Accountability and monitoring for compliance with accepted professional standards and policies should be required in all facilities. Juvenile detention is increasingly viewed as a continuum of care, ranging from secure confinement to community based alternatives. Juvenile services agencies should assure the fullest utilization of that continuum of care which best serves the youth and the public. That continuum may be interrupted if the largest component is privatized. Furthermore, if higher rates of secure detainment result in greater revenue, there will be a disincentive to utilize more appropriate, less costly and less restrictive non-secure alternatives to detention.
Government is legally responsible to provide juvenile justice services.
Privatization of those services does not relieve government from legal liability when standards of care are violated. NJDA supports policies which mandate that private and public facilities and services adhere to accepted professional standards of care and custody. Further, NJDA recommends that monitoring for compliance with such standards be rigorously enforced in order to ensure safe and productive conditions of confinement. Overcrowding exists whenever the population exceeds the facility's design or program capacity. Overcrowding increases the danger to staff of physical assaults by juveniles.