Co-authored by Melanie Hartzog, Executive Director, CDF-New York
Under
New York’s juvenile justice system a child as young as 7 can be
arrested for a crime, and a 16-year-old is automatically charged as an
adult.
These laws are shockingly behind the times — bad for
children and bad for public safety. New York is one of only four states
to create a juvenile jurisdiction for little children who are barely old
enough to shed their baby teeth and still believe in the tooth fairy.
And they are expected to have the cognitive development necessary to
participate in and understand a trial?
New York is one of only two states to ignore the latest neurological research underscoring the fact that 16- and 17-year-olds are still children developmentally.
Their brains will not be fully formed until age 25, and they lack the
ability to control impulsive behavior by focusing on its consequences.
This
key developmental period is an important opportunity for
rehabilitation. Research shows that adolescents are highly receptive to
change in a way that adults are not. They respond very well to proven
interventions and with them can learn to make more responsible choices.
Ignoring
evidence-based interventions proven to reduce recidivism and continuing
to ship teens off to crime school (adult prison) are mistakes we can’t
afford to keep making. In adult prisons, youths are more likely to
suffer physical, sexual, and emotional abuse and be molded by other
prisoners, often hardened career criminals. Studies have found that
youths in the adult criminal justice system are 36 times more likely to
commit suicide and are rearrested 34-percent more often for felony
crimes than their peers in the juvenile justice system.
This sobering fact, that automatically charging 16- and 17-year-olds as adults makes them more likely to commit violent crimes, is proof that this policy is a threat
to public safety. The evidence shows that children should be treated as
children, particularly since these teen arrests are overwhelmingly for
nonviolent crimes like shoplifting, turnstile jumping, or drug
possession. The racial disparities in policing youths of color (over 70
percent of the children arrested and 80 percent of the children sent to
prison statewide are Black and Latino) compound the harm that these
unfair laws are inflicting on our children and communities.
Earlier this year, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo included recommendations from his Commission on Youth, Public Safety & Justice
in his 2015-16 executive budget. His proposal raises the minimum age of
juvenile jurisdiction from age 7 to 12 (age 10 in rare cases of
homicide). It also raises the overall age of juvenile jurisdiction to 18
and broadens the list of eligible circumstances in which young offender
status can be assigned to age 21. Importantly, this means that 16- and
17-year-olds would never again be housed with adult criminals. Instead,
the justice system would focus on proven services and interventions that
the most current research has demonstrated result in better outcomes
for youths and reduce recidivism and keep communities safer from violent
crime.
CDF’s work to raise the age in New York builds on our early work to keep children out of adult jails — recognizing inhumane conditions and great harms to children. In the foreword to our 1976 report "Children in Adult Jails," Judge Justine Wise Polier,
the state of New York’s first woman judge, who presided in New York
City’s family court for 38 years and at the time was the director of
CDF’s Juvenile Justice Division, chided states that continued to
prosecute and jail children in the adult criminal justice system: “It
has been over three-quarters of a century since states began to
legislate that children should be treated as children.”
Today New York and North Carolina are the only two states left
that automatically treat children as adult criminals, but how pleased
Judge Polier would be that Gov. Cuomo has put forward a comprehensive,
evidence-based approach to juvenile justice reform that would change
that. Now is the time for the New York state legislature to join him by
adopting this important, long-overdue change. Then North Carolina, as
the last outlier, should join the rest of the states in seeking justice
for children.
Friday, March 27, 2015
Friday, March 20, 2015
Don't Leave Children Short
Congress is about to strike a deal that takes care of seniors and
doctors but leaves low-income and “at-risk” children short. Congress’
annual struggle to avoid cuts in Medicare reimbursement rates so
physicians will continue to give seniors the care they need is widely
considered must-pass bipartisan legislation. Known as the Sustainable
Growth Rate (SGR) or “doc fix,” this annual process often provides a
vehicle for moving other legislative health priorities. (Last year it
included one year of funding for the important Maternal and Infant Early Childhood Home Visiting program.)
