Juvenile Accountability in Pennsylvania: The Juvenile Accountability Incentive Block Grant Program

• NCJ Number: 180842
• Journal: Pennsylvania Progress Volume: 6 Issue: 3 Dated: Summer 1999 Pages: 1-7
• Author(s): Patrick Griffin
• Date Published: 1999
• Length: 7 pages
• Grant Number(s): 98-J-05-8576
• Agencies: OJJDP-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Program/Project Description

Annotation

This is an account of the way first-year funds of Pennsylvania's Juvenile Accountability Incentive Block Grant Program (JAIBG) are being distributed among local governments; it describes the range of accountability-promoting programs the funds are helping support.

Abstract

The purpose of JAIBG funds, which are authorized under the Federal Juvenile Accountability Block Grants Act of 1997, is to encourage State and local governments to hold delinquent youth responsible for their offenses through accountability-based sanctions. Although JAIBG in Pennsylvania is paying some or all of the salaries and benefits of 57 juvenile court staffers statewide as well as other project staff and juvenile workers, most of the funding is going into local innovation. This report describes funded local programs that pertain to youth offender accountability to victims, restitution programs, community service initiatives, youth aid panels, information sharing, and safer schools. Each local government's efforts in these areas are described. The report notes that at this point most of the programs have just begun, so no evaluation data are available to measure their success. The JAIBG program has been funded for a second year, so as to provide local governments with the flexibility and resources to make their own investments in juvenile accountability.