Serious staffing shortages plague Juvenile Justice

By Kip Tabb | Outer Banks Voice on December 30, 2022

Dare County law enforcement officials discuss the impact

Understaffed and hampered by what many see as an inadequate compensation scale, the Division of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (JJDP) in the North Carolina Department of Public Safety (DPS) is struggling to meet its staffing requirements. Dare County, for example, has lost all three of its Juvenile Court Counselors in the past year.

For young offenders, those under 18, JJDP is usually their first encounter with North Carolina’s law enforcement officers. Although some of the youngsters who break the law end up in the court system, JJDP offers other services that will often keep a first-time offender out of the court system. Those services include community programs, including case management. JJDP can also place youth with state ordered counseling services. The division is also responsible for the state’s nine Juvenile Detention Centers and five Youth Development Centers.

Juvenile Court Counselors are the interface between the courts and juveniles and their families. The counselors have a wide range of responsibilities including court, the juvenile’s family, monitoring school activity and public outreach. JJDP employees are generally responsible for transporting young offenders to detention facilities, but if no JJDP employee is available, local law enforcement have to use extra personnel to fill the need.

According to Field Specialist Paul Pollock, who has 27 years of experience in the Juvenile Justice Division, staffing levels at JJDP have reached a critical shortage. That shortage, according to law enforcement officials, is putting a strain on police resources and complicating enforcement for juvenile offenders.

“We’ve been struggling locally to attract and retain employees here in Dare County, and also, our juvenile detention centers in the state of North Carolina have been, I understand, at 52% vacancy for staff,” he said.

As a Field Specialist, much of Pollock’s responsibilities include training new and existing staff, professional development of the Juvenile Court Counselors who work directly with juveniles in the system.

But Pollock has been struggling to perform his duties as key personnel, especially court counselors, are leaving their positions. “We are supposed to have had three court counselors here [in Dare County] a year ago…. And then over the past year, we lost all three of those court counselors.”

The professional requirements for those counselors are a bachelors degree and two years of experience in criminal justice, or a masters degree and one year working with criminal justice. Beginning salary is $43,076 annually and other than cost of living adjustments, the position offers no additional raises.

For Pollock, the problems of retaining employees are caused by inadequate beginning pay and a salary structure that is unique within DPS. “We don’t have a step system like the correctional officers and adult probation officers,” he said. The only way an employee in his department can earn more is through promotion, but promotions, Pollock points out, can be hard to come by.

“In many areas…those promotions can be really locked up,” he said. “So where we are today is that the starting pay is too far behind so we can’t even attract and retain new employees. The trainee starts at $35,000 or 37,000, and that’s a person with bachelor’s degree.”

The staffing shortages has significant law enforcement implications. Captain John Towler of the Kill Devil Hills Police Department notes that there are legal requirements for how juvenile offenders are handled.

“It’s very, restrictive how we can detain and hold a juvenile,” he said. “We have at our police department, for example, a holding cell where they can put somebody temporarily…We can’t put a juvenile in there under any circumstances according to the laws and guidelines. We wind up tying [personnel] up who have to stay with the juvenile…sit with the kid until the juvenile officer can break free from whatever he or she is doing to do the transport” to a detention facility.

Echoing Towler’s sentiments, Dare County Sheriff’s Department Captain Kevin Duprey told the Voice in an email that “It has always been the responsibility of the arresting agency to keep custody of the juvenile until they are charged. Charging them can take one to two Deputies off the street to file the charges and watch the juvenile until they are turned over to the [Juvenile Justice Service]. We do transport the juveniles after they have been charged and that can also take 1 to 2 Deputies…”

Towler also points out that in a law enforcement division as shorthanded as JJDP has become, some offenders slip through the cracks and that leads to something more significant than staffing issues.

“There has always been a strong feeling in the law enforcement community that when you commit a crime as a juvenile, there’s very little actual consequence for you. True or not, that’s just the way that a lot of officers feel.” he said. “And the fact that more and more of them are having to be diverted because of the limited resources that makes it sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

For his part, Pollock said the emphasis on giving kids the opportunity to make positive choices is the key to what his division does.

“Children are the most salvageable group in the criminal justice system,” he said. “It’s very easy for a lot of people in criminal justice that really don’t understand children or juvenile justice [to] make some pretty hard decisions about how to deal with them. We’re here to bring our experience to it.”

The staffing issues that are affecting the work of the JJDP are being noted at the state level, according to State Senator Bobby Hanig, who said the issue of compensation is percolating in Raleigh.

“That’s one of the main topics of discussion, doing the step pay scale for anything to do with [Juvenile Justice],” he said. He went on to acknowledge that the current starting salary is inadequate to keep and retain the people needed to work with juveniles.

“It’s not enough. You can’t get people, and when you do get people to come there, it’s just a stepping stone. They’re there to get a year’s experience or whatever, then they’re moving on to something bigger and better,” he said.

Hanig went on to suggest that one possibility would be to offer entry level positions after completion of an associate’s certificate with the state working with the employee to get a bachelors degree.

“Why don’t we do an associates program and then you pay for them to get to get their bachelors,” he said. “They’re already there [at Juvenile Justice] at least two years. So now they’re a little bit embedded…It’s all speculation of course, but what we’re doing now is not working.”