While Congress has long discussed passing a permanent “doc fix,”
leaders in the House of Representatives have now released an outline for
doing it and plan to act on it next week. They hope the Senate will
follow and act before the current “doc fix” expires March 31.
This is great news for seniors whom we support, but why is Congress leaving children behind by extending funding for the successful bipartisan Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and the Maternal and Infant Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) program for only two years? The cost of the “doc fix” is about $140 billion, while a two-year extension of CHIP and home visiting funding is less than $6 billion. Yet in the House proposal this increase required an “offset,” meaning it had to be paid for, while the “doc fix” that is more than 20 times more expensive does not. This is profoundly unjust to children whose lives are equally important.
A clean four-year CHIP funding extension and four years of funding for home visiting must be included in any final “doc fix” package. Certainly the price tag is not the obstacle. Funding for CHIP and home visiting for four years is expected to add up to less than $12 billion to serve millions of vulnerable children, a critical investment in the health of lower-income children.
Today, more than 8 million children depend on CHIP for health coverage. Together with Medicaid, CHIP has played a vital role in bringing the number of uninsured children to the lowest level on record. Simply put, CHIP is a bipartisan success story. But if funding is not extended quickly, up to 2 million children could become uninsured, and millions more would have to pay significantly more for less-comprehensive coverage. This would reverse the progress made over the past two decades and create a health coverage gap among children in working families. The vast majority of governors, both Democrats and Republicans, share our concerns about CHIP funds expiring abruptly. They are concerned about higher costs and inadequate benefits for children, budget challenges to cover children without CHIP, and an increase in uninsured children if CHIP funding ends.
The Children’s Defense Fund strongly supports a clean four-year extension of CHIP through 2019 because:
Rigorous research studies have found that quality, evidence-based home visiting programs produce measurable, long-term outcomes for children and families, including better health; greater school readiness, academic achievement, parental involvement, and economic self-sufficiency; and reduced child maltreatment, abuse, and juvenile delinquency.
Almost 80 percent of families participating in the MIECHV program had household incomes at or below 100 percent of the federal poverty line. As in CHIP, where states have flexibility to craft their programs, states that receive MIECHV funding can tailor their programs to serve the specific needs of their communities but have to meet certain benchmarks. Four more years of funding will enable important progress in meeting those benchmarks.
Congress must stop playing politics with children and pass four more years of funding for CHIP and MIECHV as part of the “doc fix” package if millions of children are not to be left with uncertainty and at greater risk. We need to ensure our children are healthy, supported, and strong if they are going to be able to support our growing number of seniors in the future. Congress must commit to this small but extremely important investment. About 30 years ago, CDF, AARP, the National Council on Aging, and the Child Welfare League of America established Generations United, an energetic organization today committed to improving the lives of children, youths, and older adults through intergenerational collaboration, public policies and programs for the enduring benefit of all. Its motto is “Stronger Together.” Four years of funding for both CHIP and MIECHV will help strengthen our children and help them support our older and aging generations.
This is great news for seniors whom we support, but why is Congress leaving children behind by extending funding for the successful bipartisan Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and the Maternal and Infant Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) program for only two years? The cost of the “doc fix” is about $140 billion, while a two-year extension of CHIP and home visiting funding is less than $6 billion. Yet in the House proposal this increase required an “offset,” meaning it had to be paid for, while the “doc fix” that is more than 20 times more expensive does not. This is profoundly unjust to children whose lives are equally important.
A clean four-year CHIP funding extension and four years of funding for home visiting must be included in any final “doc fix” package. Certainly the price tag is not the obstacle. Funding for CHIP and home visiting for four years is expected to add up to less than $12 billion to serve millions of vulnerable children, a critical investment in the health of lower-income children.
