Authorizing legislation

Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act.
JUVENILE JUSTICE AND DELINQUENCY PREVENTION
SUBCHAPTER I--GENERALLY
42 U.S.C. 5601 Sec. 101. Congressional statement of findings
(a) The Congress hereby finds that-(1) juveniles accounted for almost half the arrests for
serious crimes in the United States in 1974 and for less
than one-third of such arrests in 1983;
(2) recent trends show an upsurge in arrests of
adolescents for murder, assault, and weapon use;
(3) the small number of youth who commit the most
serious and violent offenses are becoming more
violent;
(4) understaffed, overcrowded juvenile courts,
prosecutorial and public defender offices, probation
services, and correctional facilities and inadequately
trained staff in such courts, services, and facilities are
not able to provide individualized justice or effective
help;
(5) present juvenile courts, foster and protective care
programs, and shelter facilities are inadequate to meet
the needs of children, who, because of this failure to
provide effective services, may become delinquents;
(6) existing programs have not adequately responded to
the particular problems of the increasing numbers of
young people who are addicted to or who abuse
alcohol and other drugs, particularly nonopiate or
polydrug abusers;
(7) juvenile delinquency can be reduced through
programs designed to keep students in elementary and
secondary schools through the prevention of
unwarranted and arbitrary suspensions and expulsions;
(8) States and local communities which experience
directly the devastating failures of the juvenile justice
system do not presently have sufficient technical
expertise or adequate resources to deal
comprehensively with the problems of juvenile
delinquency;
(9) existing Federal programs have not provided the
direction, coordination, resources, and leadership
required to meet the crisis of delinquency;
(10) the juvenile justice system should give additional
attention to the problem of juveniles who commit

serious crimes, with particular attention given to the
areas of sentencing, providing resources necessary for
informed dispositions, and rehabilitation;
(11) emphasis should be placed on preventing youth from
entering the juvenile justice system to begin with; and
(12) the incidence of juvenile delinquency can be
reduced through public recreation programs and
activities designed to provide youth with social skills,
enhance self esteem, and encourage the constructive
use of discretionary time.
(b) Congress finds further that the high incidence of
delinquency in the United States today results in enormous
annual cost and immeasurable loss of human life, personal
security, and wasted human resources and that juvenile
delinquency constitutes a growing threat to the national
welfare requiring immediate and comprehensive action by
the Federal Government to reduce and prevent
delinquency.
42 U.S.C. 5602 Sec. 102. Congressional declaration of purpose and
policy
(a) It is the purpose of this chapter-(1) to provide for the thorough and ongoing evaluation
of all federally assisted juvenile justice and
delinquency prevention programs;
(2) to provide technical assistance to public and private
nonprofit juvenile justice and delinquency prevention
programs;
(3) to establish training programs for persons,
including professionals, paraprofessionals, and
volunteers, who work with delinquents or potential
delinquents or whose work or activities relate to
juvenile delinquency programs;
(4) to establish a centralized research effort on the
problems of juvenile delinquency, including the
dissemination of the findings of such research and all
data related to juvenile delinquency;
(5) to develop and encourage the implementation of
national standards for the administration of juvenile
justice, including recommendations for administrative,
budgetary, and legislative action at the Federal, State,
and local level to facilitate the adoption of such
standards;
(6) to assist States and local communities with
resources to develop and implement programs to keep
students in elementary and secondary schools and to
prevent unwarranted and arbitrary suspensions and
expulsions;

