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A committee appointed to advise Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle voted 5-3 in favor of closing the Ethan Allen School, a juvenile detention facility in Waukesha County, instead of the Lincoln Hills School in northern Wisconsin. But the committee’s final recommendations to the governor offered many reasons for keeping the Waukesha facility open. Supporters note in particular that about 70 percent of incarcerated juveniles come from Southeastern Wisconsin.

“You’ve got two large institutions built years ago, now sitting there half full,” says Bishop Charles McClelland, a member of the committee and president of Word of Hope Ministries, a provider of reentry programs for juvenile offenders. “But it made absolutely no sense to close Ethan Allen when two-thirds of the young people come from Southeastern Wisconsin.”

The state is looking for ways to close a predicted $25 million deficit over the next two years in its juvenile corrections division – and looking hard at closing one of the boys’ schools. Closing Ethan Allen in the Waukesha County town of Wales is expected to eliminate $13 million of the budget gap. Closing Lincoln Hills, which is about 20 miles north of Wausau, would save slightly more, $14 million.

Although Ethan Allen is close to Milwaukee, where about half of detainees come from, juveniles still have relatively little contact with their families, the committee found, because parents or other family members are unwilling or unable to visit the boys. “Current visitation data does not reflect increased family involvement at (Ethan Allen) even though it is located substantially close to their home,” reports the committee, which met several times between April and June. The data undercuts a key argument for keeping the facility open.

“The rates are pretty low,” says Jim Moeser, co-chair of the committee and deputy director of the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families. “If Ethan Allen stays open, (the state department of corrections) needs to work on that. It needs to find ways to better engage parents.” Although Ethan Allen is much closer (about 25 miles) to Milwaukee than Lincoln Hills (about 220 miles away), it’s still a struggle for some poor families or those lacking a car, he says, to make the trip.

Is Lincoln Hills better run?

Moeser voted to close Ethan Allen. Lincoln Hills seems to be better run and offer better programming, he says. Its students appear to be better behaved and file fewer complaints against staff, according to the report. Students at Ethan Allen, in 2009, were between seven and 15 times more likely to be placed on observation for bad behavior or to assault a staff member. The committee’s review of both schools found more discord among staff at Ethan Allen. In Wales, staff filed 109 grievances in 2009. At Lincoln Hills, there were none.

On the other hand, although Lincoln Hills appears to be better run, the report says, boys released from its care are still about as likely to commit further crimes as those released from Ethan Allen.

According to McClelland, who is a bishop in the Holy Cathedral Church of God in Christ, the Lincoln Hills staff is lacking in diversity, meaning juveniles find it harder to identify with staff members. “The environment is not a reflection of where they come from,” he says. McClelland recommends adding more minority staff members to both facilities.

The state is facing the $25 million deficit largely because juvenile incarceration rates have plummeted in the past decade. Between 2001 and 2008, the rate dropped 35 percent.  Other factors causing the drop in demand for boys’ schools in the state include the rise of alternative local programs to help juvenile offenders and the rising cost for counties of placing juveniles in one of the schools.

The state charges counties a daily rate for each juvenile they have incarcerated in one of the schools. The funding comes from both local property taxes and state dollars, but the state funding has grown much more slowly than the daily rate, which has risen significantly in recent years. The daily rate system, the “Youth Aids” program, was created to provide an incentive for counties to seek local alternatives for juveniles. It seems to be working.

Other proposals

State Rep. Fred Kessler (D-Milwaukee) has proposed returning 17-year-olds to the juvenile justice system instead of treating them as adults, a shift that could allow both facilities to stay open, he says, by increasing their populations. “We made 17-year-olds criminals instead of delinquents, and I don’t think that’s good public policy,” says the lawmaker.

Kessler says legislative leaders never brought his bill, introduced in the last legislative session, to a vote. It would have added a $14 surcharge to traffic offenses to cover the cost of moving the 17-year-olds from adult prisons to the more expensive juvenile facilities.

Unions representing employees at the boys’ schools, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and the Wisconsin Education Association Council teachers union, are pushing the state to keep both facilities open by seeking new federal revenue and budgeting more state funds for juvenile corrections.

Moeser and McClelland are expecting a decision from Doyle sooner than later since the deficit only grows larger as time passes. “It’s in the governor’s hands,” McClelland says.

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