Today, more than 8 million children depend on CHIP for health coverage. Together with Medicaid, CHIP has played a vital role in bringing the number of uninsured children to the lowest level on record. Simply put, CHIP is a bipartisan success story. But if funding is not extended quickly, up to 2 million children could become uninsured, and millions more would have to pay significantly more for less-comprehensive coverage. This would reverse the progress made over the past two decades and create a health coverage gap among children in working families. The vast majority of governors, both Democrats and Republicans, share our concerns about CHIP funds expiring abruptly. They are concerned about higher costs and inadequate benefits for children, budget challenges to cover children without CHIP, and an increase in uninsured children if CHIP funding ends.
The Children’s Defense Fund strongly supports a clean four-year extension of CHIP through 2019 because:
- The new health insurance exchanges need at least four years to make changes to ensure children have comparable pediatric benefits with costs to families no higher than in CHIP today. It is highly unlikely these improvements will be enacted and implemented by 2017.
- CHIP coverage saves money for states and the federal government. It is more efficient than private health insurance, costs less than subsidized exchange coverage and provides the comprehensive coverage that gives children and families access to the pediatricians, specialists and special facilities children need.
Rigorous research studies have found that quality, evidence-based home visiting programs produce measurable, long-term outcomes for children and families, including better health; greater school readiness, academic achievement, parental involvement, and economic self-sufficiency; and reduced child maltreatment, abuse, and juvenile delinquency.
Almost 80 percent of families participating in the MIECHV program had household incomes at or below 100 percent of the federal poverty line. As in CHIP, where states have flexibility to craft their programs, states that receive MIECHV funding can tailor their programs to serve the specific needs of their communities but have to meet certain benchmarks. Four more years of funding will enable important progress in meeting those benchmarks.
Congress must stop playing politics with children and pass four more years of funding for CHIP and MIECHV as part of the “doc fix” package if millions of children are not to be left with uncertainty and at greater risk. We need to ensure our children are healthy, supported, and strong if they are going to be able to support our growing number of seniors in the future. Congress must commit to this small but extremely important investment. About 30 years ago, CDF, AARP, the National Council on Aging, and the Child Welfare League of America established Generations United, an energetic organization today committed to improving the lives of children, youths, and older adults through intergenerational collaboration, public policies and programs for the enduring benefit of all. Its motto is “Stronger Together.” Four years of funding for both CHIP and MIECHV will help strengthen our children and help them support our older and aging generations.
Friday, March 13, 2015
Staying on the March
Fifty years ago I traveled from Mississippi to Selma, Alabama on March 21st,
1965 to join Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and thousands of fellow
citizens marching the 54 miles to the steps of the state’s capitol in
Montgomery. Millions of Americans now know about this march thanks to
the movie Selma and the recent 50th anniversary
celebration. Selma was the site of a courageous voting rights campaign
by Black citizens which was met by brutal Southern Jim Crow law
enforcement and citizen violence. The nation was shocked two weeks
earlier when John Lewis and Reverend Hosea Williams set out on a
nonviolent march with a group of 600 people toward Montgomery to demand
their right to vote and were brutally attacked by lawless state and
local law enforcement officials at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The
televised images of “Bloody Sunday” and the savage beatings of the
marchers—including Congressman Lewis whose skull was fractured—were a
pivotal moment in the Civil Rights Movement and in America’s struggle to
become America. It provoked the thousands of us (ultimately about
25,000) who came together later to finish the march, safer thanks to
Federal District Court Judge Frank M. Johnson, Jr.’s order that we had a
right to peaceful protest and with National Guard protection. And we
were buoyed by President Johnson’s March 15th, 1965 address calling on Congress to pass what became the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
In that speech—“The American Promise”—President Johnson said: “This was the first nation in the history of the world to be founded with a purpose. The great phrases of that purpose still sound in every American heart, North and South: ‘All men are created equal’—‘government by consent of the governed’—‘give me liberty or give me death’... Those words are a promise to every citizen that he shall share in the dignity of man... To apply any other test—to deny a man his hopes because of his color or race, his religion or the place of his birth—is not only to do injustice, it is to deny America and to dishonor the dead who gave their lives for American freedom.” President Johnson also said: “Should we defeat every enemy, should we double our wealth and conquer the stars, and still be unequal to this issue, then we will have failed as a people and as a nation.”
