Departmental Policy
Recommendation – Final
Project
CJ 520 CRIMINOLOGY AND PUBLIC POLICY
HEIDI SMITH
Communities where crime is high often accept the higher crime rates and delinquency
because of the socioeconomical circumstances such as lower incomes, little supervision, and
little access to resources to name a few. The needs of these communities revolve around
lowering crime. Because the juvenile delinquency rates are higher in these communities, one
need and hope would be to successfully rehabilitate young offenders. The corrections branch of
the criminal justice system would be at the center of this need. The communities will also be a
central participant in the rehabilitation process helping juveniles become gainfully employed and
offering support and encouragement.
When juveniles enter the criminal justice system for their first offense, this is the best
chance at successful rehabilitation. This is because most juveniles do not commit crimes
because they were born bad or have criminal tendencies. There are typically economic
constraints placed on their families along with an expectation that they achieve monetary gain by
whichever means they can, lawful or taking the avenue of criminal acts. The California
Department of Corrections has developed policy and programs aimed at juvenile rehabilitation
and reducing recidivism. The department policy looks at all the factors leading to the criminal
choices and then works very closely with the young offenders to educate and train them in
alternative, lawful means to obtain the things they need and want.
Although the departmental policy has good intentions, there are positive changes that can
be made to improve the policy to help raise the successful re-entry of juvenile offenders into
society. The department of corrections along with social workers, probation officers, families
and other community members will need to work together to obtain a better understanding of
how the juvenile ended up in the criminal justice system. To achieve this, one aspect of the
policy that needs improving is the assessment of the juvenile when they first arrive.
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Upon admission into the corrections facility, the juvenile should be given a survey or
questionnaire to self-assess why they think crime was the best choice at the time. They should
be observed and interviewed by department staff to help identify factors that may have been
overlooked on the survey. Once all the factors including family situations, economic constraints,
and level of education to name a few are identified to the best of facilitator’s ability, a treatment
plan can be developed specific to that juvenile. People are not all the same, so the treatment
plans need to be customized.
Included in the treatment plan needs to be what interests the juvenile regarding a longterm career. The training and education the juvenile will receive will incarcerated should be
tailored to these interests and local businesses contacted to see if they are willing and able to
assist with employment upon release. Longer terms of probation post-release should also be
added to treatment plans to ensure the juveniles are solid in their rehabilitation before they are
permanently released. Delivery of rehabilitation and long term reduction in recidivism services
will improve with customized treatment plans because they have been tailored to address the
individual needs of that specific youth.
Criminological theories need to be considered when developing treatment plans as these
theories help support the most appropriate course to take to in rehabilitation based on the
background and history of the juvenile. The Social Disorganization theory supports the positive
changes customized rehabilitation will bring to low income and economically stressed
communities where crime and delinquency is generally accepted as a way of life. When youth
can be trained and criminal paths corrected early, the public benefits from lower crime rates.
The Strain Theory suggests that people will take the avenue of criminal acts to achieve
monetary gain when doing so through legitimate ways is too much work or takes too long.
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Treatment plans should include education and training on the concept of delayed gratification
and the feeling of accomplishment that comes with hard work and success through lawful means.
This concept will be especially important for juveniles who come from families with a history of
crime or in other words, other family members with criminal backgrounds.
Potential impacts of the departmental policy recommendations on the public can be
enormous when successfully executed. If treatment plans can be carefully written and followed,
juveniles will have learned lawful alternatives to criminal choices and become productive
members of their communities instead of adding to the problem. The corrections department
will also be largely impacted by the recommendations and may require extra staff to guarantee
success. Because there will most likely be budget constraints, this may impact the programs
negatively and alternative solutions such as public volunteers to help monitor the juveniles and
their programs may be one way to overcome budget constraints.
In 2016 the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation released a report of
a 3 year study of juvenile offenders and the rate of their return to incarceration. The study
concluded that over 64 percent of youth who returned to state‐level incarceration did so within
18 months of their release from Department of Juvenile Justice (CDCR, 2016). These youth also
have higher rates of continued return to incarceration with every re-release. These statistics are
discouraging and can be used to help create community buy-in to the recommendations for
customized treatment and the hope of reduced crime among juveniles. More research will need
to be conducted to help raise positive reactions to the changes once the recommendations are
implemented.
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References
Marion, N. E. (2012). Public Policy of Crime and Criminal Justice, 2nd Edition. [MBS Direct].
