Restorative Community Pathways is King County’s program that helps youth dealing with a misdemeanor or first-time low-level felony keep away from detention.
Since its inception in late 2021, RCP has been controversial, partly by its personal phrases and methods.
A collective of small nonprofit organizations that features jail abolitionists, RCP accepts youth referred by the King County Prosecutor’s Workplace and presents “therapeutic and restoration” as an alternative of conventional punishment.
Within the 2023-2024 funds, King County allotted $6.9 million for RCP to divert juvenile instances out of the prison justice system and supply providers for harmed events. Since 2021, the prosecutor’s workplace referred 1,238 instances to RCP. State legislation mandates diversion for many juvenile misdemeanors.
Lack of knowledge and unclear expectations make understanding whether or not RCP is efficient almost unimaginable.
To its credit score, the King County prosecuting lawyer’s workplace sought to seek out a solution to essentially the most primary query: Do youth concerned in RCP go on to commit additional crimes?
After retaining a Seattle College and College of Washington researcher, the prosecutor’s workplace discovered that the two-year recidivism price for felonies was 53.2% — far too excessive.
Consequently, the prosecutor’s workplace is pausing felony diversion referrals to RCP pending additional evaluation, in accordance with a July 17 memo despatched to King County Govt Shannon Braddock and Metropolitan King County Council members.
These instances would possible be routed to extra conventional diversion packages run by juvenile courtroom, mentioned King County Prosecuting Legal professional Leesa Manion.
There are many caveats to the recidivism information. For one, there may be little analysis into the juvenile justice system, so making comparisons is troublesome. The prosecutor’s workplace is dedicated to finishing a second, extra complete evaluation that seeks to guage recidivism charges for RCP versus conventional prosecution.
“The take house is: Let’s proceed to review RCP,” mentioned Manion. “To people which might be both champions of RCP or in the event that they’re involved concerning the lack of success from RCP, let’s do an extra deep dive.”
In its July 17 memo to King County leaders, the prosecutor’s workplace listed key attributes it needed to see in diversion packages, together with transparency, price effectiveness, measurable outcomes and decrease recidivism.
These are sound guideposts to which the Metropolitan King County Council and the subsequent King County government ought to stick when figuring out budgets and coverage round juvenile offenders.