Fifty years later, speaking at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, President Obama echoed the same themes: “[Selma is] the manifestation of a creed written into our founding documents... These are not just words. They’re a living thing, a call to action, a roadmap for citizenship and an insistence in the capacity of free men and women to shape our own destiny.” He added: “The American instinct that led these young men and women to pick up the torch and cross this bridge, that’s the same instinct that moved patriots to choose revolution over tyranny. It’s the same instinct that drew immigrants from across oceans and the Rio Grande; the same instinct that led women to reach for the ballot, workers to organize against an unjust status quo; the same instinct that led us to plant a flag at Iwo Jima and on the surface of the Moon. It’s the idea held by generations of citizens who believed that America is a constant work in progress; who believed that loving this country requires more than singing its praises or avoiding uncomfortable truths. It requires the occasional disruption, the willingness to speak out for what is right, to shake up the status quo. That’s America. That’s what makes us unique.”
The first Selma march was planned not only to gain the right to vote but to protest the tragic death of Jimmie Lee Jackson, a 26-year-old Black church deacon and military veteran killed in Marion, Alabama when he, his mother, sister, and 82-year-old grandfather attended another nonviolent voting rights demonstration where marchers were brutally attacked by racist Alabama law enforcement officials who broke it up. Jimmie Lee Jackson was shot and beaten trying to shield his mother from a police nightstick. What a terrible irony that in this year of celebration of the Selma marches we are witnessing the resurgence of overt law enforcement brutality and injustice in Ferguson, Cleveland, New York City, and elsewhere, reminding us how far we still have to go. The continuing protests against unequal justice under the law by those enjoined to protect all of us and all of our children after the deaths of teenager Michael Brown, 12-year-old Tamir Rice, and others are a wake-up call about the deeply embedded systemic racism still alive in America. Each of us has a responsibility to root it out and stop it in its tracks.
Each American must remember and help America remember that the fellowship of human beings is more important than the fellowship of race and class and gender in a democratic society. Each of us has a personal responsibility to be decent and fair and insist that others be so in our presence. Don’t tell, laugh at, or tolerate racial, ethnic, religious, or gender jokes—or any practices intended to demean rather than enhance another human being. Walk away from them. Stare them down. Make them unacceptable in our presence and in our institutions. Through daily moral consciousness each of us has a responsibility to counter the proliferating voices of racial and moral and ethnic and religious division that are regaining respectability over our land. Let’s face up to rather than ignore our growing racial problems which are America’s historical and future Achilles’ heel unless addressed firmly and courageously.
As Dr. King spoke to us at the end of the exhilarating Selma to Montgomery March he reminded us that we weren’t done: “Let us therefore continue our triumphant march to the realization of the American dream. Let us march on segregated housing until every ghetto or social and economic depression dissolves, and Negroes and whites live side by side in decent, safe, and sanitary housing. Let us march on segregated schools until every vestige of segregated and inferior education becomes a thing of the past... Let us march on poverty until no American parent has to skip a meal so that their children may eat... Let us march on ballot boxes until we send to our city councils, state legislatures, and the United States Congressmen who will not fear to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God.”
And let us all stand up right now to all those in our Congress, statehouses, and across our country who are trying to take away and suppress the right to vote and who are refusing to honor the sacrifice of all those who died to gain this fundamental American right. Shame on them and shame on us if we don’t act to insist that Congress renew the Voting Rights Act without a minute’s more delay. And shame on us if we do not stand up to all those who seek to turn the clock of racial progress backwards by denying equal justice under the law for all. We still have so far to go in our march to make America America—but we must march forward and never backwards.
