Increased Teen Driver Restrictions May Not be Working

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A lot of debate exists about whether teen driving restrictions are successful, and a new nationwide study says graduated driver licensing programs placed on younger teens are merely shifting the dangers to older teens, according to the Los Angeles Times. But then others still support a study published last year in the journal Traffic Injury Prevention that found the rate of fatal crashes to be lower and the accident rate for 18- and 19-year olds to be essentially the same. For more than a decade, many states have enacted laws to restrict their newest teen drivers, such as restricting the hours when they can get behind the wheel and whom they can bring along as passengers, and public officials believed they were saving lives. Now, this new study published in the latest edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association, suggests otherwise. When the researchers examined data on more than 131,000 fatal crashes involving teen drivers from all 50 states and the District of Columbia between 1986 and 2007, they found that the number of fatal crashes among 16- and 17-year-old drivers has fallen.

Photo credit: khteWisconsin/Flickr

Young and Poor in America

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Some 46 million people (a number representing more than 15 percent of the population) in the nation now live below the poverty line. Dismal figures released by the Census Bureau last week not only brought news of a record number of poor living in poverty in the United States, they also revealed that young people have suffered more than any other group during the nation’s economic downturn. Young people between the ages of 15 and 24 saw their family’s income fall 15.3 percent between 2007 and 2010, the most precipitous decline of any group. They were followed by those aged 45 to 54, who witnessed a fall off of 9.2 percent, while those 65 and older saw incomes rise by more than 5 percent, according to the Census. Poverty experts have good reasons why the young have absorbed much of the pain.

Three Strategies for Changing Juvenile Justice

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A recent report from the National Juvenile Justice Network (NJJN), titled, "Bringing Youth Home: A National Movement to Increase Public Safety, Rehabilitate Youth and Save Money," documented the extraordinary number of states and jurisdictions (at least 24) that are closing or downsizing their youth correctional facilities, due to budget cuts, legislation, lawsuits, and pressure from reformers. (Download the report for tips on ways to downsize wisely.)

This is a good thing, because it means taxpayers can save money or avoid the high cost of incarceration, and reallocate those monies to community-based programs that are more effective at helping young people turn their lives around. Right on the heels of the NJJN report comes a new report from Jeffrey A. Butts and Douglas N. Evans from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice's Research and Evaluation Center in New York, titled, Resolution, Reinvestment, and Realignment: Three Strategies for Changing Juvenile Justice. In it, they ask:

Do these reforms represent a permanent shift in policy and practice, or are they merely a temporary reaction to tight budgets and low rates of violent crime? Will policymakers maintain the reforms if and when crime rises and budgets rebound?

Study Looks at Strategies for Juvenile Justice Reform

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A study by researchers at the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice released this week attempts to answer these larger questions and highlights some of what the authors believe to be some of the more sustainable examples of juvenile justice reform being implemented around the country.

Overloaded Public Defense Systems ‘Jeopardizing The Fairness of Our Justice System,’ Report Finds

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The ongoing overburdening of U.S. public defense systems that serve millions of people annually is jeopardizing the fairness of our justice system and can result in more and longer prison sentences, concludes a recent report published by the Washington D.C.-based Justice Policy Institute (JPI). According to the report, 73 percent of county-based public defender offices lacked the requisite number of attorneys to meet caseload standards, while 23 percent of these offices had less than half of the necessary attorneys to meet caseload standards. With an increasing overload of cases, lack of quality defense and a shortage of resources, the report argues, justice is not being served and the wellbeing of millions of people is at stake. The findings in System Overload: The Costs of Under-Resourcing Public Defense echo the perspective shared by Jonathan Rapping, associate professor at Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School and founder and CEO of the Southern Public Defender Training Center, which trains public defenders across the southeastern United States. Rapping tells JJIE.org, “we need to make sure that we create a campaign to view juvenile defenders as part of the larger public defender community; they’re just as important as their counterparts in the adult system.

KIDS COUNT: Significant Decline in Children’s Economic Well Being Over Past Decade

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There has been a significant decline in economic well being for low-income children and families in the last decade, according to the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s annual KIDS COUNT Data Book.

Among the findings, the official child poverty rate, a conservative measure of economic hardship according to the report, increased 18 percent between 2000 and 2009. The increase represents 2.4 million more children now living below the federal poverty line, returning to roughly the same levels as the early 1990’s.

“In 2009, 42 percent of our nation’s children, or 31 million, lived in families with incomes below twice the federal poverty line or $43,512/year for a family of four, a minimum needed for most families to make ends meet,” Laura Speer, associate director for Policy Reform and Data at the Casey Foundation, said in a press release. “The recent recession has wiped out many of the economic gains for children that occurred in the late 1990’s.”

Parents Beware: Identity Thieves Are Targeting Children, Study Finds

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It seems that identity thieves have set their sights on some new, more vulnerable victims – children. A study released earlier this year shows that children’s identities are being stolen at a rate 50 times greater than that of adults. A child could have his or her social security number stolen by a stranger at birth or shortly thereafter, from common places such as a school, hospital, or doctor’s office. Social Security numbers are issued using a system that is more or less easy to predict, making it possible for thieves to snag brand new numbers, or ones that are just a couple of years old. Most children don’t find out until later in life when applying for jobs or loans.

Teens Living Near Fast Food Eat More Fast Food, Study Finds

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Following in the footsteps of the familiar movie maxim, “If you build it, they will come,” a new study found California teens that live in neighborhoods with lots of fast food restaurants eat lots of fast food. The study found that the average California teen lives or goes to school in an area with more than seven times as many fast food restaurants, liquor stores and convenience stores as healthy food options such as farmers markets and grocery stores. The unsurprising result: the average California teen is 18 percent more likely to eat fast food at least twice a week than teens who live in neighborhoods with more healthy options. All of that junk food leads to the intake of excess calories that often leads to obesity, diabetes and other health problems, according to the research. "We have put our children and youth in harm's way,” said Robert K. Ross, M.D., president and CEO of the California Endowment, which funded the study.

Juveniles in Custody Dropped 12 Percent, New Report Says

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A new report shows that nationally the total number of juvenile offenders in custody dropped by 12 percent from 2006 to 2008. The biannual census by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) surveyed juvenile residential facilities about population, size and security measures, among others. According to the report, the drop may be explained by a decline in juvenile arrests during the same period. OJJDP acting administrator Jeff Slowikowski writes in the report that while “crowding is still a problem in many facilities, improvements continue.” The number of facilities that were at or above their bed capacity dropped nearly 20 percent between 2000 and 2008. To read the complete report click here.