Razor wire fence borders the Metro Regional Youth Detention center in Atlanta, Ga. JJIE Staff, 2010. File photo.

County Police Called to Quell Riot at Georgia YDC

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Operations have returned to normal at the DeKalb County Regional Youth Detention Center (RYDC) after local law enforcement were called in to secure the facility following a riot this past Sunday. More than half of the 64 juvenile inmates were involved in the disturbance, according to a report by WSB’s Richard Belcher.

This is the second time in less than six months county law enforcement have been called on to regain control of the RYDC. In May, a DeKalb County SWAT unit was called in after what was called a “group disturbance” by then DJJ spokesperson Scheree Moore.

In 2011, at least two similar incidents occurred at Eastman RYDC near Macon, Ga. In February, outside law enforcement from two nearby counties were called in to help regain control and return the 60 inmates involved to their cells.

DJJ officials declined to comment, only saying that the investigation is ongoing, but Atlanta’s WSB TV was able to piece together a timeline of what happened in the facility on the afternoon of Oct. 2 through a combination of police reports and a 911 call from an official working at the time of the riot.

The most recent incident was the largest such disturbance reported to date, involving at least 34 of the 64 youth held at the facility, according to the 911 call.

Also in May, a murder suspect escaped from the DeKalb RYDC. The 16-year-old escapee was apprehended later the same week, but the circumstances surrounding the escape are still unclear.

Citing budgetary constraints the DJJ closed two RYDC facilities last spring, although neither of the closed facilities were near Eastman or DeKalb. Twenty RYDCs remain active throughout the state. In addition there are six long-term Youth Development Campuses in Georgia.

Students Hopeful New College Loan Program Will Take the Pressure Off

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Beginning in January, students who borrow to pay for college will keep more of their paycheck when it comes time to pay the loans back. Last Wednesday, President Barack Obama announced a plan that would cap monthly payments on federal student loans to 10 percent of the borrower’s discretionary income. The change comes after a petition on the White House website asking for student loan forgiveness received 32,000 signatures. Although the focus of the plan is not on debt relief, the new proposal would forgive student loan debt after 20 years of payments. The program is a modification of an earlier proposal approved by Congress that would have taken effect in 2014 and capped monthly payments at 15 percent of a student’s income.

Giovan Bazan, 21, speaks at the 11th annual CHRIS KIDS fundraiser in September, 2011. Atlanta, Ga.

Georgia Advocate Speaks Out Against Psychiatric Medication Use in Nation’s Foster Care System

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Alongside photographs of rocker Jon Bon Jovi and Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, Giovan Bazan looks downright blithe. Although they tower over him, the tuxedo-clad Bazan wearing a slight smirk, his gelled hair and pierced ears sharply contrasting his suit-and-tie apparel.

With his cheery disposition, you wouldn’t suspect Bazan had a troubled childhood. In reality, the 21-year-old has spent a majority of his life in foster homes, and for most of his childhood, he was prescribed anti-depressants and behavioral disorder drugs.

“I went into foster care at 11 months old,” the Los Angeles native said. “When I was six, they put me on medication.”

By many accounts Bazan has come a long way since his days in foster care. In September he spoke at Atlanta-based CHRIS KIDS' 11th annual fundraiser alongside towering protraits of celebrities. He has adressed state legislature multiple times about issues pressing foster youth in the state. He has managed to turn his troubled childhood into a stepping stone, not a crux.

Kathy Colbenson, CEO of CHRIS KIDS and co-organizer of the fundraiser, said Bazan's combination of determination, will and outlook has set a tremendous example for children around the nation facing similar circumstances.

“I think what he’s doing is awesome,” she said.

Series Explores the Bully on the Playground and in our Lives

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Who hasn’t been part of, or witness to, an ugly incident on the playground? You know the scene. Recess is going well, everyone is having great fun, then a disagreement ensues, over who knows what. Before you know it, there’s a torrent of threatening words, a flurry of shoves and finally a knee to the gut or a punch in the face. It can be a rough place, the playground.