Retrieved from https://mbsdirect.vitalsource.com/#/books/9780133003079/
III, F.P. W. (2014). Criminological Theory, 6th Edition. [MBS Direct]. Retrieved from
https://mbsdirect.vitalsource.com/#/books/9780133099126
http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/News/media-policies-juvenile.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20150417212834/http://idebate.org:80/debatabase/debates/lawcrime/house-would-introduce-child-curfews
https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/migrated/publiced/features/DYJpart1.authcheckd
am.pdf
http://ucicorrections.seweb.uci.edu/files/2017/02/2016-Division-of-Juvenile-Justice-OutcomeEvaluation-Report-2-21-2017.pdf
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Policy Change Recommendation
Policy Change Recommendation
Jay Silva
University of Southern New Hampshire
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Policy Change Recommendation
The needs of the public are to keep the community safe and to attempt to rehabilitate the
juvenile offender. The primary goal is to keep the community safe but in doing so it needs to
confront the juvenile offender problem. Dealing with juvenile offenders has fluctuated between
rehabilitation and incarceration. Rehabilitation focuses on treating the offender and incarceration
focuses on punishing the offender. Placing juvenile offenders in detention centers exposes them
to negative behavior and removes them from supportive programs offered by schools and the
community which increases the likelihood of future delinquent behavior. By utilizing
rehabilitation programs instead of incarceration, we are decreasing the population of the
detention centers and giving the victims and community the opportunity to receive restitution for
the crimes committed against them. The juvenile offender learns about being accountable for
their actions. The relevant branch of the criminal justice system for this policy would be the
courts but it would also help corrections and law enforcement would need to be aware of the
policy as well.
We are recommending a policy change on how to work with juvenile offenders. Based
upon current trends and numbers, we are recommending a change to the placement of juvenile
offenders by the courts. As Arthur and Waugh state, “During 2004, more than four thousand
youth were arrested or held in custody in the United States for noncriminal behavior called a
status offense.”. We are recommending that non-violent and first-time juvenile offenders
(violent and repeat offenders would not be offered this opportunity) be assigned by the courts to
a specific rehabilitation/treatment program that works with the offender, offender’s family and
communities to prevent delinquent behavior. The programs will still hold the offender
accountable for their actions by providing opportunities to make restitution to victims, perform
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Policy Change Recommendation
community service and develop the character qualities necessary to become productive members
of our communities.
This policy change recommendation will improve the delivery of the criminal justice
services in our community be rehabilitating the juvenile offenders, so they can become
productive members of the community. The rehabilitation may not work on all juvenile
offenders, but it will work on most which means law enforcement, courts and corrections will
have a smaller population of potential repeat offenders. This smaller population of repeat
offenders means law enforcement, courts and corrections can focus their energy on other highrisk areas in their respective branch and the community will notice the decreased incidents within
the community as well, so they will have positive feedback on the policy change.
The Social Disorganization Theory would be the best criminological theory to attach to
this policy change. This theory attributes the motivations behind criminal acts to the surrounding
environmental conditions. By creating rehabilitation programs, we are providing resources to all
income communities. This theory states that lower income communities produce higher rates of
criminal behavior. The public has always been concerned with crime rates so if this theory is
correct, the juvenile offenders from the areas with the higher crime rates will receive the
resources that we are recommending. This recommendation is appropriate for this policy change
because we should be providing the resources for rehabilitation to the higher crime rate which
would mean that we are focusing our resources using evidence-based practices.
The potential impact of this policy change, the courts will sentence the juvenile offender
to an appropriate rehabilitation/treatment program. With less juveniles being incarcerated,
corrections should see a decrease in the number of people in lock-up and the police will need to
know that recently arrested juveniles could be back in the community as they complete their
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Policy Change Recommendation
rehabilitation/treatment program as opposed to being incarcerated. Like law enforcement, the
public will need to know about the juvenile offenders being released back into the community as
they complete their rehabilitation/treatment program. A potential negative impact to this policy
change is that a juvenile does not take the rehabilitation/treatment program seriously and then
goes back to committing crimes. If that is the case, as mentioned earlier, a juvenile that is a
repeat offender will not be given the opportunity for rehabilitation/treatment program and they
will be eligible to be sentenced to incarceration by the courts.
The primary indicator for positive reactions of the policy change will be to see a decrease
in delinquent behavior. A primary goal is to decrease juvenile crime and the rate of recidivism
by juveniles. We will need to do a comparison of the juvenile crimes committed over a set time
when the policy change is in place with a set time when the policy was not in place. With the
policy in place, we should see a decrease in the total number of juvenile crimes as well as a
decrease in the total number of juvenile offenders committing subsequent crimes after
completing the rehabilitation/treatment program. The positive results should then be made
available to the public so that they can see the positive impact of the policy change. In addition
to the public, we will make showcase the positive impact of this policy change to surrounding
communities. The surrounding communities can then utilize the policy change. The more
communities that buy into the policy change, the more policy actors will want to get involved in
the policy change. The more policy actors involved means more exposure to the positive work
that our department is doing for our community. If there is possible conflict to the policy
change, we leave the policy open to modifications and we allow the policy actors and the public
the opportunity to provide input on how to eliminate any conflict.
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Policy Change Recommendation
References
Marion, N, Oliver, W. (2012) The Public Policy of Crime and Criminal Justice. Upper Saddle
River, NJ. Pearson Education Inc. 89-337
Arthur, P.J.; Waugh, R. (2009) Status offenses and the juvenile justice and delinquency
prevention act: The exception that swallowed the rule. Seattle Journal for Social Justice
7 (2), 555-576.
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