← Youth Justice Transformation in Action
Youth Justice Transformation in Action
Changing Futures: How a Community Driven, Personalized Approach is Transforming Lives
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- [00:00]
Gary Ivory
Foreign.
- [00:08]
Jody Martin
Welcome to Season four of Youth Justice Transformation in Action. We are the RFK National Resource center for Juvenile justice and we're on a mission to transform the youth justice system by partnering with people like you who are passionate about improving outcomes for youth, families and communities you serve. I'm Jody Martin, Deputy Executive Director.
- [00:28]
John Toole
And I'm John Toole, Executive Director.
- [00:30]
Jody Martin
This season we're diving into the innovative and effective approaches that are reshaping youth justice across the nation. From groundbreaking programs to community led solutions, we'll be spotlighting the change makers who are driving progress and making a real difference in the lives of young people. What makes this season even more special? On June 18th through 20th in San Diego, California, we are hosting our national symposium where leaders, advocates and practitioners will come together to share insights, discuss challenges and explore new pathways for transformation. It's an exciting time for youth justice and we're honored to take you on this journey of learning, growth and action. In today's episode, Changing How a Community Driven Personalized Approach is Transforming Lives, John speaks with Gary Ivory, President and CEO at Youth Advocate Programs, Inc. About its transformative role in youth justice over the past 50 years. Youth Advocate Programs, Inc. Provides an effective alternative to youth incarceration and out of home placements by offering community based wraparound and behavioral health services keeping youth in their homes and communities. John and Gary discuss yap's primary goals, its evolution since its inception, and the personalized services it offers to youth and families. Tune in to hear how YAP is making a difference and shaping the future of youth Justice.
- [01:55]
John Toole
Good morning everyone. I'd like to welcome you to our initial episode in Season four of the Transformation of Youth justice in Action podcast series with the RFK National Resource center for Juvenile Justice. We are privileged this morning to welcome Gary Ivory to this episode. I'm looking forward to the conversation that we have and learning about what Gary has committed to for more than three decades in his professional career and certainly to the work that is being done in the field by yap. I want to provide a brief introduction of Gary, but let him at least say hello. Gary, welcome. Appreciate you being here.
- [02:33]
Gary Ivory
Thank you so much John. I'm excited to be here, excited to engage in this conversation.
- [02:37]
John Toole
So let me tell you a little bit about Gary from my knowledge before we ask him to provide an introduction for himself and then we'll get into this really good conversation. I'm looking forward to Gary currently serves as the President and CEO for Yap Inc. Which is in fact celebrating its 50th year of operations. This Year. It's an anniversary year for a very important organization that serves youth and families across the country. Gary received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Austin College and among his many honors, recognizing his trailblazing work, Gary received the Alumnus of the Decade Award from his alma mater. Additionally, he was selected by the Stanford University Graduate School of Business as a Center for Social Innovation Fellow for Executive Nonprofit Leaders. And Gary received his Master of Divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary with a focus on public policy and ethics. Gary's pioneered work with juvenile street gangs in Fort Worth, Texas, has featured in several national publications including Catalyst, a national newsletter of the ncpc, the National Crime Prevention Council, and the PBS series In Search of Law and Order. And the work has been featured as a national model for developing community based alternatives for serious juvenile offenders. I had the privilege of meeting Gary for the first time while at my alma mater, James Madison University last fall just after we had concluded our practice network meeting featuring our Innovation center for Youth Justice. And one cannot immediately help but be impressed by his sincerity, his commitment, his knowledge and his passion for young people and the work that he leads at Youth Advocate Programs, Inc. Gary, it's a privilege to have you with us. I'm looking forward to the conversation for that which I might have left out that you want to share with our listeners. How would you also introduce yourself?
