What is this bill about?
AB 702, The PROMYSE (Promoting Youth Success and Empowerment) Act, will help California fully realize the Juvenile Justice Crime Prevention Act’s (JJCPA) vision of providing collaborative, restorative, community and health-based services for young people and ensuring equitable representation and decision-making within county oversight bodies.
How does it align with yli’s values?
In 2020, the California State Auditor released a report showing that most counties across the state spent over 75 percent of their 2017–18 funds on probation departments, rather than the collaborative, restorative, community and health-based services for young people mandated by the JJCPA. In the years since the audit, county spending continues to fall short of the bill’s original goals and youths’ most urgent needs. In 2021–22, 1 in 2 counties used 70 percent or more of their JJCPA funds on probation staffing. In 2022, 19 counties spent JJCPA funds on truancy programs and school based probation officers, putting youth at risk of entering the school-to-prison pipeline. Dismal data reporting has continued – in Los Angeles County, probation was found to have spent nearly $400 thousand yearly on a youth diversion program that served zero youth participants.
AB 702 will address these long-standing problems, further the goals of the JJCPA, and support much-needed youth programming by:
- Requiring a greater investment of JJCPA funds into public agencies such as arts, parks and recreation, and behavioral health focussed agencies, as well as healing-centered, restorative, community-based programs and services that reduce and prevent young people’s engagement with law enforcement.
- Ensuring equitable community representation and improved decision-making on county Juvenile Justice Plans and the disbursement of JJCPA funds.
yli partners with thousands of youth across the state, the majority of whom are low-income youth of color. We witness first hand the brutal impacts of our state’s harmful “justice” system on their lives, and are staunch advocates of measures that will reduce the criminalization and incarceration of our communities.
This policy aligns with our Racial Justice Platform, which addresses the impacts of the carceral system on communities of color.
What is yli doing about it?
We have just submitted a letter endorsing this bill, and we are showing our support on our communications channels.
Who sponsored this bill?
- Alliance for Boys & Men of Color (Co-sponsor)
- Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, California (Co-sponsor)
- California Alliance for Youth & Community Justice (Co-sponsor)
- Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice (Co-sponsor)
- Children’s Defense Fund-California (Co-sponsor)
- Community Interventions (Co-sponsor)
- Communities United for Restorative Youth Justice (Co-sponsor)
- Fresh Lifelines for Youth (Co-sponsor)
- National Center for Youth Law (Co-sponsor)
- National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives (Co-sponsor)
- Santa Cruz Barrios Unidos (Co-Sponsor)
- SBX Youth & Family Services (Co-sponsor)
- Anti-Recidivism Coalition
- Arts for Healing and Justice Network
- Community Works
- Empowering Pacific Islander Communities
- Los Angeles Youth Uprising Coalition
- MILPA Collective
- Project Rebound: Expanded
- Safe Return Project
- Silicon Valley De-Bug
- TransLatin@ Coalition
- Urban Peace Institute
- W. Haywood Burns Institute