Sleeping Rough in a D.C. Juvenile Center

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I repeated my query. Wells responded on Wednesday: "I was last out there 10 months ago."

In a follow-up e-mail, Wells said he was told that "commitments [court placement of juveniles in DYRS custody] were running double from previous years." Wells said that when he raised concerns about the size of the new Oak Hill facility, which will have a capacity of only 60 beds, he was told that the plan is to use a mix of residential treatment placements to control the numbers.

Wells also noted that there is space in community-based group homes for young people awaiting trial, now that his speedy-trial bill has been enacted.

If this is too convoluted, let me break it down.

The city is building a new Oak Hill facility with space to house 60 youths requiring secure detention. That is substantially below the capacity of the current, dilapidated facility, which, according to a court report, housed approximately 93 young people as of July 2.

So how is the DYRS planning to handle the overflow of youths requiring secure detention?

The agency, according to the Lopes report, is developing a new assessment process that it believes "will result in a net decrease in the population of committed youth who are securely committed at Oak Hill and its successor facility."

Under the new process, youths determined by judges to require secure detention will be reassessed by the DYRS using the new evaluative scheme with the aim of placing them in halfway houses and residential treatment centers.

Put another way, the new "process" will define away the need to place some youths in secure detention. And they will be off the hands of Oak Hill and the YSC.

That's good news for troubled youths. D.C. residents, hunker down.

This week, I also asked the chief judges of the Superior Court and the Family Court, and the judge overseeing the consent decree, when they last visited the YSC. After all, each has placed youths under DYRS supervision.

I'm still waiting for answers.

kingc@washpost.com

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