Without being too cynical, the Virginia Board of Juvenile Justice’s decision on June 12 to reopen the Richmond Juvenile Detention Center may be more of a bane than a boon for Richmond’s youth who find themselves in this institution.
In the early part of 2012, allegations of forged training documents, staff misbehavior, malfunctioning locks and cameras, and ham-fisted management practically forced Mayor Dwight C. Jones to close the center down indefinitely.
Since 2009, the Virginia Board of Juvenile Justice had placed the detention center on its probation list twice.
But a Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) audit swept through the detention center in April, which has reportedly ‘reprogrammed’ and ‘restaffed’ since its closure in April 2012. A DJJ staffer, Ken Bailey, recommended that the Virginia board certify the center for reopening. According to Bailey, “It’s not the old detention center. This is a totally new program.” For those unfortunate individuals who find themselves inhabitants of the center, let’s hope so!
Although Mr. Bailey may absolutely be on the mark, how did the Richmond Juvenile Detention Center ever get to be so poorly managed in the first place? Was it political oversight or apathy, or sheer indifference?
The point is that if the problem occurred once, it doesn’t appear that the symptoms which originally drove this problem are any closer to being resolved. The unfortunate truth is that the detention center holds individuals who are deemed by our society as being unimportant, or less important than the rest of us. So when the political spotlight is turned away, corruption and mismanagement can ensue.
It doesn’t have to be this way, of course. We don’t have to wait until issues in society erupt before we come together as concerned citizens to do something about it. In the case of the center, though, it was the city that waited too long to act and those most vulnerable in society were reminded again of how little society values their worth.
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