Improving conditions for locked up kids

After an onslaught of shocking footage of immigrant children separated from their parents and detained in cages, Philadelphia is working to change the story for its own youth experiencing the horrors of being severed from their communities and placed in institutional facilities.

Take the story of Lilly, who bravely testified last month before City Council.

Lilly not only witnessed staff fighting with youth, but had been body-slammed, strip-searched, and burned by staff while in an institution at age 13. She had seizures, which went ignored. What’s more, though her mother thought she would at least get an education and therapy, those programs at Lilly’s placement were nonexistent. “There was no school at the facility. We had to stay in one room all day. There was no teacher, no books, just a tv – and even that was only on when staff wanted to watch tv. There was nothing.”

Now, the conditions that Philadelphia children face in residential facilities are finally under the microscope and poised for reform.  Philadelphia officials, members of City Council, PCCY and other child advocates are coming together to change the story foster children, and youth involved in the juvenile justice system, who are scattered across the state in institutional facilities. Tragically 900 Philadelphia youth are in living in institutions far from home, cut off from any community, and far too often facing real risks to their health, safety and academic progress. 

In part due to PCCY’s push, this week, Philadelphia City Council unanimously passed a resolution  establishing an official Youth Residential Placement Task Force to reduce the city’s reliance on restrictive placements for youth, particularly those outside of city limits, and to make the quality of placements that Philadelphia contracts to house these children much better.

The legislation, introduced by Councilmember Helen Gym and co-sponsored by Councilman Kenyatta Johnson, who had himself been a youth placed in an institutional facility, comes one month after a marathon council hearing on the deplorable conditions that youth face at these facilities, exposing major gaps in accountability.

In the worst circumstances, youth, just like Lilly, experience physical and mental abuse, Dickensian restraints, solitary confinement, and humiliating strip searches. For school they receive worksheets, coloring books, or outdated computers. 

At their very best, these institutions can help stabilize youth in crisis, but their distance from home severs critical ties to family, schools, and community, leaving significant obstacles for youth to face when they return.

Although the state sets minimum operating standards (which could stand to improve), the City holds the contracts with these facilities, and has the ability to demand needed improvements – or, plan to rely on them less. 

Council’s move to establish Philadelphia’s Youth Residential Placement Task Force is a significant step toward changing the story. Its mission is to reduce the number of kids placed in these institutions and improve the conditions of the facilities so that when a child is placed in them, they are safe, healthy and learning. 

Now that Council has created the Task Force, they must appoint the youth, family members, and experts on health, mental health, and education, and other stakeholders who can propose concrete reforms that improves the lives of the city’s most vulnerable children.

PCCY and its partners at the Defenders Association, Juvenile Law Center, Education Law Center, Support Center for Child Advocates, Disability Rights PA, CASA Philadelphia, and Community Legal Services made this happen, and together we will ensure this task force adopts a bold vision that changes the story for these children.