(1) The department may establish a medium security juvenile offender basic training camp program. This program for juvenile offenders serving a term of confinement under the supervision of the department is exempt from the licensing requirements of chapter
74.15 RCW.
(2) The department may contract under this chapter with private companies, the national guard, or other federal, state, or local agencies to operate the juvenile offender basic training camp.
(3) The juvenile offender basic training camp shall be a structured and regimented model emphasizing the building up of an offender's self-esteem, confidence, and discipline. The juvenile offender basic training camp program shall provide participants with basic education, prevocational training, work-based learning, work experience, work ethic skills, conflict resolution counseling, substance abuse intervention, anger management counseling, and structured intensive physical training. The juvenile offender basic training camp program shall have a curriculum training and work schedule that incorporates a balanced assignment of these or other rehabilitation and training components for no less than sixteen hours per day, six days a week.
The department shall develop standards for the safe and effective operation of the juvenile offender basic training camp program, for an offender's successful program completion, and for the continued after-care supervision of offenders who have successfully completed the program.
(4) Offenders eligible for the juvenile offender basic training camp option shall be those with a disposition of not more than sixty-five weeks. Violent and sex offenders shall not be eligible for the juvenile offender basic training camp program.
(5) If the court determines that the offender is eligible for the juvenile offender basic training camp option, the court may recommend that the department place the offender in the program. The department shall evaluate the offender and may place the offender in the program. The evaluation shall include, at a minimum, a risk assessment developed by the department and designed to determine the offender's suitability for the program. No juvenile who is assessed as a high risk offender or suffers from any mental or physical problems that could endanger his or her health or drastically affect his or her performance in the program shall be admitted to or retained in the juvenile offender basic training camp program.
(6) All juvenile offenders eligible for the juvenile offender basic training camp sentencing option shall spend one hundred twenty days of their disposition in a juvenile offender basic training camp. This period may be extended for up to forty days by the secretary if a juvenile offender requires additional time to successfully complete the basic training camp program. If the juvenile offender's activities while in the juvenile offender basic training camp are so disruptive to the juvenile offender basic training camp program, as determined by the secretary according to standards developed by the department, as to result in the removal of the juvenile offender from the juvenile offender basic training camp program, or if the offender cannot complete the juvenile offender basic training camp program due to medical problems, the secretary shall require that the offender be committed to a juvenile institution to serve the entire remainder of his or her disposition, less the amount of time already served in the juvenile offender basic training camp program.
(7) All offenders who successfully graduate from the juvenile offender basic training camp program shall spend the remainder of their disposition on parole in a department juvenile rehabilitation intensive aftercare program in the local community. Violation of the conditions of parole is subject to sanctions specified in RCW
13.40.210(4). The program shall provide for the needs of the offender based on his or her progress in the aftercare program as indicated by ongoing assessment of those needs and progress. The intensive aftercare program shall monitor postprogram juvenile offenders and assist them to successfully reintegrate into the community. In addition, the program shall develop a process for closely monitoring and assessing public safety risks. The intensive aftercare program shall be designed and funded by the department.
(8) The department shall also develop and maintain a database to measure recidivism rates specific to this incarceration program. The database shall maintain data on all juvenile offenders who complete the juvenile offender basic training camp program for a period of two years after they have completed the program. The database shall also maintain data on the criminal activity, educational progress, and employment activities of all juvenile offenders who participated in the program.
Findings and intent—Juvenile basic training camps—1994 sp.s. c 7: "The legislature finds that the number of juvenile offenders and the severity of their crimes is increasing rapidly statewide. In addition, many juvenile offenders continue to reoffend after they are released from the juvenile justice system causing disproportionately high and expensive rates of recidivism.
The legislature further finds that juvenile criminal behavior is often the result of a lack of self-discipline, the lack of systematic work habits and ethics, the inability to deal with authority figures, and an unstable or unstructured living environment. The legislature further finds that the department of social and health services currently operates an insufficient number of confinement beds to meet the rapidly growing juvenile offender population. Together these factors are combining to produce a serious public safety hazard and the need to develop more effective and stringent juvenile punishment and rehabilitation options.
The legislature intends that juvenile offenders who enter the state rehabilitation system have the opportunity and are given the responsibility to become more effective participants in society by enhancing their personal development, work ethics, and life skills. The legislature recognizes that structured incarceration programs for juvenile offenders such as juvenile offender basic training camps, can instill the self-discipline, accountability, self-esteem, and work ethic skills that could discourage many offenders from returning to the criminal justice system. Juvenile offender basic training camp incarceration programs generally emphasize life skills training, prevocational work skills training, anger management, dealing with difficult at-home family problems and/or abuses, discipline, physical training, structured and intensive work activities, and educational classes. The legislature further recognizes that juvenile offenders can benefit from a highly structured basic training camp environment and the public can also benefit through increased public protection and reduced cost due to lowered rates of recidivism." [
1994 sp.s. c 7 § 531.]
