The director of the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services on Wednesday touted improvements in the troubled agency since he took over three years ago, including fewer missing teenagers and an upgrade in conditions at the Oak Hill Youth Center.
Director Vincent Schiraldi, who came to the District government as a highly regarded juvenile reform advocate, deflected criticism that his reforms coddle the juvenile offenders.
“We’ve going from very, very poor to very, very good, and we’re passing through mediocre right now,” Schiraldi said at a press conference called to discuss the agency. “But my eyes, and the eyes of the staff, are on excellence.”
He is expected to testify at a D.C. council oversight hearing today.
Schiraldi boasted of a number of reforms since the agency became a cabinet-level agency three years ago.
In December, the plaintiffs in the Jerry M. case rescinded their petition to place the DYRSin receivership, and the lawyer representing the class-action lawsuit said he had seen more progress in the last two years than in the previous 20. The case has been a black eye for the city, which has been ordered to improve conditions for juvenile offenders.
Schiraldi noted that the number of teenagers who absconded from the department plummeted from 26 percent in 2003 to 3 percent as of last Friday.
And he announced new case management reforms that will reduce the case loads from 45 cases per worker to 25 per worker. Social workers will be required to meet with juveniles twice a month instead of once, and their meetings will be monitored by a computerized system so that supervisors will be notified if contact is not made.
Schiraldi also pointed out that the agency was providing opportunities for the youth, including performing Shakespeare and traveling to the Navajo Nation in Arizona. “This might sound like routine stuff for a lot of people,” he said, “but for this is not routine stuff for the kids.”
