clear direction to states to plan and implement data-driven approaches to ensure fairness and reduce racial and ethnic disparities, to set measurable objectives for disparity reduction, and to publicly report the results of their efforts.  

• Improves the Jail Removal and Sight and Sound core protections: The bill extends the jail removal and sight and sound core requirements to keep youth awaiting trial in criminal court out of adult lockups and to ensure sight and sound separation in the limited circumstances where they are held in adult facilities.     

Other improvements:  

• Improves conditions of confinement in juvenile facilities:  The bill calls for states to develop policies and procedures to eliminate the use of dangerous practices, and unreasonable use of restraints and isolation, through the use of alternative behavior management techniques.  The bill calls for the OJJDP Administrator to report annually on state data regarding the uses of isolation and restraints in juvenile detention and corrections facilities.    

• Recognizes the impact of exposure to violence and trauma on adolescent behavior and development:  The bill includes definition of "trauma-informed" and encourages states to ensure that programs and practices designed to address the needs of system-involved youth are both evidence-based and trauma-informed.  

• Provides comprehensive services and supports for youth:  The bill promotes community-based alternatives to detention; encourages family engagement in design and delivery of treatment and services; improves screening, diversion, assessment, and treatment for mental health and substance abuse needs; allows for easier transfer of education credits for system-involved youth; and calls for a focus on the particular needs of girls either in the system or at risk of entering the justice system.  

• Promotes fairness:  The bill supports state efforts to expand youth access to counsel and encourages programs that inform youth of opportunities to seal or expunge juvenile records once they have gotten their lives back on track.  

• Reauthorizes the Juvenile Accountability Block Grant (JABG) program: JABG helps states and localities reduce juvenile offending by providing judges and other juvenile justice officials with a range of age/development-appropriate options to both hold youth accountable and get them back on track so they are less likely to reoffend.  

Oversight and accountability:  

• Increases accountability:  The bill includes several provisions to ensure effective use of resources, to provide greater oversight of grant programs, and to ensure state compliance with federal standards.  

• Imposes a non-compliance penalty: States found out of compliance with a core protection will lose 20% of their Title II formula grant.  Of these monies, 50% will be reallocated to compliant states and 50% will be available to the Administrator to provide technical assistance to states on compliance issues. 

Funding levels:  

• Sets overall authorization levels for juvenile justice funding:  The bill provides $159 million for Fiscal Year 2016 to implement the bill, with a 2% increase each fiscal year for the five-year term of the reauthorization.  

On May 21, 2015, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration on Children, Youth and Families' Children's Bureau, announced the award of a $3.6 million three-year grant to the American Public Human Services Association (APHSA) to expand the National Electronic Interstate Compact Enterprise (NEICE) electronic case management system nationally.  

NEICE is a web-based electronic case-processing system that supports the administration of the Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children (ICPC) by exchanging data and documents across state jurisdictions to facilitate the safe placement of foster children quicker and more efficiently than ever before. 

NEICE was piloted in six jurisdictions - Florida, Indiana, Nevada, South Carolina, Wisconsin, and the District of Columbia.  The 17-month pilot project yielded significant results.  Since the project launch in August 2014, over 6,000 children from those six jurisdictions were entered into the NEICE system. ICPC placement decisions have already been received for almost 4,000 of those children.  The reduction in the time to placements in the pilot jurisdictions ranged between 20 and 40 percent. 

• http://www.yourhonor.com/web/Online/Education
• http://www.tjctc.org/  
• http://www.tmcec.com/programs/judges