Report: North County has large number of juvenile offenders 

For the first time, the San Luis Obispo County Probation Department released an annual statistical report, which covers data from juvenile services, adult services and juvenile hall for fiscal year 2013-14.

The information gathered for the report will benefit the probation department in achieving its goals. The county has just over 150 staff located on three main facilities and stationed in school districts, county jail and county court with 105 officers: 30 for juvenile services, 32 for juvenile hall and 43 for adult services. The total budget for the department is just over $19 million.

Paso Robles Police Department gave more referrals, 129, to juvenile probation for 2013-14 than any other city in the county, the report shows. Atascadero was the second highest with 98 referrals. The probation department gave 224 and the SLO County Sheriff’s Department gave 131. Forty-two percent of the juveniles referred to probation live in the North County. Only 26 percent live in South County, 16 percent in SLO or the Coast and 17 percent from other places.

The most common reason for that referral was for a probation violation, the next for crimes against property, followed by crimes against people and drugs and alcohol crimes. While 59.6 percent of those cases were submitted to the district attorney, 22 percent were counseled/closed by probation. Seventeen percent were diverted by probation. In 2013-14, 218 juvenile petitions were filed in juvenile court, the majority were males.

For adults on probation, as of June 2014, the majority — 42.4 percent — had committed crimes against people, 35.9 were crimes related to drugs and/or alcohol, 19.6 percent were crimes against property and 2.1 percent were crimes involving weapons.

Juvenile Services:

• The number of juveniles referred to probation for criminal or harmful behavior has decreased during the last three years from 298 in fiscal year 2011-12 to 203 in fiscal year 2013-14.
• The number of juveniles placed on court-ordered supervision has also decreased during the last three years from 316 in fiscal year 2011-12 to 230 in fiscal year 2013-14.
• In fiscal year 2013-14, 42 percent of juvenile referrals and 37.4 percent of juveniles on court-ordered supervision reside in the northern area of the county.
• In fiscal year 2013-14, 39 percent of juvenile referrals were closed or diverted from the juvenile court system by probation.
• In fiscal year 2013-14, 21.9 percent juveniles on court-ordered supervision committed a new law violation during supervision.

Juvenile Hall:

• The number of bookings into Juvenile Hall had decreased in the past three years from 633 in fiscal year 2011-12 to 520 in fiscal year 2013-14.
• During fiscal year 2013-14, 277 juveniles had at least one booking in Juvenile Hall; the average number of bookings per juvenile was 1.9.
• In fiscal year 2013-14, nearly half of the bookings (49.4 percent) were for violations of probation.

Adult Services:

• The number of adults supervised on formal probation has increased in the last three years from 2086 in fiscal year 2011-12 to 2260 in fiscal year 2013-14.
• In fiscal year 2011-12, the Department started supervising prison post-release offenders. This population increased to 135 in fiscal year 2013-14.
• In June 2014, the majority of adults on formal probation and post-release community supervision were categorized as “white, non-hispanic” and “male.”
• In June 2014, more offenders on post-release community were assessed as “high” or “medium-high” risk to commit another law violation (76.6 percent) compared to adults on formal probation (33 percent).
• In fiscal year 2013-14, 38 percent of adults on formal supervision and 33.3 percent of adults on post-release supervision committed a new law violation during supervision.

About the author: News Staff

News staff of the A-Town Daily News wrote and edited this article from local contributors and press releases. Scott Brennan is the publisher of this newspaper and founder of Access Publishing. Connect with him on Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn, or follow his blog. He can be reached at [email protected].