TEXAS, USA — The Texas Juvenile Justice Department (TJJD) confirmed to WFAA on Thursday that the state's juvenile detention facilities have stopped taking in youth due to critical staffing shortages.
The TJJD said the paused intake started last week. In a letter from the TJJD interim executive director to facility chiefs, the department said all five state secure facilities are implementing variations of their emergency operation planning.
The TJJD leader said the staffing problem is so severe it could lead to an “inability to provide even basic supervision for youth locked in their rooms.”
“This could cause a significantly impaired ability to intervene in the increasing suicidal behaviors already occurring by youth struggling with the isolative impact of operational room confinement,” the letter read.
As of May, the population hovered at around 570 youth – one of the lowest levels in the last decade, according to state records. A department spokesperson told WFAA on Thursday that there was 140 committed youth on the waitlist to come to TJJD.
"TJJD is staying in close contact with Juvenile Probation Departments, to keep them apprised of the situation. The agency regrets that it had to take this action and recognizes that many county facilities also are struggling with staffing shortages reflective of the national staffing crisis," the TJJD spokesperson said in a statement.
TJJD said it is working to resolve the underlying issues and resume intakes as soon as possible.
On June 22, Interim Executive Director of TJJD Shandra Carter testified before the Sunset Advisory Commission that children within TJJD are facing lockdowns that last 22 hours due to lack of staffing.
"Our youth are spending up to 22 hours each day in their rooms during lockdowns," Carter testified. "These lockdowns are necessary because we just don't have the available staff to safely supervise the youth when outside of their rooms."
The Sunset Advisory Commission audits state departments to ensure they're being run efficiently.
The commission has noted that staffing is the biggest problem facing TJJD.
Carter testified that staff needs to be paid more and that current staffing levels are shouldering massive amounts of overtime.
Per the Sunset Commission, the TJJD had a 71% turnover rate in the fiscal year 2021.
The next state legislature in 2023 will ultimately decide if the TJJD sticks around.
Juvenile attorney and former prosecutor Lisa Herrick for the Sparks Law Firm is representing 40 juveniles currently in DFW.
She's defended kids in Dallas, Tarrant, Parker, Johnson, and Denton counties since 2016.
She says that the entire situation is a problem.
"It's an absolute mess," Herrick said.
The worst-case scenario, Herrick said, is for juveniles who receive an 'indeterminate' disposition for their cases and waiting to be picked up by TJJD.
An indeterminate disposition means that the juvenile stays with TJJD to be rehabilitated. The agency determines when they should be released after being offered several rehabilitative services within TJJD like schooling, job training, and even drug treatment services.
However, if kids can't get picked up by TJJD for that evaluation -- the juveniles languish in detention facilities and miss out on rehabilitative services.
The same goes for 'determinate' cases, where judges order juveniles to TJJD for a certain amount of time.
However, the time they spend in county detention services would count as time served, yet those juveniles would also miss out on rehabilitative services.
"The faster the system intervenes with a child who has committed an offense; the faster rehabilitative services are offered, the more likely they are to be rehabilitated," Herrick said.
"If they're not being offered those rehabilitative services until they get to TJJD, which might be weeks or months after they're sentenced, the likelihood of them being fully rehabilitated is less," Herrick continued.
Herrick also said if a teen turns 19 before going to TJJD, they can also miss out on services.
"If a child is still in their local detention center on their 19th birthday, they will be released without ever having stepped into TJJD," Herrick said. "They just miss the opportunity."
In Tarrant County, a juvenile judge told WFAA that 23 juveniles are waiting to be transferred to TJJD.
Four of those juveniles are 18 and are being housed at the Tarrant County jail.
The longest a juvenile has waited to be picked up by TJJD? 118 days. The next longest wait time was 89 days.
The judge also said there are 27 pending juvenile homicide cases in Tarrant County. The judge said the most he's seen in the county was roughly 10.
TJJD also enacted a 15% pay increase for all direct-care staff. Direct care staff include youth development coaches (juvenile correctional officers), team leaders (dorm supervisors), case managers and case manager supervisors, cooks, food service managers, youth safety managers and parole officers and parole supervisors. This raise will increase the starting annual pay for Youth Development Coaches (JCOs) from $36,238 to $41,700. To apply, click here.
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