County governments have invested nearly a half-billion dollars over the past 15 years to modernize juvenile lockups and now have the capacity to absorb offenders currently housed in the state’s youth prisons, if those facilities are closed, a new study contends.
The report by the San Francisco-based Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice offers fresh data in support of Gov. Jerry Brown’s renewed push to shutter the state’s three remaining youth prisons as part of a historic realignment of California’s criminal justice system.
A total of $455,779,103 was allocated to renovate county facilities, according to the report, with 96 percent going to new maximum-security juvenile halls in 41 jurisdictions.
“These state-of-the-art buildings stand in stark contrast to the dilapidated and archaic 19th-century relics that DJF (Division of Juvenile Facilities) utilizes to house its remaining wards,” reads the report. “The review demonstrates that local secure county-based facilities currently surpass existing state youth correctional facilities in architectural design and structural integrity.”
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