The tasks required to establish a juvenile drug court fall into the following categories.

Assemble a planning team

The juvenile drug court planning team should include a broad range of justice system, treatment, public health, education, mental health, vocational, and other community personnel who can provide the foundation for the services delivered by the program. The planning team should meet frequently and regularly both before and after launching the program. During the planning process, many jurisdictions designate a policylevel planning/oversight committee consisting of policymakers from the critical agencies involved to develop program policies and procedures and to meet periodically thereafter. Following program implementation, most jurisdictions then designate a working committee to address the day-to-day operational aspects of the program. A major task of the planning committee is developing links among the essential agencies, which will promote ongoing communication and coordination.

Identify resources

Among the most critical tasks the planning committee must perform is identifying resources necessary to implement the juvenile drug court program. These resources should include substance abuse treatment and mental health services, related community support services (e.g., housing, parenting skills, medical services, transportation), case management, and supervision and related staff resources. Additional resources may include an array of supporting skills-building services—which must be developmentally based, culturally competent, and gender specific—designed to enhance participants’ competencies, self-esteem, and skills and promote their capacity to live drug and alcohol free. These services include tutoring, vocational training, mentoring, recreational opportunities, and literacy development.

Once jurisdictions identify the range of services and resources needed to support the juvenile drug court, local officials can catalog and assess existing resources to determine the degree to which they can support program goals. This process will identify gaps and areas where existing services may require enhancement or modification.

Develop procedures for drug court program operation

Determining the operational procedures for the juvenile drug court program entails first reviewing the juvenile justice system’s caseflow process (from arrest, through screening and intake, to final court disposition). The next step is to develop a series of hypothetical case studies that can demonstrate what modifications to the traditional adjudication process may be necessary to implement the juvenile drug court program. The newly developed operational procedures should include steps necessary to develop the interagency relations, agreements, and services that are fundamental to juvenile drug court program operations (e.g., screening and assessment, case management, drug testing, ongoing judicial supervision, mental health services, family counseling, and educational service components).

Develop program management and monitoring capacity

As noted above, the planning process should include developing the capacity to manage the program and monitor the performance of both individual participants and the overall program. Officials involved in the program’s operations should meet as soon as possible to identify:

• Information needed to manage the program.

• Program activities that should be monitored on an ongoing basis.

• Elements of participant performance that the program should track, both continuously and periodically.

Although an automated information system may ultimately be necessary to address these issues, local officials should first identify the information elements that need to be compiled on an ongoing basis and the available sources for these data.

Develop a program evaluation plan

Developing an evaluation plan for the program involves several critical tasks, including:

• Determining the questions necessary to establish whether the program is achieving its goals and having the desired impact on participants, their families, the justice system, the community, and agencies involved in the program.

• Identifying data and sources of data that are responsive to evaluation inquiries.

• Developing the appropriate management information system for these purposes.

The activities involved in developing the program’s management and monitoring capabilities, described above, are critical to developing evaluation capability.⁴

Delineate key roles and responsibilities for operating the program

The planning committee needs to define the key roles and responsibilities of the drug court team. This entails defining the roles and responsibilities of each team member and outlining team members’ functions and interrelationships in the drug court setting.

Develop and maintain community support

Drug courts—juvenile drug courts in particular—rely on community support for their survival. Upon establishing the feasibility of developing a juvenile drug court, the planning committee should clearly explain the goals and services of the program to all segments of the community and establish mechanisms for ongoing communication with the community. In addition, the planning committee should, on an ongoing basis, actively seek out agencies, organizations, and community volunteers that can contribute to the program. Among some of the common community agencies providing support to juvenile drug courts are local parks and recreation departments, arts centers, school systems and community colleges, chambers of commerce (which can provide job banks and job training), YMCAs (Young Men’s Christian Associations), and YWCAs (Young Women’s Christian Associations).

Critical Issues

Most judicial system leaders who have developed juvenile drug court programs have found that their perceptions of the complexity of factors surrounding juvenile substance abuse that motivated them to develop juvenile drug courts are also presenting the programs’ greatest challenges. The initial period of juvenile drug court operations has also brought to light a number of other special issues that were not readily apparent at the start.

Adequately assessing the treatment and other needs of juvenile drug court participants

The nature of juvenile drug court participants’ substance use and other problems is complex, requiring the provision of an array of family services, specialized treatment, and other core adolescent services. Programs frequently report not only considerable substance use by youth but significant percentages of participants with mental health problems (particularly depression, fetal alcohol syndrome or effects, and learning disabilities) and physical problems (see OJP Drug Court Clearinghouse and Technical Assistance Project, 2001). In many instances, the nature and extent of these problems do not become apparent until a juvenile has been involved in the program for some time. Ongoing and updated assessments are therefore critical.

