Combining Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse Treatment With Diversion for Juveniles in the Justice System
Treatment Improvement Protocol (TIP) Series 21

Community Decisions

• Identifying the stakeholders and leaders to be involved in the planning process
• Agreeing on community accountability
• Planning for the presence of urban, suburban, and rural differences
• Defining the roles and expectations of families
• Planning the focus and influences of community diversity

JJS Decisions

• Developing the diversion concept
• Identifying the points in the justice process at which diversion can occur
• Devising effective education and training programs for judges and court services personnel so that they know and understand the treatment resources available, and so that the most effective treatment approach can be implemented for each juvenile
• Helping treatment providers and public health officials understand the JJS
• Establishing procedures for judicial responses to AOD abuse treatment issues
• Defining appropriate target populations within the JJS's jurisdiction
• Defining noncompliance and completion of AOD abuse treatment
• Identifying the types of information required to measure outcomes needed for decisionmaking
• Developing the ability to supervise AOD-abusing juvenile offenders and monitor treatment progress

AOD Abuse Treatment Decisions

• Defining the needed continuum of services
• Identifying needed treatment modalities
• Defining treatment expectations
• Defining and locating services
• Establishing uniform eligibility and acceptance criteria
• Developing a screening and assessment process for placement in AOD abuse treatment
• Defining the supervision roles of AOD abuse treatment providers
• Planning to deal with issues of culture, gender, and ethnicity

Ethical and Legal Decisions

• Deciding what information is appropriate to exchange
• Deciding who is appropriate to receive information
• Protecting confidential electronic data
• Reporting in accordance with local, State, and Federal guidelines
• Defining the scope of confidentiality rules

Decisions Regarding Physical and Mental Health Services and Social Services

• Defining what physical and mental health services and social services need to be available to youth and families
• Establishing linkages with the AOD abuse treatment system to integrate services for youth into the diversion program

Management Decisions

• Resolving funding and cost considerations
• Ensuring confidentiality and adequate communication among all parties
• Identifying program management capabilities
• Encouraging interagency cooperation and collaboration (which includes written documentation)
• Developing preimplementation training and public education
• Conducting system oversight
• Defining the evaluation process
• Conducting feedback analysis and reporting on outcomes
• Defining the need for ongoing research
• Defining ongoing data and demographic requirements

Since funding is a critical issue, it is important to include in the first group people who are knowledgeable of funding streams, who are potential funders, or who have ties to funding organizations. Often, commitment to productive change is more important than a person's position or field of work. Planners from these groups are not likely to be directly involved in the implementation of the program, although some collaborating groups may designate some to be involved. Elected officials should be included on the collaborating committee if possible or appropriate. Often the single State agency (SSA) has the power to reprioritize funds based on identified local need.

The responsibilities of planning team members and possibly the team's composition may shift as planning progresses. For example, planning will require the participation of people with the ability to communicate problems and solutions, and it will necessitate support and commitment from people representing a variety of organizations in the community. Some members should be able to clearly explain the process of juvenile diversion and what it means for the JJS, the AOD abuse treatment field, and the community. As planning moves toward implementation, the judge and agency and department heads will need to assert leadership so that the program being planned can be activated. As planning moves to implementation and expands into ongoing programming, this committee leadership can be vital to sustaining the diversion program.

Each community that is planning a diversion program for AOD-abusing youth should evaluate the extent and nature of its AOD problems and develop a response that reflects the local challenges of AOD use and the unique characteristics of the community. Accordingly, the planning team membership should also reflect the community's social characteristics.

Because an evaluation plan is critical to developing the diversion program, members of the team should include people with appropriate research or project evaluation backgrounds. If this expertise is missing within the community, linkage with a college or university may be appropriate. The committee should take advantage of research findings and plan to document its efforts for future evaluation, feedback, and development. Selection of an individual with the ability to develop and operate a management information system (MIS) is necessary to ensure that appropriate data collection systems are in place.

