The Close to Home initiative was supposed to move detained kids to less restrictive settings and improve their ability to complete their education. That hasn’t happened.
Come Election Day, voters will decide whether to raise the retirement age of judges to deal with civil and criminal court backlogs. But nothing is being done for Family Court, which oversees New York’s most vulnerable.
New York stands virtually alone among states in allowing teenagers to be tried as adults and sentenced to adult prisons. Amid a wave of juvenile justice improvements, these children seem to have been forgotten.
The city’s teenaged dads can make a huge difference in the lives of their kids. Yet they are forced to navigate Family Court with little guidance, and must deal with agencies and jurists who know next to nothing about them.
In an interview with City Limits, Administration for Children’s Services Commissioner Ronald Richter says of the scarce resources in Family Court: “Our issues are often not popular. It takes a lot of effort to draw politicians’ attention.”
A conversation with Edwina Richardson-Mendelson a one-time lawyer and then a courtroom judge in Family Court who now oversees the city’s system.
New York’s juvenile justice system is the target of reform efforts. But to some critics, it’s the fact that New York State tries so many teens outside of juvenile court that most needs reform. Chapter 4 in our Family Court investigation.
All parties in Family Court are supposed to be fighting for the welfare of the child. But chapter 3 of our Family Court investigation finds that in the adversarial format of a courtroom, players sometimes take on conflicting roles.
In chapter 5 of our investigation of New York City Family Court, we look at past reform efforts and survey judges, lawyers, advocates and parents on how they think the system could be improved.
New York recently began trying to get more children who were removed from their homes placed in guardianship relationships with other relatives. While there are potential pitfalls, the approach can save time and money.
City Limits uses investigative journalism through the prism of New York City to identify urban problems, examine their causes, explore solutions, and equip communities to take action.
Founded in 1976 in the midst of New York’s fiscal crisis, City Limits exists to inform democracy and equip citizens to create a more just city. The organization is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit funded by foundation support, ad sponsorship and donations from readers.
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