Judge Teske Gives Voice to Juvenile Justice Reforms on National Stage

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Regular JJIE contributor Judge Steve Teske was recently featured in The Washington Post for his crusade to end the school-to-prison-pipeline. The Post examines how Teske’s work to reduce schools’ referrals to juvenile court has gained a national audience.

Teske says zero tolerance policies have resulted in too many kids entering the juvenile justice system. In Teske’s opinion, “zero tolerance often means overpunishment for low-level misdeeds,” according to The Post. Because of that, he helped bring reforms to his home community of Clayton County, Ga., where Teske is chief juvenile judge. Since implementing the changes, juvenile crime has dropped, recidivism is down and graduation rates are up.

Teske, the story says, remains tough on crimes involving guns and drugs.

“The cases we have in court now are the burglars, the robbers — the kids who scare you, not the kids who make you mad,” Teske told The Post.

As Teske travels the country speaking about the need for reform, the success of Clayton County, The Post notes, is now inspiring communities in Connecticut, Indiana and Kansas, among others, to implement similar reforms.

And Teske is quick to point out his own teenage lapse in judgment, a school prank that today would have landed him in juvenile court. At 13, he pulled his school's fire alarm but his principal insisted the school handle Teske's punishment.

“Would I even be a judge today had I gone to jail that day?” he asked in The Post.

In New York and Across Nation, Demonstrations Grow As Media Begins to Pay Attention

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Demonstrations that began in the financial district of Lower Manhattan are spreading to cities across the United States, and now Ireland, fueled in large part by social media and the Internet. Collectively known as Occupy Wall Street, the protests are a response to what protestors view as income inequality and “greed and corruption” among the nation’s richest one percent, according to a website loosely affiliated with the movement. Protestors call themselves the “99 percent.”

Initially ignored by major news outlets (NPR, for example, declined to cover the protests their first week), the protests have grown through word-of-mouth on the Internet and through social media such as Twitter. Media have criticized the protests for lacking clear goals.

“We went from media ignoring us to controlling the news cycle. It's important to celebrate victories 4 morale & this change is a Victory,” wrote OpWallStreet on Twitter.

In a nationally televised press conference on October 6, President Barack Obama said the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations are a product of “broad-based frustration about how our financial system works.”

Largely viewed as a reaction by the left, prominent conservative activists have responded to the protests with their own “We are the 53 percent” website, referring to the number of Americans they claim pay income taxes. The assumption is that the protestors on Wall Street are part of the 46 percent who do not pay income taxes and that the protestors have failed to take personal responsibility for their economic plight.

But as The Washington Post points out, this is a strange position for conservatives to take as it flies in the face of decades of conservative tax policy aimed at reducing or eliminating Americans’ tax responsibility. In fact, The Post says, tax cuts put in place by both Republican presidents George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan lowered the tax liability for income levels across the board, not just for the wealthy.

Despite the criticism from the right, the protests have spread to cities across the country. Demonstrations have popped up in Atlanta, San Francisco and other cities. English language Al Jazeera features a map of all the demonstrations. Protests in Boston lead to the largest mass arrest in that city since the Vietnam War. Police arrested veterans and others after the protestors refused to move from a series of parks known as the Rose Kennedy Greenway, according to The Boston Globe.

National Youth Justice Awareness Month Aims to Raise Issue of Juvenile Incarceration

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This October marks the fourth annual National Youth Justice Awareness Month. The month long program, sponsored by the Campaign for Youth Justice, involves activities and events across the United States that are centered on raising awareness and civic involvement with youth justice issues, primarily the incarceration of minors in the prison system of the nation.

National Youth Justice Awareness Month was created by Tracy McClard, a Missouri mother whose 17 year-old-son committed suicide while incarcerated in an adult prison. McClard, who now runs the organization Families and Friends Organizing for Reform of Juvenile Justice, said that she began the program as a means to raise awareness about the incarceration of minors in the United States.

“One reason why we started the National Youth Justice Awareness Month is because [the general public] doesn’t understand what it’s like to have a child in jail at all,” McClard said. “If you don’t know what it’s like, it’s real easy to approve of policies that you don’t understand or know the statistics about.”