- [04:29]
Gary Ivory
Well, John, you've been overly generous in your introduction. I think the thing that I think is most important for our conversation today is that for the past over three decades I've been committed to helping to create alternatives, community based and home based alternatives for the nation's young people who are people oftentimes have said that they should belong in either correctional facilities or in residential treatment or in psychiatric facilities. I'm proud to say that we've been part of a movement of helping to demonstrate that young people can be supported in their homes and neighborhoods without jeopardizing public safety. So often the narrative has been that if young people are released back home after they've committed some offense that they are a threat, they're going to jeopardize community of public safety. And we don't think that narrative is true. And so I'm just proud to say that part of an organization, Youth Advocate Programs Incorporated, that's helped to provide an alternative. And that's what I'm very excited about.
- [05:36]
John Toole
And Gary, I think you know from our conversation that we support what you're doing and believe what you believe in. These youth can be served in their homes, in their community without that incarceral alternative being enacted upon them. Unfortunately, you know that there is a prevailing sentiment among far too many legislators that we can't do that safely. And it just brings to light the incredible importance of the work that you lead and the work that YAP is doing. I'm curious, Gary, what drew you to the work in working with young people and focusing on this, this effort?
- [06:15]
Gary Ivory
Well, there are a few things, John, that drew me to the work. First, in childhood, I grew up in a small town in East Texas called Pittsburgh, Texas, I always say Pittsburgh without the H. Growing up in a small rural community. And I had brothers, three who were incarcerated. So I saw the impact on the carceral system or on the justice system, on my. My own family, through my brothers. And I wanted to be able to help other young people who were facing conditions, you know, such as mine, or could have been anybody else's condition. I just wanted to help those young people. It was informed by my faith. I formed, you know, that for me it was a justice issue to help, as I like to say the least, the last, the lost, the lonely and the unloved. So that's a calling in that sense. I first got introduced to YAP when I was a youth pastor. I was in seminary and YAP was leasing space from the church at which I was a youth pastor, a very large inner city church in Trenton, New Jersey. And I saw the work they were doing for these young people that, you know, there was a group of young people working with that were labels, that were sex offenders, had a history of sex offending, and another group who were involved in the child welfare system, another group came from the behavioral health system, another group in child welfare. So I saw these challenges and I knew there had to be a better way instead of these young people being separated from the community. So that all informed my why behind this work and my commitment to it. And then lastly, I worked in, as I shared with you, for Congressman both in Texas and in D.C. and I quickly saw the role that policy plays in helping to shape and inform what happens to young people. And so all of that informed my why behind I do this work and my commitment to it.
- [08:08]
John Toole
Great backstory, Gary. Certainly the passion becomes evident. The deep seated commitment that you've made becomes evident early in our interaction. Can you give us an overview of the youth advocate programs? Because that's where you've spent more than three decades making this commitment that you spoke to real. If you wouldn't mind sharing kind of the overview and the primary goals the organization that you've so capably led for so long.
- [08:35]
Gary Ivory
Youth Advocate Programs was started in 1975 by Tom Jeffers. Tom Jefferson, I always like to say, was a Millerite in the sense that he had worked with. Miller was the head of the youth justice system in Massachusetts. He started there and the whole deinstitutionalization movement there, Jerry Miller. And then, you know, he did work in Ohio and Illinois and then eventually Pennsylvania. And there were hundreds of young people who were housed with adults at the Camp Hill Prison, which is in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. And Tom had the vision at that time to see that those young people could be served in their homes and communities instead of being incarcerated. So at that time he developed an advocate model, which is the same model we have today. We call it yaprap, which is a form of our advocate model combined with wraparound supportive services. And it was basically a very simple idea. Hire people from the neighborhoods where the young people live their GED to PhD. Hire the people that care the most, who are closest to the problem. Those folks can oftentimes have the solution that other people don't have and don't get hung up on credentials and all that. Tom wasn't huge on credentials, except the credentials of compassion and hope and optimism and the belief that people can change and wanting to give back and all those kind of things that we think are very important. And he developed a model that we're utilizing to this day. And they helped to bring home over 300 young people from Camp Hill Prison, that mall spread to New Jersey and Philadelphia. Now we're in 33 states and have global partnerships in Africa, in Europe, and in Central America as well. So the model is really, and our mission is to develop, to deliver and advocate for safe and effective alternatives for the nation's highest risk and highest need young people and develop alternatives to out of home care for them. That could be any kind of out of home care, residential treatment, secure detention, psychiatric hospitals, any form of out of home placement. And so we do that through contracting with government agencies, 93% of our funding through contracting with government agencies to really address the needs of their populations that are at highest risk for out of home placement. And so we contract with child welfare, juvenile justice, behavioral health, substance use, and deliver this model. That's the evidence based model. And so that's what we do. We also do policy advocacy and all of that's geared towards, it's not partisan advocacy, but we try to get policymakers to understand that there are cost effective and effective alternatives to out of home care. We try to make sure that policymakers understand that role. But our primary thing is to deliver great outcomes so that young people rely less on out of home care.
