The issues are treatment of cases lacking in legal sufficiency to support a petition, the criteria that should apply to intake decisions, whether intake should be a function of the judicial or executive branch, and whether prosecutors should monitor diversion programs. The proposed standards are those of the Joint Commission of the Institute for Judicial Administration/American Bar Association (IJA/ABA), the National Advisory Committee for Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (NAC), and the Task Force on Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (Task Force). With respect to cases lacking in legal sufficiency, providing for an unwaivable right to counsel at intake is the most effective way to protect the juvenile rights involved. The IJA/ABA standards guarantee this right and also require that a case is to be dismissed, not diverted, if a legally sufficient case does not exist. The IJA/ABA standards also present more detailed and desirable guidelines regarding intake decisions than are provided by the other standards. Both the IJA/ABA and Task Force standards place intake in the executive branch, while the NAC standards take no position. Prosecutorial monitoring of the operation and effectiveness of diversion programs would be desirable, but is not covered in the standards. Nevertheless, it is consistent with the prosecutorial monitoring of postadjudication dispositional alternatives recommended by the IJA/ABA and Task Force standards. The subsequent discussion focuses on placement of the intake function in the executive branch and prohibiting a child from waiving counsel.