(7) to establish a Federal assistance program to deal
with the problems of runaway and homeless youth;
(8) to strengthen families in which juvenile
delinquency has been a problem;
(9) to assist State and local governments in removing
juveniles from jails and lockups for adults;
42 U.S.C. 5653 Sec. 243. Research, demonstration, and evaluation
functions of Institute
(a) The Administrator, acting through the National
Institute for Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention,
is authorized to-(1) conduct, encourage, and coordinate research and
evaluation into any aspect of juvenile delinquency,
particularly with regard to new programs and methods
which seek to strengthen and preserve families or
which show promise of making a contribution toward
the prevention and treatment of juvenile delinquency;
(2) encourage the development of demonstration
projects in new, innovative techniques and methods to
prevent and treat juvenile delinquency;
(3) establish or expand programs that, in recognition
of varying degrees of the seriousness of delinquent
behavior and the corresponding gradations in the
responses of the juvenile justice system in response to
that behavior, are designed to-(i) encourage courts to develop and implement a
continuum of post- adjudication restraints that
bridge the gap between traditional probation and
confinement in a correctional setting (including
expanded use of probation, mediation, restitution,
community service, treatment, home detention,
intensive supervision, electronic monitoring, boot
camps and similar programs, and secure
community-based treatment facilities linked to
other support services such as health, mental
health, education (remedial and special), job
training, and recreation); and
(ii) assist in the provision by the Administrator of
information and technical assistance, including
technology transfer, to States in the design and
utilization of risk assessment mechanisms to aid
juvenile justice personnel in determining
appropriate sanctions for delinquent behavior;
(4) Encourage the development of programs which, in
addition to helping youth take responsibility for their
behavior, take into consideration life experiences
which may have contributed to their delinquency when
developing intervention and treatment programs;

(5) encourage the development and establishment of
programs to enhance the States' ability to identify
chronic serious and violent juvenile offenders who
commit crimes such as rape, murder, firearms
offenses, gang-related crimes, violent felonies, and
serious drug offenses;
(5) provide for the evaluation of all juvenile
delinquency programs assisted under this subchapter in
order to determine the results and the effectiveness of
such programs;
**** Two (2) number (5) were enacted
(6) provide for the evaluation of any other Federal,
State, or local juvenile delinquency program;
(7) prepare, in cooperation with educational
institutions, with Federal, State, and local agencies,
and with appropriate individuals and private agencies,
such studies as it considers to be necessary with
respect to the prevention and treatment of juvenile
delinquency and the improvement of the juvenile
justice system, including-(A) recommendations designed to promote
effective prevention and treatment, particularly by
strengthening and maintaining the family unit;
(B) assessments regarding the role of family
violence, sexual abuse or exploitation, media
violence, the improper handling of youth placed in
one State by another State, the effectiveness of
family-centered treatment programs, special
education, remedial education, and recreation, and
the extent to which youth in the juvenile system
are treated differently on the basis of sex, race, or
family income and the ramifications of such
treatment;
(C) examinations of the treatment of juveniles
processed in the criminal justice system; and
(D) recommendations as to effective means for
detering [FN1] involvement in illegal activities or
promoting involvement in lawful activities
(including the productive use of discretionary time
through organized recreational [FN2] on the part
of gangs whose membership is substantially
composed of juveniles;
(8) disseminate the results of such evaluations and
research and demonstration activities particularly to
persons actively working in the field of juvenile
delinquency;
(9) disseminate pertinent data and studies to
individuals, agencies, and organizations concerned

with the prevention and treatment of juvenile
delinquency;
(10) develop and support model State legislation
consistent with the mandates of this subchapter and the
standards developed by the National Advisory
Committee for Juvenile Justice and Delinquency
Prevention before October 12, 1984;
(11) support research relating to reducing the excessive
proportion of juveniles detained or confined in secure
detention facilities, secure correctional facilities, jails,
and lockups who are members of minority groups;
and
(12) support independent and collaborative research,
research training, and consultation on social,
psychological, educational, economic, and legal issues
affecting children and families;
(13) support research related to achieving a better
understanding of the commission of hate crimes by
juveniles and designed to identify educational
programs best suited to prevent and reduce the
incidence of hate crimes committed by juveniles; and
(14) routinely collect, analyze, compile, publish, and
disseminate uniform national statistics concerning-(A) all aspects of juveniles as victims and
offenders;
(B) the processing and treatment, in the juvenile
justice system, of juveniles who are status
offenders, delinquent, neglected, or abused; and
(C) the processing and treatment of such juveniles
who are treated as adults for purposes of the
criminal justice system.

(b) The Administrator shall make available to the public-(1) the results of evaluations and research and
demonstration activities referred to in subsection (a)(8)
of this section; and
(2) the data and studies referred to in subsection (a)(9)
of this section; that the Administrator is authorized to
disseminate under subsection (a) of this section.
[FN1] So in original.
[FN2] So in original.
activities)".

Probably should be "recreational