- [11:37]
John Toole
GARY the origins that you speak to are logical, they're practical, they make sense to the people living in that community, as the origins of the solutions come from within that community. And probably initially it wasn't necessarily identified the way you just did as research. Informed evidence supported a wraparound model that has so much research around its successful approach. But it is now, and you may have contributed to that very body of research because of what you did in the original approach, this what is now known as yaprap, as you referenced. How has the program evolved since its creation to serve the needs of current communities and current youth and their families?
- [12:20]
Gary Ivory
GARY well, it's evolved in a few ways, just a few elements I did mention that I want to mention. Then I say how it's evolved. At the beginning of the model, when Tom Jeffers created yap, he had this idea that so often in human services writ large, we focus on a lot of things, but we don't focus on getting people out of poverty. He said poverty is the lowest common denominator. That leads oftentimes to system involvement. We know that in child welfare system neglect and other things can lead to that. It happens in juvenile justice system as well. So there's an approach to the work we do called supported work, which is a form of paid work experience where we give young people and their caregivers an opportunity to have employment and we pay their wages. They're considered a trainee and it's a great opportunity for them to get income for whatever needs they may have, to hopefully get them on the track of upward mobility and improve the opportunity for them to get into the workforce. There are just all kind of benefits to that, and it helps reduce recidivism. The young people who are unsupported work do better in forms of reducing recidivism as well. So that was in the original founding of yap. There are some things that we've enhanced over the years. One is we've added in our Chicago program. We call it choose to Change. It's a YAP RAP model, but it also has a component we call form of cognitive behavioral therapy that's referred to as SPARKS S P A R C S. And the Sparks model helps young people to deal with chronic stress and trauma because we know that a lot of young people that we serve that are in the juvenile justice system have a lot of chronic stress, have trauma, and have adverse childhood experiences. And so The CBT model helps us deal with those adverse childhood experiences. It helps us deal with trauma, helps deal with toxic stress. The outcomes with those participants in Chicago through Chicago Public Schools is amazing. Seeing a 48% in violent crimes amongst that, the cohort of young people were serving there in Chicago. And so that's an element of the program we've added on. We've also done more with what we call YAP Works, which is an evidence based curriculum that we utilize to help young people get labor market information and build social capital so that they can get a first job or learn about a job that they may be interested in. So we have all kind of entrepreneurs around the country, corporations, businesses, who are both employing our young people, but also serve as opportunity advisors to give our young people an opportunity so they don't see them as a threat, they see them as an opportunity. They see them as somebody in their local neighborhood that they want to give back to help. And so we're doing that around the country. That's something relatively new. We've added on community violence intervention where we're looking at, in some neighborhoods, we have eight of those sites around the country where we're looking at hiring life coaches like we're doing in Baltimore, working with young people up to age 25 and sometimes even older than that. The young people who have been, you know, the most system involved and adults in Baltimore, we're working with them to prevent homicides and prevent violence. And that's more of a community violence intervention. It's a group violence reduction strategy. That's what it's called. But we're doing models like that. It's not as individualized as our core model. Our core model is a Yapra model, very individualized, about 10 hours a week, a very intensive support to that young person and his or her caregivers. But we also do these broader CVI models. And I would say lastly, YAP has always dealt with young people who are system involved, that come from multiple systems. But we really honed in on our behavioral health and mental health support to young people because we just know that a lot of people in the juvenile justice system and these other systems, there are oftentimes some issues related to their mental health and mental well being that need to be addressed. And so those are some of the things that we realized over the years.
