OJJDP FY 12 Juvenile Justice Reform and Reinvestment Demonstration Program

This program will provide funds to three state and/or local administering agencies for juvenile justice to develop and implement an integrated set of evidence-based and cost-measurement tools that will enable them to make informed decisions about resources and services for justice-involved youth. OJJDP expects awardees to fully participate in training and technical assistance and an evaluation of this initiative. The initiative will determine whether systematic use of these tools helps awardees realign services and costs and ensure the provision of the right services, for the right youth, for the right duration of time. This program is authorized by Pub. L. 111-117, 123 Stat. 3034, 3171 and Pub. L. 112-74, 125 Stat. 786, 898. The State of Iowa proposes the establishment of a Juvenile Justice Reform Project (JJRP), implementing both the Standardized Program Evaluation Protocol and the cost-benefit Results First model created by the Washington State Institute for Public Policy (WSIPP). In recent years Iowa's juvenile justice system has become ever more committed to the use of data in establishing and improving programming. A significant step in this process has been implementation of the Iowa Delinquency Assessment (IDA), a variation of a delinquency risk/needs instrument developed in Washington State. The IDA has proven to be a major step in movement toward data-informed decision-making in Iowa, and the State's interest in implementing SPEP is a logical outgrowth of this movement. Iowa is a "Results First" state, having implemented the cost-benefit model in the adult corrections system. The Division of Criminal and Juvenile Justice Planning is anticipating completion of the Results First juvenile justice module in the next two years. Implementing SPEP as part of this process - first in three judicial districts and then statewide -- will provide a process to measure effectiveness of juvenile justice programming and appropriate youth for the respective programs. CA/NCF