In that speech—“The American Promise”—President Johnson said: “This was the first nation in the history of the world to be founded with a purpose. The great phrases of that purpose still sound in every American heart, North and South: ‘All men are created equal’—‘government by consent of the governed’—‘give me liberty or give me death’... Those words are a promise to every citizen that he shall share in the dignity of man... To apply any other test—to deny a man his hopes because of his color or race, his religion or the place of his birth—is not only to do injustice, it is to deny America and to dishonor the dead who gave their lives for American freedom.” President Johnson also said: “Should we defeat every enemy, should we double our wealth and conquer the stars, and still be unequal to this issue, then we will have failed as a people and as a nation.”
Fifty years later, speaking at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, President Obama echoed the same themes: “[Selma is] the manifestation of a creed written into our founding documents... These are not just words. They’re a living thing, a call to action, a roadmap for citizenship and an insistence in the capacity of free men and women to shape our own destiny.” He added: “The American instinct that led these young men and women to pick up the torch and cross this bridge, that’s the same instinct that moved patriots to choose revolution over tyranny. It’s the same instinct that drew immigrants from across oceans and the Rio Grande; the same instinct that led women to reach for the ballot, workers to organize against an unjust status quo; the same instinct that led us to plant a flag at Iwo Jima and on the surface of the Moon. It’s the idea held by generations of citizens who believed that America is a constant work in progress; who believed that loving this country requires more than singing its praises or avoiding uncomfortable truths. It requires the occasional disruption, the willingness to speak out for what is right, to shake up the status quo. That’s America. That’s what makes us unique.”
The first Selma march was planned not only to gain the right to vote but to protest the tragic death of Jimmie Lee Jackson, a 26-year-old Black church deacon and military veteran killed in Marion, Alabama when he, his mother, sister, and 82-year-old grandfather attended another nonviolent voting rights demonstration where marchers were brutally attacked by racist Alabama law enforcement officials who broke it up. Jimmie Lee Jackson was shot and beaten trying to shield his mother from a police nightstick. What a terrible irony that in this year of celebration of the Selma marches we are witnessing the resurgence of overt law enforcement brutality and injustice in Ferguson, Cleveland, New York City, and elsewhere, reminding us how far we still have to go. The continuing protests against unequal justice under the law by those enjoined to protect all of us and all of our children after the deaths of teenager Michael Brown, 12-year-old Tamir Rice, and others are a wake-up call about the deeply embedded systemic racism still alive in America. Each of us has a responsibility to root it out and stop it in its tracks.
Each American must remember and help America remember that the fellowship of human beings is more important than the fellowship of race and class and gender in a democratic society. Each of us has a personal responsibility to be decent and fair and insist that others be so in our presence. Don’t tell, laugh at, or tolerate racial, ethnic, religious, or gender jokes—or any practices intended to demean rather than enhance another human being. Walk away from them. Stare them down. Make them unacceptable in our presence and in our institutions. Through daily moral consciousness each of us has a responsibility to counter the proliferating voices of racial and moral and ethnic and religious division that are regaining respectability over our land. Let’s face up to rather than ignore our growing racial problems which are America’s historical and future Achilles’ heel unless addressed firmly and courageously.
As Dr. King spoke to us at the end of the exhilarating Selma to Montgomery March he reminded us that we weren’t done: “Let us therefore continue our triumphant march to the realization of the American dream. Let us march on segregated housing until every ghetto or social and economic depression dissolves, and Negroes and whites live side by side in decent, safe, and sanitary housing. Let us march on segregated schools until every vestige of segregated and inferior education becomes a thing of the past... Let us march on poverty until no American parent has to skip a meal so that their children may eat... Let us march on ballot boxes until we send to our city councils, state legislatures, and the United States Congressmen who will not fear to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God.”
