BP BHEAD INT S [atlas:bill]

AN ACT Relating to community residential facilities for juvenile offenders; and creating a new section.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1. (1) The department of social and health services, within existing funds, shall conduct a special study of the contracts, operations, and monitoring of community residential facilities that house juvenile offenders who are under the jurisdiction of the department's juvenile rehabilitation administration.

(2) The department shall enter into a contract with an independent consultant to conduct the study.

(3) The contract must require the independent consultant to investigate and report on community residential security, staffing, and operation; offender intake and assessment procedures; employee hiring practices and background checks; violations and infractions committed by offenders; and community notification and participation in the facility siting and offender placement process.

(4) The contract must require the independent contractor to consult with nearby residents, local sheriffs and police chiefs, courts, probation departments, schools, and employers in the community in which the community residential facility is located.

(5) The independent consultant shall investigate and report on at least the following issues:

(a) Community residential security, staffing, and operation:

(i) Are the facilities physically secured with door locks, alarms, video monitors, and other security features so that staff are immediately aware of any unauthorized exits or unauthorized visitors? Which homes are not?

(ii) What legal barriers exist, if any, that prevent equipping community residential facilities with locks, alarms, video monitors, and other equipment that would make the facilities more physically secure?

(iii) How much would it cost to equip community residential facilities with security equipment?

(iv) For each facility describe:

(A) The staffing level by shift;

(B) The times, if any, in which offenders are either locked inside secure rooms or locked inside the facility;

(D) How much time must elapse before an unauthorized absence becomes an escape;

(E) The escape reporting procedure;

(F) Who may visit the offender and at what hours;

(G) What is the screening process used to authorize visitors; and

(H) Whether offenders share bedrooms.

(v) Describe the monitoring level by the juvenile rehabilitation administration and specifically address the following:

(A) How often does the juvenile rehabilitation staff visit the community residential facilities?

(B) How many of these visits are random, unannounced, or conducted at night and on weekends and holidays?

(D) How often does the juvenile rehabilitation staff contact neighbors, schools, employers, and law enforcement to determine whether juvenile offenders in the community residential facilities are disruptive or that staff is responsive to community concerns?

(b) Offender intake and assessment procedures:

(i) Identify legal, procedural, and financial barriers to sharing information about juvenile offenders in community residential facilities between the juvenile rehabilitation administration, schools, courts, law enforcement, other department of social and health services' programs including the division of children and family services and the division of alcohol and substance abuse, and the public.

(ii) What authority does the state have to remove the barriers?

(iii) Identify what entity, the county, the juvenile rehabilitation administration, or the community residential facility, is responsible for collecting risk assessment data. Describe the process and if it varies in different counties.

(iv) What types and sources of data are being collected inconsistently?

(v) What types and sources of data are being used inconsistently in performing risk assessments?

(vi) What safeguards exist to ensure that assessments are being made with complete information?

(i) Review the laws, policies, and rules that govern conducting criminal history and disciplinary history background checks for employees of community residential facilities.

(ii) Are the laws, policies, and rules consistently and uniformly followed?

(iii) Are background checks conducted on all employees and if not what is the criteria to conduct one?

(iv) Are there existing employees on whom background checks have not been conducted?

(v) What are the specific offenses or disciplinary violations that disqualify potential employees from working in a community residential facility, whether state operated or contracted?

(vi) How many current employees have a felony conviction, for what offense or offenses, and what is the date of conviction?

(d) Violations or infractions committed by juvenile offenders in community residential facilities:

(i) What constitutes an infraction or violation under policies or rules of the juvenile rehabilitation administration or community residential facilities? Are some infractions considered more serious and result in more severe punishment than others?

(ii) Are the policies and rules governing infractions and violations uniformly applied and consistently followed?

(iii) What barriers, if any, are preventing consistent application from occurring?

(iv) How many violations, by type and seriousness level, have occurred or have been reported about juvenile offenders residing in community residential facilities during fiscal year 1997?

(v) What are the consequences for committing a violation or infraction?

(vi) What appeals process, if any, exists that governs an offender's appeal from a finding that the offender committed an infraction?

(e) Community notification and participation in the facility siting and offender placement process:

(i) What process, if any, does the juvenile rehabilitation administration use to notify local law enforcement, residents, schools, and businesses that a community residential facility that will house juvenile offenders will be located in a particular place?

(ii) What process, if any, does the juvenile rehabilitation administration or the community residential facilities use to notify the individuals and entities identified in (e)(i) of this subsection regarding the placement of specific offenders into a community residential facility?

(iii) To what extent, if any, does the juvenile rehabilitation administration or the community residential facility seek public comment on or participation in siting community residential facilities or placing particular offenders in those facilities?

(iv) Compare the department of corrections' practices in obtaining community comment and participation in siting facilities and placement of offenders.

(v) Identify models in other jurisdictions that provide for greater community comment and participation in siting facilities and placement of offenders.

(vi) Identify any legal, procedural, practical barriers to increasing community comment and participation in siting facilities and placement of offenders.

(6) The department shall require the independent contractor to recommend changes to existing laws, procedures, and practices governing community residential facilities to increase public safety, community residential facility security, protection of juvenile offenders housed in community residential facilities, and community comment and participation in siting facilities and placement of offenders. The contractor shall also identify costs associated with implementing recommended changes.

(7) An initial status report of the progress of the study shall be presented to the house criminal justice and corrections committee and the senate human services and corrections committee no later than May 1, 1998. The department shall present a final report to those committees no later than September 1, 1998.