$1.5b juvenille acoountability bill set for floor action

As County News went to press, the House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), was preparing to send a new juvenile block grant program for state and local governments to the Senate floor. The bill, titled the Juvenile Accountability Block Grants Act of 1997 (Section 301 of H.R. 3), introduced by Rep. Bill McCollum (R-Fla.), would authorize a $1.5 billion funding level.

At least 75 percent of the funds must be distributed at the local level. Although the legislation contains several controversial features such as a provision that requires states and counties to send juveniles 15 years or older to adult court when they commit serious crimes, the bill also contains a number of positive provisions, including a new block grant formula that relies substantially, for the first time, on the use of criminal justice expenditure data to determine city and county allocations.

Two-thirds of the formula is based on relative criminal justice expenditures at the local level. One-third is based on the volume of serious crime.

The $1.5 billion block grant, authorized over a three-year period, would be used for:

• building, expanding or operating temporary or permanent juvenile correction or detention facilities
• developing and administering accountability-based sanctions for juvenile offenders
• hiring additional prosecutors, so that more cases involving violent juvenile offenders can be prosecuted and backlogs reduced
• providing funding to enable juvenile courts and juvenile probation offices to be more effective and efficient in holding juvenile offenders accountable
• establishing court-based juvenile justice programs that target young firearms offenders through the establishment of juvenile gun courts for the adjudication and prosecution of juvenile firearms offenders
• the establishment of drug court programs for juveniles so as to provide continuing judicial supervision over juvenile offenders with substance abuse problems and to provide the integrated administration of other sanctions and services
• establishing and maintaining interagency information-sharing programs that enable the juvenile and criminal justice system, schools, and social services agencies to make more informed decisions regarding the early identification, control, supervision and treatment of juveniles who repeatedly commit serious delinquent or criminal acts, and
• establishing and maintaining accountability-based programs that work with juvenile offenders.

Rep. Frank Riggs (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Youth and Families, has jurisdiction for the reauthorization of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act and is soon expected to introduce his subcommittee bill with a major emphasis on prevention.

At some point, Rep. McCollum's H.R. 3 and Frank Riggs' bill are expected to be merged together.