And let us all stand up right now to all those in our Congress, statehouses, and across our country who are trying to take away and suppress the right to vote and who are refusing to honor the sacrifice of all those who died to gain this fundamental American right. Shame on them and shame on us if we don’t act to insist that Congress renew the Voting Rights Act without a minute’s more delay. And shame on us if we do not stand up to all those who seek to turn the clock of racial progress backwards by denying equal justice under the law for all. We still have so far to go in our march to make America America—but we must march forward and never backwards.
Friday, March 6, 2015
Who Are We? What Do We Americans Truly Value?
Too much and for too long, we seem to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our Gross National Product, now is over $800 billion dollars a year... if we judge the United States of America by that... Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.
Yet the Gross National Product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans. --Senator Robert F. Kennedy
What
do we stand for as a nation and who do we wish to be? In a 1968 speech
at the University of Kansas, Senator Robert Kennedy correctly worried
too many used our nation’s wealth as the standard of greatness rather
than the human values that should matter most. Our Gross Domestic
Product — now $17.7 trillion — includes many things for us not to
be proud of. So we should ask ourselves how well America is doing on
the things that should matter most—the well-being of our children and
families and the quality of justice and life in our communities and
nation?
Among high-income countries the
United States ranks first in Gross Domestic Product and first in the
number of billionaires, and second worst in child poverty rates – ahead
only of Romania whose economy is 99 percent smaller than ours. It is a
national disgrace that children are the poorest group of Americans with
14.7 million living in poverty.
We are first in military spending — $11.1 billion a week — and first in military weapons exports.
We
are first in the number of people incarcerated and worst in protecting
our children against gun violence. A Black boy born in 2001 has a one in
three chance of going to prison in his lifetime and a Latino boy a one
in six chance of the same fate. Children and teens in America were 17
times more likely to be killed by gun violence than those in 25 other
high-income countries combined.
We are 30th in preschool enrollment rates and 17th in reading, 23rd in science, and 31st
in math scores for our 15-year-olds. Nearly 60 percent of all fourth
and eighth grade public school students in the U.S. and more than 80
percent of Black and almost 75 percent of Latino children in those same
grades could not read or compute at grade level in 2013.
We rank first in health expenditures but 25th in low birth weight rates, 26th in child immunization rates, 31st in infant mortality rates, and second worst in teenage births – just ahead of Bulgaria.
If
we compare Black child well-being in America to child well-being in
other nations, the U.S. Black infant mortality rate exceeds that in 65
nations including Cuba, Malaysia, and Ukraine. Our incidence of
low-birth weight Black infants is higher than in 127 other nations
including Cambodia, the Congo, and Guatemala.
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child
spells out the basic rights children should have everywhere and is the
most widely and rapidly ratified international human rights treaty in
history. For years the United States and Somalia, which had no
recognized government, were the only United Nations members that had
failed to ratify the convention. In January 2015 Somalia became the 195th
nation to do so. The United States now stands only with new U.N. member
state South Sudan as the two countries that have not ratified it — and
South Sudan has started working towards ratification.
The
United States stands alone, despite recent progress, in still
permitting life-without-parole sentences for juvenile offenders who were
under 18 at the time of the offense. The U.S. Supreme Court has banned
capital punishment for crimes committed by juveniles but America remains
one of 58 nations that continues to use capital punishment for adults.
In 2013 the U.S. had the sixth highest number of executions — after
China, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and North Korea.
If
America wants to be a truly great nation on the world stage, it’s time
to redefine the measures of our success. The litmus test I propose is
that of the great German Protestant theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer,
executed for opposing Hitler’s holocaust, who said “the test of the
morality of a society is what it does for its children.” The great South
African president Nelson Mandela
agreed with him and believed “there can be no keener revelation of a
society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children.” On the
Bonhoeffer-Mandela measure of success, we must do much, much better.
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