The Political Dynamics of Justice Reform in The U.S.

To Harp, every issue in juvenile justice, including racial disparities, should be looked at
through the lens of public safety and offender accountability. Local jurisdictions have
“drifted a bit to a focus on avoiding arrests at all costs,” she said in a March
interview with the Juvenile Justice Information Exchange, a news and commentary
website. “It went a little too far to the side of providing services.”
Youth advocates counter that working to keep juveniles of color out of lockup has
nothing to do with public safety. Black children get into fights, steal property, carry
weapons and use and sell drugs at about the same rates as white kids, according to an
analysis of federal data by the Sentencing Project—they just get disproportionately
policed for it.
Under the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act, first passed in 1974, the
agency now run by Harp must ensure four “core protections” for children: not locking
them up for age-based “status offenses” such as truancy, running away and curfew
violations; removing them from adult jails, with few exceptions; always keeping them
separate from adult inmates; and ensuring that states research and address racial
disparities.
Since 2000, states have seen considerable success in meeting the first three objectives.
Many have raised the age at which kids are sent to adult facilities, and the number of
youth incarcerated for status offenses has been cut to just a few hundred nationally.
But three current officials in the Office of Justice Programs, which oversees the juvenile
justice office, concede it has fallen short on the racial justice provision. The law is vague
about how exactly local agencies must address disparities, and budgets relatively little
money to fix such an entrenched problem. Some grants to state youth-justice systems
are as small as $400,000, yet are meant to pay for a range of services including afterschool
and anti-gang programs, job training, drug treatment, mentoring and legal
defense for juveniles.
“Congress doesn’t care about juvenile justice—that’s the underlying issue here,” said
one of the officials, who declined to be named for fear of jeopardizing their employment.
There’s also the challenge of incorrect or incomplete data reporting. While states like
Washington assemble thorough statistics on racial trends, others, especially in the
South, have not.
Some insiders at the agency were heartened when Harp came in and said she’d be
simplifying things.
The office is known for frequent budget delays and leadership changes and blunders,
including from an Obama-era administrator who employees said knowingly accepted
bad data from states but gave them funding anyway. After Chuck Grassley, now
chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, repeatedly wrote to the Justice
Department in 2014 and 2015 accusing it of mismanaging the grant program, the
agency overreacted by enforcing cumbersome procedures, some officials believed.
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