Providing a broad spectrum of family, treatment, skills-building, and other core adolescent services for participants

The initial experience of juvenile drug courts strongly suggests that services need to be family focused and complemented by a sound program of other core adolescent services. In addition, individualized treatment services often need to be developed for participants. Programs also must enable participants to develop the capacity and the self-confidence to fill time previously devoted to drugs and crime with productive activity, thereby increasing the likelihood that they will lead drug- and crime-free lives.

A number of juvenile drug courts have been adopting the Multisystemic Therapy (MST) approach, which is designed to provide family-based treatment to reduce or eliminate the need for out-of-home placement. MST’s “family preservation” model of service delivery is based on the philosophy that the most effective strategy for helping substance-involved juvenile offenders is through improving intrafamilial relations and assisting the family in providing the support structure that can function during and after the period of the court’s intervention. The MST approach was developed in response to the lack of scientifically proven, cost-effective strategies designed to treat adolescent substance abuse. Preliminary evaluation of MST programs has indicated that, compared with traditional service, MST has been significantly more effective in reducing long-term rates of criminal behavior and also is considerably less expensive. Additional evaluations now in progress appear to corroborate these results.

Adequately assessing and addressing family needs and problems

Most practitioners agree that drug use by adults has a direct effect on the children with whom the adults are in contact, whether the contact occurs in utero, in person, or by example or other involvement. It is vital for juvenile drug courts to include in their assessment process a review of possible substance use by a juvenile’s family members to assess its potential impact on the juvenile. Most juvenile drug court practitioners observe a high correlation between a juvenile’s drug abuse and that of a parent or other family member. It is unlikely, therefore, that juvenile drug courts will be able to deal with delinquency issues without getting involved with dependency issues—even if no formal dependency action is pending. Conversely, if family issues are not addressed, practitioners consider it likely that the child will continue to be involved with drugs and delinquent activity. The challenge for the juvenile drug court is to fully assess family needs and meaningfully engage the family in the court’s efforts to address the needs of the juvenile to the greatest extent feasible.

Involving parents of juvenile drug court participants

Once the above assessment is completed, juvenile drug court judges must determine how to engage parents and other family members in supporting a juvenile’s participation in the drug court program while also addressing their child’s substance use and related behavioral issues.

A number of juvenile drug court programs, for example, require parents or other adults in the youth’s life to participate in special parent groups that provide both support and the opportunity to develop parenting skills. Even if the court has the authority to incarcerate or impose other sanctions on noncompliant parents, it is unclear whether such actions would help or harm the parent-child relationship and the drug court’s ability to achieve its goals. Most juvenile drug court judges are coming to realize that the long-term effectiveness of programs depends on their ability to achieve parental cooperation with program requirements through persuasion rather than coercion. Parental incarceration or removal of a child from the home is therefore generally viewed as a last resort.

Some States require parents to participate in court proceedings involving their children; in some States (e.g., Indiana), this requirement extends to any adult living in a child’s household. In others, however, no clear authority compels parental participation. While most juvenile drug courts are using existing legal authority to compel parental participation, strategies for dealing with a truly noncompliant parent, such as appointment of a guardian ad litem for the juvenile, may need to be explored further on a case-by-case basis.

One special issue relating to family involvement and compliance that many juvenile courts are addressing is how to define “family.” A child’s immediate family may not be nuclear; it may include godparents, stepparents, other relatives, live-in friends of parents, neighbors, or other caretakers. Juvenile drug court programs, therefore, frequently find it necessary to identify an adult figure in the child’s life with whom the child can work, recognizing that this adult figure may change during the period of the court’s jurisdiction.

Some drug court programs use peer groups of juveniles who are further along in the juvenile drug court process to reinforce positive family forces and overcome negative ones. Drug court programs, though focusing on family issues, also recognize that some families may be unable to provide meaningful support despite the court’s best efforts. Juvenile drug courts, therefore, must equip participants with life and coping skills and, if necessary, strive to help them find alternative adult role models.

Developing constructive relationships with local schools

Most juvenile drug courts make a special effort to develop a close relationship with local schools, as it is in everyone’s best interest for participants to succeed in school. In a number of jurisdictions, school systems that previously expelled students arrested for illicit substance use have begun working with the court to keep these youth in school. Schools also have provided additional support services for the juvenile drug court.

Jurisdictions are finding that the juvenile drug court program’s rigid supervision elements can benefit the school system by reinforcing school policies and providing a mechanism for addressing school-related problems as soon as they occur. Because juvenile drug court participants often are not attending school at the time of program entry, drug courts are making special efforts to develop relationships with local school systems to ensure that participants can reenroll and obtain any special support services deemed necessary.

The most recent information from juvenile drug courts indicates that more than 80 percent of participants have returned to, or remained in, school full-time as a result of program participation—a significantly higher rate than would have been expected if the juvenile drug court program had not been established (OJP Drug Court Clearinghouse and Technical Assistance Project, 2001).