NEWPORT, Ky. — Three weeks after Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear was reelected in 2023, big changes were rolled out at the Campbell Regional Juvenile Detention Center in Newport. Starting Nov. 29, state officials announced, only males would be housed at the Newport facility, at least until further notice.
It was the third major change announced for the Campbell County center in 11 months. In June, state officials announced girls housed at the former female-only facility would be moved to the state’s regional juvenile detention center in Ashland. The Newport facility had only been an all-female center for six months when the change was announced.
Low staffing levels “due to the competitive local labor market” were cited as the reason for the move to Ashland in a June 16 memo from the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice. But the series of rapid overhauls over the past year at the Campbell County facility are glaring in the light of a 2023 independent audit indicating ongoing problems — including understaffing, use of force, and questionable use of isolation — at the state’s eight juvenile detention centers, including the one in Newport.
At the time the 231-page audit was conducted by consulting firm CGL Management Group in 2023, 24.1% of correctional officer positions at the Newport facility were vacant, the report shows. There were only 22 officers working at the facility, although the facility had funding for 29 officers, per the audit. Changes had just been made in June in response to understaffing according to the June 16 memo.
When asked about staffing and other issues at the state’s juvenile detention centers during his weekly Team Kentucky update on Thursday, Beshear focused mostly on the positives. He said staff numbers have gradually improved thanks to over $267 million budgeted for juvenile justice programs in the current state budget and $25 million in additional funds appropriated by lawmakers last year.
“It took a little bit longer in Northern Kentucky than others, but we’re getting more people and more applicants,” the governor said.
But problems persist. The audit also cited concerns with use of force and isolation of juveniles – sometimes confined for days, according testimony from the state Department of Public Advocacy last fall.
Isolation – either room confinement or other forms of separation – happened 65 times in the first five months of 2023 at the Campbell County facility alone, according to the audit. Statewide, the audit cited 1,579 total isolation incidents – or an average of 197 per month – reported at juvenile detention centers from January through October of 2023 (the only months for which isolation data was reported in the audit).
Most isolations reported in the audit occurred at the Adair Regional Detention Center in southern Kentucky where riots and assaults were reported in 2022. Those events precipitated a new policy ordered by Beshear in Dec. 2022 that turned the Campbell County facility (albeit briefly) into a female-only detention center and ordered separate housing for males charged with serious offenses.
Regarding use of force, pepper spray – recommended for use only as a “last resort” per national best practices, the audit says – was deployed four times at the NKY facility between April and June last year based on audit data. Pepper spray was then used four more times at the NKY facility in a two-month period between September and October 2023, per the report.
Only 65 pepper spray use incidents were reported statewide by the audit, although the data only included incidents from five of the eight juvenile detention centers and only for nine months, from March through November 2023. Once again, most incidents were reported in Adair County, with 41 reported pepper spray incidents compared to eight in Campbell County, twelve in Warren County, and two each in Fayette and Jefferson counties.
(Stun guns are also allowed to be used at the detention centers, according to the audit, though the report didn’t cite any data for the Campbell County facility.)
Regular use of isolation and “use of force” tactics, including use of pepper spray and tasers, go against national “best practices” said the audit.
Last October, the state Department of Public Advocacy raised red flags about isolation at the state’s juvenile detention centers in testimony before the Legislative Oversight and Investigations Committee. Lauren Bieger Hunter, an attorney with the DPA, said juveniles have been left in isolation far beyond the maximum allowed period of 24 hours at the regional facility in Adair County.
“Isolation is going on for days,” Bieger Hunter told the committee. “Even when they aren’t calling it isolation, it is isolation because they are in cells that they are not allowed out of.”
To improve operations at the state’s juvenile detention centers, the Kentucky House put $329 million for juvenile justice in its budget proposal it passed Feb. 1. Part of that is $15.6 million for “alternative programming and support” at the centers. The House proposal is pending in the Senate.
House Speaker David Osborne (R-Prospect) seemed skeptical, however, that a lack of funding plays into problems at the centers in a statement released by his office when the audit went public.
“This independent report simply confirms what we have heard about the living conditions, mismanagement, and lack of appropriate protocols from both concerned staff and the heartbroken families of children housed in these facilities and served by the department,” Osborne said. “Clearly, money is not the issue as the audit itself points out that the legislature has provided more funds than the administration asked for. This legislature has also made significant reforms through statutory changes.
“It is time for the department, the cabinet, and the Governor to stop making excuses and fix the problems within juvenile justice,” the Speaker said.
As the state’s enforcement branch, it is the responsibility of the Department of Juvenile Justice to implement state laws governing juvenile corrections in Kentucky. The department’s website describes its mission this way: “The DJJ is responsible for prevention programs for at-risk youth, court intake, pretrial detention, residential placement and treatment services, probation, community aftercare and reintegration, as well as the confinement of youth awaiting adult placement or court.”
As governor and the state’s chief enforcer, it is Beshear’s responsibility to put people in charge of the department who will make sure those processes go smoothly. The department has an interim commissioner right now: Larry Chandler was appointed to that post after the Nov. departure of beleaguered former commissioner Vicki Reed, hired as commissioner by Beshear in 2021.
It was the latest of “several leadership changes in the past several years” at the department, according to the Associated Press.
Beshear downplayed the audit to reporters on Thursday, calling it “the first audit I’ve ever seen where it was never provided to the organization to provide a response.” He said some of the findings were “entirely and fully wrong,” including a claim that the department has no use of force policy.
The use of force policy, Beshear told reporters, was implemented by emergency regulation last year.
“I think an audit can be constructive but only if it’s run under auditing practices and is fair and receives information and feedback from the subject of the audit, and is not a political tool,” the governor told reporters.
Beshear also said isolation at the state’s juvenile detention centers takes different forms, from confinement to a room to being separated from the general population.
“They can be out in the facility, walking around outside. But that has to be used sometimes based on the number of violent incidents, or we continue to have serious gang issues that sometimes, for people’s personal safety, require them to be separated,” he said.
Access to pepper spray by juvenile corrections officers has Beshear’s support, too. He said Thursday there’s been a 40% decrease in violent incidents at the centers since he signed off on use of the spray last year.
“I believe that equipping our officers with pepper spray was absolutely necessary,” Beshear told reporters. “Most often when it’s used, it’s used to break up fights.”
State Auditor Allison Ball, whose office formally released the audit results on Jan. 31, commented on the audit findings in a Jan. 31 press release, saying the audit shows a “lack of leadership from the Beshear Administration.” Ball said the result is “disorganization across facilities and, as a result, the unacceptably poor treatment of Kentucky youth.”
Juvenile detention centers are using “cruel isolation policies and high levels of extreme use of force” without clear policies in place based on the findings said Ball, the former Kentucky state treasurer elected to her first term as state auditor last November.
“As a previous Assistant Floyd County Attorney who prosecuted juvenile delinquency cases, I am alarmed by the findings of this report, but I am hopeful this will provide clear direction for the numerous improvements needed within our juvenile justice system and open the door for accountability and action within DJJ,” Ball said.
Beshear did not address Ball’s comments with reporters Thursday. As for improvements, however, he admitted there is room for more.
“We’ve got a lot of improvement we need to continue to make,” the governor said. Improved documentation of use of force incidents and isolation use is one change he wants to see implemented, he said.
“Certainly one thing we’ve got to do better in the Department of Juvenile Justice is better documentation,” he said. “Better documentation of different incidents, better documentation of things that happen. We need to have a more accurate, clearer picture to be able to learn from and that documentation is key.”
LINK nky is a media partner of WCPO.com.
Watch Live:
