Antonovich Predicts Juvenile Court Soon for Antelope Valley

Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich predicted Wednesday that the Antelope Valley, with what some have characterized as the most serious child abuse problem in the county, will get a satellite court soon to handle juvenile dependency cases.

Although two presiding judges said several major issues remain unresolved, Antonovich told a gathering of business leaders in Palmdale that the new court is needed to save local residents from having to drive to the county’s recently opened dependency court complex in distant Monterey Park.

County officials are exploring conversion of a courtroom in the county’s Lancaster courthouse into a full-time Juvenile Court, and moving the civil cases now handled there to another location.

Dependency courts decide whether abused and neglected children will remain with their parents, be sent to foster homes or be placed in other facilities. To get to the complex in Monterey Park using public transit, Antelope Valley families have to leave at 4 or 5 a.m. the day of a hearing.

Officials reached general agreement on the satellite plan during a meeting Monday of Antonovich and his staff, county Chief Administrative Officer Richard B. Dixon, Los Angeles Superior Court Presiding Judge Ricardo Torres and Jaime Corral, presiding judge of the county’s Juvenile Court.

But in interviews Wednesday, Torres and Corral said the plan depends on whether the county would provide the necessary money to reconfigure the existing courtroom for juvenile use, lease a facility for the civil cases, and hire a judge to staff the new dependency court.

Torres also said he was skeptical about the makeshift plan, although he agreed that the Antelope Valley would get some type of dependency court facility in the coming months.

“If you come up with something in the next quarter, pardon me saying it, but it’s going to be crappy,” he said.

Two recent developments have highlighted the need for a dependency court in the Antelope Valley.

In July, county officials closed a dependency court in Van Nuys to consolidate it with the new $60-million Monterey Park facility. And the Antelope Valley has been hit since mid-1991 by a string of as many as seven child-abuse homicides, prompting a child abuse rate in the region that is 50% above the county’s average.

Although the two judges said they need additional funding to make the court plan work, Antonovich aide Lori Howard said the supervisor’s office is asking all the county agencies that would be affected by the change to find money from existing resources.