{"id":31352,"date":"2016-05-31T00:55:32","date_gmt":"2016-05-31T07:55:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/state-mulls-privatizing-youth-detention-centers\/"},"modified":"2016-05-31T00:55:32","modified_gmt":"2016-05-31T07:55:32","slug":"state-mulls-privatizing-youth-detention-centers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/state-mulls-privatizing-youth-detention-centers\/","title":{"rendered":"State mulls privatizing youth detention centers"},"content":{"rendered":"

KENAI<\/strong> \u2014 The state is seeking contractors to look into the feasibility of privatizing four of its juvenile detention facilities.<\/p>\n

The Alaska Department of Health and Social Services is considering privatizing facilities in Kenai, Palmer, Nome and Ketchikan in an effort to cut costs as the Legislature looks to trim the state budget, The Peninsula Clarion reported.<\/p>\n

The feasibility study is required by an agency reform bill that was passed by lawmakers but still awaits Gov. Bill Walker\u2019s signature.<\/p>\n

The study will focus on whether switching to private juvenile centers would cut costs and maintain quality of care, said Rob Wood, director of the department\u2019s Division of Juvenile Justice.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Legislature is trying to do the best it can with the budget situation we have and is asking the state departments like mine to take a look at things that may help with that and may actually provide better service, too,\u201d Wood said.<\/p>\n

Wood said attracting a private company to Alaska\u2019s short-term juvenile facilities could be complicated, though it\u2019s a relatively common practice in the Lower 48.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of the people who\u2019ve been involved in privatization in the country have been major corporations who work on corrections and juvenile justice issues,\u201d Wood said. \u201cAlaska\u2019s an expensive place to operate, though, and these are for-profit. That makes it kind of a difficult proposition for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The facilities being studied are the department\u2019s short-term detention centers, rather than longer-term mental health or substance abuse treatment centers. Wood said the department was told to look at some of their eight facilities, so they chose the smallest and most straightforward ones.<\/p>\n

The contract for the juvenile detention study will be awarded July 11. The finished report will be presented at the beginning of the Legislature\u2019s next regular session in January 2017.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

Related stories:<\/p>\n

Former Juneau inmate: After release, ‘Judgment, everywhere I went’<\/a><\/p>\n

Downtown Juneau businesses lose thousands from burglaries<\/a><\/p>\n

Juneau youth detention center celebrates renovation<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KENAI \u2014 The state is seeking contractors to look into the feasibility of privatizing four of its juvenile detention facilities. The Alaska Department of Health<\/a> and Social Services is considering privatizing facilities in Kenai, Palmer, Nome and Ketchikan in an effort to cut costs as the Legislature looks to trim the state budget, The Peninsula […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":31353,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-31352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31352"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31352\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31352"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=31352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}