Opening Remarks by OJJDP Administrator Liz Ryan at the OJJDP National Conference on Youth Justice
November 19, 2024
Good morning, everyone! I’m Liz Ryan, the Administrator of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, or OJJDP, and it is my pleasure to welcome you to the OJJDP National Conference on Youth Justice.
What an incredible sight! So many people working to transform youth justice! Thank you for taking the time and effort to be here! You are here with nearly 2,500 of your colleagues from across the country! Every state and territory is represented. Your dedication and commitment to youth justice is truly inspirational!
I also want to thank the Gar-Field High School Junior ROTC, led by Sergeant Major Ellis, for the presentation of colors this morning, and recognize Judge Sheila Calloway for that gorgeous rendition of the National Anthem.
I want to acknowledge the land on which we gather today. This is Piscatawayland. The Piscataway people were the District of Columbia’s first people and stewards of this land. I am deeply grateful to be here today, and I recognize and honor the relationship that exists between the Piscataway people and the land on which we meet.
This conference is the culmination of our year-long commemoration of OJJDP’s 50th anniversary.
Our staff spent over a year organizing this conference. Their careful planning and attention to detail is apparent in every session. Our efforts here are supported by the Justice Department. Attorney General Merrick Garland will be joining us on Thursday to help close out this event. Principal Deputy Associate Attorney General Benjamin Mizer will be here later this afternoon. We are grateful for their support.
We are excited to now turn our focus–with all of you–to the future—to shaping the next 50 years of youth justice together!
We are at an inflection point in youth justice. This is a critical moment in time.
Let’s start by asking ourselves some crucial questions.
What do we want youth justice to look like for the next 50 years? What can we learn from the past 50 years? What is working? What isn’t? How can we direct our collective resources to support young people? Who is not at the table that needs to be part of this conversation? How can we do better?
To guide us in answering these questions, we can take some decisive next steps together. First, we must not let all that we’ve accomplished together be rolled back. Responding to the needs of youth and families is beneficial for young people, for communities, and for public safety.
Second, we must reaffirm our commitment to some key priorities and principles. To guide our efforts, OJJDP has set clear priorities and principles with direct input from so many of you in this room and your colleagues back home.
Over the past nearly three years, many of you have heard me share OJJDP’s priorities. If you know them, please read them along with me. Our three priorities are:
- First: Treat children as children.
- Second: Serve youth at home, with their families and in their communities; and
- Third: Open up opportunities for young people who come into contact with the juvenile justice system.
Our guiding principles include an unwavering commitment to racial equity and fairness and a promise to always partner with youth and families who are directly impacted by the juvenile justice system.
To operationalize these priorities and overarching principles, OJJDP along with many of you are focusing on how essential it is to deliver a continuum of care in youth justice. In fact, this convening is crafted around a continuum of care.
A functioning continuum of care must include prevention, intervention, and reentry programs. By offering a continuum of care, we can support most youth from ever coming into contact with the justice system by meeting the needs of both youth and families. Many of the children who fall through the cracks of our system could have—and should have—been served much earlier in the continuum of care.
Finally, we need to expand and accelerate our partnerships with directly impacted youth and their families. Throughout the past several years, we’ve listened and learned from so many young people and family members during numerous site visits to your states, listening sessions, and meetings. Young people informed so many aspects of this conference. They helped drive our session planning and topic selection. They are here participating as speakers and guests on panels, and we are welcoming several emerging leaders to the stage.
We have three days together. Three very important days.
This is an opportunity for us to recharge, take a breath, and focus.
Think about what you want to learn, what you want to contribute, who you want to connect with, who you want to inspire and be inspired by, and most of all, what you want to share with your colleagues back home who could not be here with you.
Now, it is my distinct pleasure to introduce our next speaker, Acting Assistant Attorney General Brent Cohen. He leads the Office of Justice Programs, which includes OJJDP and several other program offices.
Mr. Cohen has a long history of leadership roles in criminal and juvenile justice, including serving as the Vice President for Youth Engagement at the Center for American Progress and as the Executive Director of Generation Progress, where he led advocacy efforts on a range of issues including criminal justice reform. Please welcome, Acting Assistant Attorney General Brent Cohen.
###