EDITORIAL: Redemption must remain part of juvenile prison plan
The governor has been busy selling his plans to rescue the state from financial collapse. Practically none of those plans offer comfortable, no-brainer choices.
Here's one more with potentially serious consequences: Jerry Brown wants to do away with the decrepit California youth prison system to save hundreds of millions of dollars. Juvenile offenders would be handed off to the counties, shifting direct expense away from the state, which reportedly spends $234,000 per ward each year.
Brown's plan has problems that aren't easily shrugged off.
Most, if not all, county detention systems are overcrowded, underfunded or in various states of disrepair.
The plan doesn't appear to provide clear safeguards that would keep juveniles convicted of lesser crimes out of adult prisons. What if the counties, deep in their own budget problems, can't accommodate them? Will these kids end up in adult facilities? Will counties lean toward prosecuting more youth offenders as adults to avoid having to house them? Will they be tempted to not prosecute them at all?
We agree that the state corrections system is in need of major reform, especially the juvenile branch. But we must remember that adult prisons are full of inmates who are kept away from more youthful offenders for reasons that include -- but aren't limited to -- coerced gang indoctrination and advanced criminal training.
Incorrigible youth offenders are likely to end up in adult populations. The others, though, could perhaps be housed in or near adult institutions to save money and minimize administrative redundancy, but they must be protected -- segregated from adult inmates and given opportunities for genuine reform while they have their whole lives ahead of them.
Brown's aspirations are worthy. But any plan must be part of a wide-ranging re-imagining of the state's bloated penal system. For youthful offenders especially, redemption must remain part of the equation.
