Fund Juvenile Facility

There’s nothing like a crisis to get government’s attention. Partly in response to a string of outrageous gang attacks earlier this year, the Ventura County Board of Supervisors has unanimously approved $600,000 to create more space to lock up young offenders.

We don’t even want to imagine what sort of crisis it would take to shake loose the $55 million or more that local authorities say it would take to replace the county’s cramped and antiquated Juvenile Hall with a modern, efficient, self-contained juvenile justice center. But the county and its representatives in Sacramento and Washington need to step up their efforts to do just that.

The men and women working to steer Ventura County’s youths away from crime--and to protect the rest of us from those who don’t get the message--have a tough enough job without the handicap of overcrowding.

Space limits have tied the hands of police and the courts for a decade. Judges who think one night in detention might be enough to straighten out a young offender don’t have that option; every bed is needed for more serious cases. So the kid gets sent home, left to conclude that his or her offense wasn’t all that bad after all.

Too few beds for too many heads also forces the early release of some youths who are considered a threat to the community. In 1997, more than 1,300 gang members and serious juvenile offenders were turned away because of overcrowding.

Since 1970, Juvenile Hall has had the official capacity to house 84 offenders, yet its average daily population is about 115 and has gone as high as 140. Other sites include Colston Youth Center in Camarillo, the Juvenile Restitution Project in Ventura and the Tri-County Boot Camp--totaling fewer than 300 beds no matter how you add them. The newly appropriated $600,000, plus $620,000 previously appropriated, will help pay for a $1.4-million project to convert a vacant adult work-furlough building at the Camarillo Airport, adding 40 beds by next summer.

The county soon will release a report detailing the needs of its juvenile justice system. The report will call for a juvenile complex with more than 300 new beds of detention space, juvenile courtrooms, office space and mental health and other facilities. Such a facility could cost $55 million or more and take as long as 10 years to fund and build.

One promising funding source faded when the state Legislature rejected a bond measure that, if passed by voters, would have provided $350 million to build new local juvenile facilities. The new state budget does include $100 million for juvenile facilities but that money is for renovations rather than new construction; Ventura County will go after its share anyway.

So the challenge of paying for a new center just got tougher. But in a county that has done so well in controlling adult crime, the entire community of public and private organizations should pull together to find an answer to this critical need.

Without waiting for an even greater crisis.