Probation Camps Aren’t a Frill

Thousands of teen-agers break the law in Los Angeles. Those who are sent to county probation youth camps are more likely to get an education and stay out of trouble than the more hardened juvenile offenders who go to facilities of the state Youth Authority. Youth camps reduce recidivism, but that success is not enough to protect them from the county’s budget crisis.

County probation executives reluctantly have recommended closing the camps to ease a projected departmental deficit of more than $40 million. The Board of Supervisors, though faced with hundreds of similarly tough choices, cannot allow the camps to shut down.

The supervisors must come up with $20 million to keep the camps open. Finding money for youth camps poses a formidable challenge at a time of growing state and federal deficits. To save the camps, the supervisors must find the money or cut elsewhere. The question is where.

Can the supervisors find some renovation project to raid? Despite tight times, the county’s chief administrator, Richard Dixon, spent more than $3 million to remodel his offices. Can the supervisors take the money out of overly generous county pensions? The board approved a loophole allowing senior county managers to count cars and other perks as income to boost retirement income. Fancy lunches, fancy furniture for consultants--these excesses add up. That money could be better spent on services such as youth camps.

Can the supervisors each raise $1 million from private donations to send young offenders to camp? In the aftermath of the riots, business executives and ordinary citizens may be more willing to invest in the future of troubled young men and women.

Youth camp is no summer camp. It’s tough. It includes 24-hour supervision. It has solitary confinement for those who refuse to obey the rules. It is also a school. And it works. More than half of the young felons who go to camp do not repeat crimes, according to a probation officers’ report; more than two-thirds who go to Youth Authority facilities are rearrested.

If county youth camps are closed, some offenders who normally would go there will go to the overcrowded Youth Authority instead; but most offenders in this category will simply have to be sent home. The Board of Supervisors must keep the camps open.