Pinellas County Juvenile Justice Council

Council Meeting of June 25, 2009

Seminole Community Library

9200 -113 Street North

Seminole, FL 33772

Minutes – Approved as submitted 7/23/09

Call to order—Chair Cathy Corry called the meeting to order at 7:00 P.M.

Call of the roll—In the absence of Membership Registrar Brian Pitts, Chair Corry called the roll and announced that a quorum was not present.

Public comment.—A family’s experience with the juvenile justice system was recounted and discussed.

Approve minutes of Council meetings—The minutes of the 02/26/09 and 04/23/09 Council meetings were not considered for lack of a quorum.

Reports—

(1) Chair’s report
(a) DJJ investigation—DJJ completed its year-long investigation of the Pinellas County Juvenile Justice Council’s complaint that DJJ violated Florida statute when it substituted “concept papers” for grant applications for review by Florida’s Circuit Juvenile Justice Boards and County Juvenile Justice Councils. The DJJ report determined that two counts of the charge of violation of policy/rules were inconclusive. A second charge, negligence, was substantiated. The complete report is on the Pinellas County Juvenile Justice Council website www.PinellasJJC.org.
(b) Circuit 6 Juvenile Justice Board—Next meeting is Monday, July 27, 2009, 2:00pm, Downtown Clearwater Courthouse, County Commission Assembly Room, 315 Court Street, Clearwater, FL.
(c) Pinellas County Juvenile Justice Council—Next Council meeting is Thursday, July 23, 2009, 7:00 pm, at this same location, Seminole Community Library - 9200 - 113th Street North, Seminole, FL.
(d) Copy of the Chair’s report was submitted for the record.

(2) Vice-Chair’s report—As Chair of the Nomination Committee, the Vice-Chair reported that there were no nominations for appointment to the Circuit 6 Juvenile Justice Board to replace Randall Jones who resigned.

(3) Secretary’s report—A summary of Pinellas County Public School-related charges in six charts created from statistics provided by the Pinellas Juvenile Assessment Center (PJAC):
(a) The number of times charges were applied (count) during the first three quarters of a school year dropped from over 900 counts [948] in 2004-5 to fewer than 600 counts [561] in 2006-7. Since then, the counts  have risen from just over 600 counts [630] in the first three quarters of 2007-8 to 700 counts [703] in the same period in 2008-9.
[Column chart: Pinellas…School-Related Charges 1^st Three Quarters…2004-5 through 2008-9]
(b) Charges most commonly levied are what the Council categorizes as “behavior.” This category has only two charges: disorderly conduct and disruption of school environment. These two charges were applied over 38% of the time from the first three quarters of 2004-5 through the same period of 2008-9. The Council contends that, while these behaviors may be obnoxious, they pose no physical threat to people or property and should not be used Pinellas County’s public schools. One hundred thirty nine unique charges were used more that 3600 times (3606) in the first three quarters of the schools years 2004-5 through the same period of 2008-9.
[Pie chart: Pinellas County School-Related Charges by Category 1^st Three Qtrs…2004-5 through 2008-9]
(c) The Council began receiving PJAC monthly reports of school-related charges in May 2008 in addition to its quarterly reports. A review of the monthly figures, reveals that the use of school-related charges rose from fewer than 60 counts [58] in May 2008 to nearly 100 counts [98] in May 2009.
[Column chart: School-Related Charges…May 2008 through May 2009]
(d) ESE, Alternative, and Elementary schools accounted for 12% of the total number of times charges were levied against students in the first three quarters of the 2008-9 school year. These are schools where the students are expected to have issues. Pinellas County public schools has a ban on the use of law enforcement to resolve issues in Elementary schools. However, in the first three quarters of the 2008-9 school year charges were applied in Elementary schools a total of 9 times in these categories: battery [3], drugs [1], theft [2], trespass [2], weapons [2] and other [1]. Without details of the charges, the Council cannot determine the exact nature of the crimes. For example, a student knocked a box of crayons from his desk the box struck a passing teacher and the student was charged with battery on a school official.
[Pie chart: Pinellas…School-Related Charges by School Level May 2008 through May 2009]
(e) Elementary, Alternative, and ESE schools generated 113 counts from May 2008 through May 2009. The three top categories—accounting for 76% of all counts in these schools during this time—are battery (28%), behavior (13%) and other (28%).
[Pie chart: School-Related Charges by Category…Elementary, Alternative and ESE School…]
(f) The top three charges that make up the “other” category in Elementary, Alternative and ESE Schools from May 2008 through May 2009 are violation of probation, resisting arrest with violence and false fire alarm. Virtually all of these “other” charges were applied in ESE schools.
[Table of charges by category for Alternative, Elementary and ESE schools]
(g) Copies of charts were given to all Council members and submitted for the record.

New business—

(1) Appoint of a member of the Circuit 6 Juvenile Justice Board to fill a vacancy—Tabled as there was neither nominees nor a quorum.

(2) Chair appointed Vice-Chair Sullivan to head a new Nomination Committee—
(a) Identify nominees for the four (4) Council officer positions—Chair, Vice-Chair, Secretary and Registrar. Officer terms expire in September, 2009.
(b) Identify nominees to fill two (2) positions on the C6JJB. The first to fill the current vacancy on the Board and the other to fill the seat occupied by Member Matt Sullivan when his term expires in October, 2009. Sullivan can be re-appointed as there is no term limit for members of the C6JJB.

Council member announcements—

(1) Dennis Segall stated that he is planning to speak with writers from the St. Petersburg Times about events at Circuit 6 Juvenile Justice Board meetings.

(2) Cathy Corry called attention to an article that highlights Dennis Segall’s work with youth. The article, titled “C.R.Y.S. Against the System,” appeared in the November-December 2004 issue of Prism magazine. Copies of the magazine were made available to the members.

(3) There were no other announcements.

Public comment—There was no public comment.

Adjourn—Chair Corry announced that there were no further items on the agenda and, if there was no objection, the meeting would be adjourned. There was no objection. Chair Corry declared the meeting adjourned at 8:10 P.M.

Draft Minutes prepared by Dave Plyer, Secretary, 07/07/09.

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