INITIATIVE WORKS TO HELP KIDS
INVOLVED IN JUVENILE JUSTICE,
CHILD WELFARE SYSTEMS
MIKE HAGBURG
Attorney at Law
Since July 2017, representatives from many
corners of North Dakota government have
been working with consultants from the
Robert F. Kennedy (RFK) Children’s Action
Corps to develop new ways to help children
caught up in both the juvenile justice system
and the child welfare system.
The group presented its full report, findings,
and recommendations to the public on July
12. The report is available on the North
Dakota Supreme Court website.
The RFK Children’s Action Corps has
worked with state and local jurisdictions
for more than 15 years to help “dual
status youth” – kids who are involved
simultaneously with the juvenile justice
system and the child welfare system. RFK
has developed a framework for government
teams to follow in analyzing and examining
the situation of dual status youth in an area
and then formulating an action strategy for
improvement.
In North Dakota, the dual status youth
initiative was headed up by a leadership
team consisting of Supreme Court Justice
Lisa Fair McEvers; Shari Doe, director
of Children and Family Services for the
Department of Human Services; Lisa
Bjergaard, director of the Division of Juvenile
Services for the Department of Corrections
30
THE GAVEL
and Rehabilitation; and Terry Traynor, chair
of the Juvenile Justice State Advisory Group.
Working under the leadership team was
an executive committee chaired by Cory
Pedersen, Juvenile Court Director for the
South Central Judicial District, consisting of
members from the courts and social service
systems as well as representatives from a wide
range of agencies from the Indian Affairs
Commission to the Department of Public
Instruction.
The study and analysis at the core of the dual
status youth project was carried out by three
groups: the data collection, management, and
performance measurement subcommittee;
the resources and practices subcommittee;
and the law policy and information sharing
subcommittee.
The data subcommittee worked to identify
dual status youth currently involved in
the system and then looked closer at their
characteristics. It determined most of the
youth were 14 years old or younger when
they first came in contact with the juvenile
justice system; that many ended up being
placed in group homes or other facilities;
and that behavioral health problems, like
substance abuse, were common among the
youth and their families.
The resources and practice subcommittee
looked at the ways the juvenile justice and
child welfare systems handle dual status
youth and tried to identify ways that case
flow could be changed to achieve better
outcomes. The subcommittee determined one
of the best ways to improve the handling of
dual status youth would be for representatives
of the different systems to work more closely
together as a team on behalf of the kids.
Finally, the law and policy subcommittee
examined statutes and rules governing
privacy of records relating to dual status
youth and tried to find legal and appropriate
means to overcome barriers to sharing
information and cooperating in the care of
dual status youth.
Based on the findings and recommendations
of the subcommittees, the executive
committee developed a strategy for both
immediate and long-term actions to help
children involved in both the juvenile justice
and child welfare systems. Responsibility
for executing the strategy will belong to an
implementation team made up of members
drawn from the existing subcommittees as
well as new members from the agencies that
will be carrying out the plan.
The implementation team’s initial goals
include completing new policy and protocols
for handling dual status youth; developing
tools to guide new practices and procedures,
including a release for information sharing
and a new benchbook section for judges
handling dual status cases; organizing
training on the new procedures; and
finalizing a memorandum of understanding
between the court system and the
Department of Human Services on sharing
of information.