One-stop center keeps youth out of court

Key Takeaways

To better support at-risk youth, Calcasieu Parish, La., built its Multi-Agency Resource Center, a “one-stop-shop” model that proactively connects young people with community supports before they’re involved with the justice system.

Since opening in 2011, the center has served 22,486 youth, providing 46% of them with immediate services within hours, diverting 88% from formal court processing and keeping 39% from even light touch justice system involvement, according to Anthony Celestine, director of Calcasieu Parish’s Office of Juvenile Justice Services.

“We realized that there was a gap in service, and we needed to expedite that front end of our system and increase opportunities to have more meaningful contact with families,” Celestine said. 

“… We wanted to make sure that we were addressing the needs of the whole child, and we wanted to provide effective services in a timely manner.”

The Multi-Agency Resource Center (MARC) brings together juvenile justice, education and community partners into a single centralized hub to serve at-risk youth between the ages of 6 and 17 in matters related to truancy, ungovernability and runaway behavior. 

“We needed a single point of contact to address front-end support services, and we needed an outlet for law enforcement, schools, community providers, as well as families to refer to our system directly,” Celestine said. 

“So, we saw that need for change, and really realized that sometimes without net widening, if you don’t work with families or young people early on, they will likely return in new circumstances that will leave them caught up in our system and have less productive outcomes.”

The center is open from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Saturday and has a 24-hour helpline for those in need of immediate support. 

Putting the services under one roof has helped families get support more quickly, according to Celestine.

When a youth is referred to the MARC, they and their family undergo a number of screenings to help determine what type of support they need. 

That process has cut the time it takes to connect them with community services from several weeks to just two to three hours.

“We get all the pertinent information and start addressing some of the domains that they’re struggling in to direct them to the appropriate services,” Celestine said. 

“Whether it’s anger management, maybe it’s conflict resolution, maybe it’s [functional family therapy].”

Youth served through the MARC are also less likely to reoffend: The recidivism rate dropped from 26% to 12%, according to an outcome study by the Vera Institute of Justice.

“The rate of recidivism in doing it in that way is astronomically low,” said Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Gene Pittman. 

“It’s incredible what a little bit of intervention and diversion will do.”

The center also helps law enforcement get back on the streets faster, with an average turnaround time of roughly 10 to 12 minutes.

Before the MARC was created, the only option law enforcement had when dealing with youth was putting them in juvenile detention, which resulted in lower-level juvenile offenders filling up the detention center’s limited capacity, Pittman noted.

“In the meantime, we’re not solving the problem, and we’re busy, and it takes guys time and away off the road working on family issues, which is what most of these involve,” Pittman said. 

“… There’s only so many beds [in juvenile detention], and then when you would have a serious gun crime or a violent crime involving a juvenile, the beds were full, so using the MARC as a diversionary tool has kept that limited number of beds from being full, which also means that we can put serious juvenile criminals in juvenile detention, and they’re not walking the streets.”

Over the years, the MARC has evolved from a diversion tool for youth who have committed misdemeanors to one that also supports them before they’re justice-involved, according to Joshua Campbell, the MARC’s assistant director.

“Let’s say a law enforcement officer goes out to the home, and a youth is exhibiting some behaviors that are very concerning, but it’s not a legal issue,” Campbell said in a video published by the parish’s Police Jury.

“That law enforcement officer can, in turn, refer the family to the MARC. You can let the parents know, ‘This is not enough to formally charge youth, but I do see that you need some assistance.’

“… It’s the old adage of if you provide someone with a support, they will use it. We’ve found that if we give families the opportunities, they are going to take advantage of them.”

The center is an Annie E. Casey Foundation national learning hub site, serving as a model training site for juvenile assessment centers interested in replicating the work. Celestine’s advice for localities looking to do something similar: Bring everyone to the table.

“This doesn’t happen overnight,” Celestine said. 

“Our collaborative team met for over two years, stamping out every aspect of this process. You have to have trust in your community.

“The school system has to trust you, Child Protective Services has to trust you, law enforcement, your health community, families, court, the prosecutors and your staff in and of itself has to be able to trust the process. It has to be a meaningful system where you have voluntary referrals.”

In 2017, 348 youth were booked into the Calcasieu Parish Juvenile Detention Center. 

This year, the parish projects it will book only 72, according to Celestine.

“We’re keeping a huge number of kids out of that formal court process, or it’s being delayed, so we’re doing more on the front end to keep those children out of the back end of our system,” Celestine said. 

“Because once you take a child out of their home environment, that’s a very tragic experience for them to go through … So, the work that we’re doing matters. We’re seeing positive outcomes, and we’re extremely proud of this process.”