Advocates for reform also point to statistics showing the number of youth in detention. This week, for example, the Annie E. Casey Foundation issued a new report on juvenile detention in the United States. The report, No Place for Kids: The Case for Reducing Juvenile Incarceration, details the enormous cost associated with detaining tens of thousands of young people each year.

Celebrating the Power of the Still: Photography and its Place in Our Lives

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JJIE launches Arts site:
Not too many years ago, the still photo was the domain of the professional and the dedicated hobbyist. Today, when school children routinely have iPhones at the ready, we’ve reached the point where the world is our collective subject, caught from a billion different angles.

And what a glorious addition to our gallery of life’s great riches it is, this daily chronicle of human life, the capture of otherwise forgotten moments, the tally of the small order of life's minutiae as well as the dramatic breaths in time that bring about outcries of emotion, the sparking of movements, the fall of governments.

With so many photos taken by so many photographers, though, the prevailing opinion may be that the art form has been eroded, that the cascade of mostly mediocre images pummels the viewer into disinterest. The riveting scene from a few years ago now ranges from mildly interesting to old hat.

But the truth is, stunningly wonderful photography exists at the top of the populace’s current body of work. These are the images produced by those who know the science of the trade and practice it with a passion, every day. You see their work in the giant metro papers, but also in galleries. The composition, if you will, is there. A nice picture, that on closer inspection tells a story that demands your attention and stirs your emotions.

Today, JJIE introduces Bokeh, what you might call our fine arts site. Here is a place where some very fine still images will reside, along with photo essays and written essays on the art of photography.

Some of this work will include those at top of the field. On Monday, we begin publishing photographer Richard Ross’ work. Ross spent five years photographing and interviewing some 1,000 inmates in youth detention centers all across the country.

Other work on Bokeh (the name roughly means, ‘the aesthetic quality of the blur in that part of the unfocused image’) includes our own. Today, a photo essay, “Saturday in the Park,” by JJIE photographer Clay Duda runs on the site. This is our attempt to capture the voices and thoughts of kids on common, but important, questions of the day. (Click here or see the introduction to the essay below.)

And finally, through our partnerships with groups such as VOX Teen Communications, you’ll see the work of young photographers, the way they see the world and the issues dominant in their lives.

Youth as its subject and the quality of the work are the common threads in the photography of the professionals, the up-and-coming photojournalists and the dedicated beginners congregating on Bokeh.

What you see on Bokeh is meant to be craft, strong and compelling, a home for the best work on the issues of juvenile justice.

We hope you enjoy it.

California Foster Care, Mental Health Reforms

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Under a new agreement, California will begin providing intensive mental health services, both home- and community-based, for children in foster care or at risk of entering the foster care system as part of the early periodic screening, diagnosis and treatment (EPSDT) requirements mandated by federal law.

The new services will be available to a class of children covered under Medicaid, a requirement virtually all foster kids and those at risk of entering foster care meet, according to advocates.

The agreement is the result of a settlement reached after nearly two years of negotiations in a class action suite, Katie A. v. Bonta, aimed at statewide child welfare and health reform. The case, first filed more than nine years ago, charges county and state agencies with neglecting to provide federally-mandated mental health services to children in the state’s foster care system.

The California suit is just one of many that is in the process of or has already been filed across the country seeking to force states to comply with federal Medicaid requirements concerning the well-being of children.

New JJIE Columnist Will Field Questions

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When you are struggling with a substance abuse issue -- what to do with a son, daughter, friend or yourself -- you have to seek professional help. No one should travel this journey alone.

We do what we can here at the JJIE to cover issues dealing with young people, including substance abuse, addiction and recovery, but we aren’t experts.

So we’ve gone out and found one. Neil Kaltenecker is on the board of the national Faces & Voices of Recovery and is executive director of the Georgia Council on Substance Abuse.

Got a question? Every month, Neil will write a column offering advice.

Submit your questions through the form provided and bookmark www.jjie.org/advice to keep up with regular updates.

All you have to do is Ask Neil. She knows.