At-large D.C. Councilman David Catania is introducing an ambitious, comprehensive bill that’s meant to prevent youth violence by cracking down on truancy and requiring mental health screening for the District’s children starting in preschool. Catania announced the bill Wednesday, the one-year anniversary of a mass shooting on South Capitol Street that left four teenagers dead. It was found that some of the accused killers were wards of the city’s juvenile justice agency when they allegedly pulled the trigger. Catania said the shooting and the persistence of a mother who lost her child that day inspired him to develop the legislation, which, if passed, will link the city’s patchwork of youth mental health programs and tighten policies on students who skip school.
“The District’s legacy of failure in these areas created the conditions that made tragedy like the one that occurred a year ago possible,” Catania said. “The bill will create the most comprehensive and sophisticated youth mental health screening system in the country and will at long last ensure real enforcement of existing truancy laws.”
Under current law, a D.C. student can have 25 unexcused absences from school before being referred to the court system. Catania’s bill would reduce that to seven days within a month or 10 days over the course of a school year. It would also require schools to keep track of truancy and intervention methods, and then file reports to the council. The reports will help lawmakers assess if it’s the policies that are failing or the schools’ enforcement of the policies, Catania said.
But the biggest change would be breaking down barriers between the city’s mental health programs and Medicaid reimbursement, said Shannon Hall of the D.C. Behavioral Health Association.
“The bill will streamline the Medicaid reimbursement process, allowing mental health programs to focus their resources on helping people rather than fighting paper tigers,” Hall said.
Catania said improved access to Medicaid dollars will also be key in finding the cash in a tight budget cycle to fund the bill’s proposals.
“The real question is what is the cost if we don’t address these issues in our city?” Council Chairman Kwame Brown said. “How could I look more families in the eye and say we didn’t do what was necessary to stop the violence?”
