The head of Florida’s juvenile justice system is weighing in on how a bill aimed at decriminalizing adolescence will affect her agency.
Florida Department of Juvenile Justice Secretary Christy Daly says her agency intends to review the fiscal impact of a statewide effort expanding the use of juvenile civil citations. But, for now, she doesn’t foresee it having a negative effect on DJJ.
“Civil citations in our system, we’ve really been able to do it at not a significant amount of cost,” said Daly, recently speaking to lawmakers. “I don’t believe that we would see a significant financial impact on providing additional civil citations across the state.”
In fact, Daly says she knows civil citations saves dollars because those kids aren’t going through the more costly court system. The bill—starting to move through the Senate—would require law enforcement to issue a civil citation if it’s the juvenile’s first time committing a certain misdemeanor crime. That includes trespassing, disorderly conduct, and theft.
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