Representing the JJS

• Juvenile courts: This group should include the juvenile court judge or the referee, master, or designee, as well as probation and parole officers and other representatives of juvenile court.
• Prosecutors: Some prosecutors are accustomed to working with a more limited concept of diversion than the definition proposed in this TIP. Involving them in the planning process can avoid any constraint on buy-in.
• Public Defender's Office: Included with representatives from the public defender's office may be those attorneys identified by or contracted with the jurisdiction to represent delinquent or status-offending youth.
• Law enforcement: Although official involvement with juveniles usually ends once the juvenile has been charged, police can serve as valuable mentors or community resources. Police also may want feedback about case disposition, particularly in community policing models. Some communities incorporate police officers into school systems as resource officers, an interactive arrangement in which police build trust with children and youth.

Representing AOD Abuse Treatment Providers

• Youth AOD abuse treatment providers: Include both public and private providers that specialize in adolescent AOD abuse treatment.
• Community-based resources relevant to treatment: In some parts of the country, continuing care and relapse prevention may be provided by physical and mental health services, social services, or other organizations.

Representing Physical and Mental Health and Social Services Providers

• Community school professionals: This group can include staff from the mainstream public and private schools as well as from alternative education environments. If the number of schools is too large to incorporate, a member from a representative teachers' organization may be selected.
• Healthcare professionals: These professionals may be private practitioners or representatives of public and private providers, as well as providers focusing on prevention or representatives of professional organizations such as the National Association of Social Workers. They should include representatives from community mental health centers (most States have a well-developed network of community mental health centers or child guidance programs) and from the public health department. The public health system ensures that general medical services (preventive health care, infectious disease screening and treatment, and reproductive healthcare) are incorporated as appropriate in treatment programs.
• Social services professionals: This group can include professionals from public and private social welfare agencies, child protective services, child welfare organizations, and family service programs (for example, the Salvation Army, Jewish community services, and city and county human services organizations).

Representing the Community

• Support groups: This category includes such groups such as Alcoholic Anonymous (AA), Narcotics Anonymous (NA), and Rational Recovery (RR). If AA, NA, and RR have no meetings for youth, perhaps adult members can participate in the implementation effort by initiating them. Since AA, NA, and RR have no official representatives, participants from these groups will be active, interested private individuals with a special interest in assisting youth.
• Victim advocacy groups: These groups have different names in different localities but will be known to most professionals in child and juvenile welfare organizations.
• Business community: Members of the business community who are involved in decisions about healthcare coverage and who also have an interest in youth as future members of the workforce should be included. Planning committee members from businesses can provide assistance by establishing youth advocacy efforts, offering incentives such as job training and other opportunities for recovering youth, supporting drug testing as a condition of employment, and making facilities available for use as meeting space by the planning committee.
• Parent groups: Parents who have experience with juvenile justice and AOD abuse treatment should be included but not parents whose children are currently in these systems.
• Teenage peers: Youth recovering from AOD abuse problems should be included.
• Clergy: Clergy and members of the religious community have the resources and ability to make decisions that have a positive impact. They may offer cultural or ethnic perspectives on the diversion program, as well as support the program. They also can educate their congregations about the AOD abuse treatment diversion program.
• Community elders: Elders who can provide guidance and practical perspectives often are available to volunteer. Diversion is not a new concept, and many times the community elders have particularly salient views on why past efforts have succeeded or failed.
• Funders: Representatives of both private and public funding sources should be included, as well as lawmakers who develop legislation for programs and who are responsible for the appropriation of funds.
• Local officials: Representatives from the mayor's office, the city council, the county board, and local representatives to the legislature should be included.
• Volunteer organizations: Examples include community youth service organizations such as Boys and Girls Clubs, Big Brothers/Big Sisters, YMCAs and YWCAs, police youth clubs, service sororities and fraternities, Civitan clubs, and other youth organizations such as church groups or entrepreneurship development programs.

The length of this list suggests that a large group might be created, so large that it could outnumber the target population of AOD-abusing youth. In a large city, the collaborating group might be even larger. It is more likely, however, that a much smaller group would participate with representatives from a few key organizations interested in juvenile welfare and community safety.

The following chapter describes some of the major decision points facing the collaborating committee. They are provided to assist local groups in planning and developing their AOD abuse treatment diversion program for appropriate juveniles involved in the JJS.