The LA County Office of Diversion and Reentry has published a new report on their efforts to implement the new, comprehensive model of youth diversion that the Board of Supervisors adopted in November 2017. The aim of the new model is to connect at-risk youth with community-based services that support their development instead of arrest or citation.
Los Angeles County has the largest juvenile justice system in the nation. Available data suggests that although the total number of youth arrests in the county has decreased in the last decade overall, youth of color have become increasingly more likely to be arrested than their caucasian peers. In 2015, the arrest rate for Black youth in Los Angeles County was over 6 times higher than that of White youth. According to the new ODR report, one factor that contributing to this inequity is the wide variation in youth diversion practices and resources in Los Angeles County: “Coordination and support is needed to scale and spread evidence-informed practices and build a continuum of services that can effectively address the needs of youth in communities countywide.
Informed by local data and evidence of effective practice, this model will build the infrastructure needed to ensure that all youth in Los Angeles County can connect with a continuum of services that address their needs, reducing youth arrests and equitably improving outcomes for youth and communities.”