Department of Juvenile Justice Secretary W.G. "Bill" Bankhead has offered lawmakers a package of proposals aimed at beefing up safety at Florida's juvenile detention centers. That step alone represents progress, given Bankhead's earlier insistence that the high-profile death of Opa-Locka's Omar Paisley, while in custody, was an "isolated incident." But Bankhead is wrong to imply that Florida's detention problems boil down to a few "bad" employees.
The problems are far more systemic than that, and solving them will take more than merely tinkering with employee background checks.
Bankhead recently offered his plan to the House Select Committee on Juvenile Detention Facilities, convened this summer following 17-year-old Paisley's death, from a ruptured appendix, while detained at Miami-Dade's Juvenile Detention Center.
Paisley writhed in pain for days before guards finally summoned medical help. The supervisor in charge had a lengthy arrest record, as well as reprimands for abusing young detainees.
Bankhead's proposals include more stringent pre-employment screening, yearly criminal checks for employee convictions or arrests, and psychological tests for applicants. Those reforms are fine, as far as they go. But they skirt the more fundamental issue, responsibility for which Bankhead cannot palm off on his employees or recruiters. Adolescents and teens in juvenile detention will continue to be at risk as long as staff are encouraged, directly or indirectly, to view them as little adults to be broken, not young people to be rehabilitated.
"They see them as bad people," said trial lawyer Clinton Pitts, referring to how detention staff tend to view the juveniles in their charge.
With few exceptions, young people are sent to detention because they have broken the law, often in serious ways. They need to understand and face the consequences of doing so.
But in recent years, Bankhead and his department have gone overboard in favoring punitive policies over those that seek to rehabilitate. Rep. Gus Barreiro, R-Miami Beach, who has done a good job leading the select committee, this fall offered a refreshingly blunt - though distressing - assessment of Bankhead's priorities.
"He refuses to invest in the kinds of programs that would keep kids out of trouble," Barreiro said of Bankhead. "Every year they come with their recommendations for the budget, and they continue to ask for money simply to lock up kids and build new detention centers. Under Bankhead, there is always money for mortar, there is always money for bricks . . . (but not) for the programs that we know work. . . . "
