partnership: Older and younger people working together around a table

Opinion: Here’s How to Make Youth-adult Partnership Work

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How different would today look if people most affected by decisions held equal power in making those decisions? 

If public health decision-makers included Black, Indigenous and Latinx patients who are disproportionately affected by COVID-19 and suffer the effects of racially biased health care? If police accountability review boards, prosecutor’s offices and elected city leaders had actual power over law enforcement activities and included the Black, Indigenous and transgender people most affected by overpolicing, police violence and the prison industrial complex? If economic policy was set in partnership with hourly, tipped, domestic and essential workers who drive so much of the economy? 
If students, especially Black and Indigenous students and students with differing ranges of intellectual and physical abilities, partnered in education policy and planning? The vision arising from these questions pushes past those in power today “reaching out” to engage the community. Rather, the vision upends traditional decision-making structures and positions everyone who will be impacted by a decision as equal partners in power, accountability and value.

South Carolina: Men standing seen from the back wearing orange uniforms with scdc inmate on back.

South Carolina Inmates, Families Charge They’re Not Being Protected From COVID

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Mark Trammell hadn't been a free man since he was a teenager, but this year he hoped that was about to change. 

Set for parole in February, Trammell was ready to go home to see his family. After more than 40 years for voluntary manslaughter and kidnapping in South Carolina Department of Corrections (SCDC) facilities, he wanted his last moments to be outside prison walls. His stage 4 liver cancer, the result of untreated hepatitis, would make him particularly vulnerable to diseases like COVID-19. Not only would he be denied parole, but by June 6 he would die in a Columbia, South Carolina hospital from COVID-19. Though initially his death was erroneously reported to his family as related to his cancer, Trammell would be one of the first reported COVID-19 deaths at an SCDC facility.

book: Book between mountains gap.

Incarcerated Youth Need Books to Combat Their Increased Isolation

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As a society, we owe a special commitment to youth in custody. Incarceration of any kind causes very real trauma and doing so at a time when young people are growing and learning only compounds the trauma. Our juvenile justice system must seek not to punish, but to support these children’s social, emotional and educational development. 

In normal circumstances, our national juvenile justice system does not always serve these children properly. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, we are failing our community’s children. With the current health restrictions around the pandemic, youth in custody have extremely limited or no in-person visitation from family and friends.

Auburn: Parking lot for building with 2 small turrets framing entrance

Auburn Prison COVID-fighting Policies Inconsistent, Deficient, Inmates Say

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Editor's note: Several of the seven people now incarcerated at Auburn Correctional Facility who were interviewed requested anonymity due to fear of retaliation. Several family members requested anonymity as well. AUBURN, N.Y. — In late May came the news from Albany: The first day of family visits —  suspended due to COVID-19 — would be pushed to August. Cliff Graham, an inmate at Auburn Correctional Facility, an all-men’s maximum security prison, saw the memo, typed a message on his tablet and waited in his cell for his 15 daily minutes of Wi-Fi. 

For two months he had been confined to a cell for at least 22 hours a day. There were no more Alcoholics Anonymous courses.

Auburn: Women wearing masks, carrying bags wait on line outside building

As New York Prisons Open to Visitors Again, Mixed Emotions Run High

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AUBURN, New York — On the day she would see her father for the first time in nearly five months as he bounced among three maximum-security prisons, Julianna Bundschuh, 5, hung on the metal fence of Auburn Correctional Facility as if it were at a playground. Near her stood Kristina Abell, who arrived first at 7 a.m. Wednesday with eight boxes of food for her son. Behind Abell was a woman named Courtney who didn’t want to give her last name. She came to see her fiance and was wondering how long these visits would last. None had seen their loved ones since mid-March, when state-run prisons across New York suspended visitation due to coronavirus.

California: Young guy with stand-up locs outside

California Probation Can Handle COVID, Proposed Transition of High-needs Youth to Counties

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Probation in California has the responsibility of treating and supervising our community’s most high-needs and high-risk youth. We take our role in promoting healthy, prepared and positive adolescents seriously and provide each youth the supervision and support services they need to help guide them into adulthood.  

The use of individualized, evidence-based practices to advance the long-term well-being of youth is foundational to our work. We rely on practices and tools such as risk and needs-based assessments, cognitive development, counseling, therapy, and trauma-informed care and evidence-based supervision models. 

Our rehabilitative and health-centered focus has been proven successful. 

Since 2007, California’s juvenile justice system, led by local probation departments, has successfully decreased juvenile detention rates by 60% and juvenile arrest rates by 73%. In addition, we safely treat 90% of youth in the justice system in our communities, and have diverted nearly 67% of youth. When the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in California this year, county probation departments remained focused on keeping our youth safe both in the community and in our secure facilities while still creatively providing the supports and services each youth needed for stability and their individualized growth.

gun violence: Man in short-sleeved pink shirt, mask speaks at outdoor podium surrounded by crowd wearing masks

New York City’s Public Advocate Unveils Proposal to End Gun Violence

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NEW YORK — Jumaane Williams, New York City’s public advocate, announced his proposal for curbing gun violence in the five boroughs after a week of at least 64 shootings. Only 20 were reported for the same week in 2019. Williams unveiled his ideas in a letter to Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York City Police Commissioner Dermot Shea on Friday. Putting into place CompStat, the New York Police Department’s statistical data tool and a new “Advance Peace” crisis management system were at the top of his list. He also called for changes to the police department’s responses right away but the timeline was unclear.

NY Legislation- Parole, Solitary: Man in sweats, sneakers, sunglasses, hat speaks on lawn with fake graves behind him.

NY Bills on Parole and Solitary the Focus of Overnight Demonstration

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ALBANY, N.Y. —A makeshift cemetery created outside the New York State Capitol building was the backdrop to a last-ditch overnight demonstration to push for three longshot criminal justice bills organizers helped write. Organizers for Release Aging People from Prison (RAPP) and the New York Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement (#Haltsolitary) had worked on three bills that focused on solitary confinement, paroling certain elderly inmates and changing parole criteria.

telehealth: Doctor with a stethoscope on the computer laptop screen.

More Telehealth Could Be Among Policy, Practice Implications of COVID-19 Pandemic

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In a remarkably short period of time, the COVID-19 pandemic has required us to change almost everything about how we live and work. It has also exposed significant fault lines in our understanding about, and delivery of services to, the most vulnerable in our communities. During this time, many of our systems have been challenged to handle complex crises and rapidly changing circumstances. Just as our health care systems have strained to meet acute medical needs, our education, justice, housing and child-serving systems are also navigating unprecedented challenges. Four Stoneleigh Foundation Fellows shared their preliminary observations on the impact COVID-19 is having on our communities’ young people in a virtual convening in spring.

New Massachusetts Group PPAL Helping Families With Justice-involved Youth During Pandemic

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 In mid-March, everything changed because of COVID-19. One mom said her life changed in 24 hours. Her teenage son had been arraigned for his first offense. He was in detention, though not found guilty, with no option to be heard in court. The schools had closed, daycare closed and the juvenile courts were closed.