- [16:27]
John Toole
That is a incredibly comprehensive answer. There's so much there that I want to follow up on and I'm going to do just that in a couple of instances. Gary, so you spoke about the YAP rap. But now in that answer you spoke about the. The recognition of social supports in the arena of housing and employment that you've expanded into that nature. That's not traditionally where the juvenile or youth justice system focuses its efforts. That YAP Inc. Is focusing on those social supports, recognizing their contribution to perhaps the dysfunction or the trajectory into a delinquency or criminal justice system is extraordinary. Clearly, this recognition of the active trauma symptoms and methodologies to intervene like the CBT as a part of your service provision, as a part of your recognition of what it takes to enable the success for these youth is extraordinary. I'll go back to the employment piece, the YAP works focus. Another arena there, Gary Yap has to be congratulated for recognizing all these are components of serving the whole youth, the whole family in that community, and then finally the cvi, the community Violence intervention or as a broader approach. So many of these youth, as you well know, are involved in gangs or groups that are part of a culture of the violence experienced in that community. And these are comprehensive approaches that you all are embracing that can undermine that commitment to that violent culture. It's a very impressive array of programs and services that have grown out of your original commitment underneath a still very fundamental wraparound approach and yet touched on it at the end. I want to transition to the types of services that you're offering to youth and families that are part of the individualized treatment that is so characteristic of yap. Can you comment on that focus as well, Gary, that's so critical to their success?
- [18:28]
Gary Ivory
First, let me just share these guiding principles that undergird everything we do and then I get unpack that individualized support. The guiding principles that we believe in strongly and they've led our work over these decades has been very first of all, strength based approach. You know, when young people come to us, when I was started in this field, I would get these files and our founders talk about meet the young person, not the file. And that's not uncommon, but we meet the young person. Well, I read the file though, and there'd be this psychological report, it'd be 70, 80 pages long. And it was looking at pathology, weakness, symptomatology, disease, all these other things. Tom was very clear. He didn't really believe too much in medical model approaches, that they weren't sufficient to help people that had complex needs, that you needed other interventions that weren't of a medical nature. That was the genesis of the creation of YAP and the YAPRAP model. The individualized part, the strength based Part the family focus, not just focusing on the child. When we go into home, the first thing we do is say who is supporting this young person? Who are the caregivers? And we support all of them. So it's neighborhood based recruitment. So recruiting people who do the work from the same neighborhoods, they're more familiar, they have ownership, they know the neighborhood conditions, they know how to navigate in a neighborhood, the areas that may be unsafe, and they know the resources in the neighborhood. And so all those things are very important. Cultural and linguistic competence, making sure we get people to understand the culture or have cultural humility, that's a change. They call it cultural humility now. But all those things are very, very important. And a team approach. But to unpack the individualized service aspect of this, our goal is to develop a plan that's going to work for that youth and that family. And they have to co own and co author the plan. If not, it's not going to work. And so a part of our engagement strategy is to develop a plan with them that they agree to. Now. There are always some non negotiables. John Vandenberg, when he developed the wraparound model, said that because we're unconditional caring doesn't mean we're unconditional fools. And so, you know, there are always some things that we like when we get a referral. And there are on the first page of the referral, there's all these probation conditions and court orders and I just call those non negotiables. We'll come to the young person family and say, and I did this hundreds of times over the years. These are non negotiables. Let's be clear. There are some mandates here. We're going to do that. But the other half of it are things that we can address that we can come in in your plan with. So tell me, I know your child has been in the system for the third or fourth time, but tell me what it's like to have a good day. Tell me what you'd like to see us accomplish together and work on together. Tell me what your strengths are. Tell me some things about your hopes and your aspirations and all that. Tell us about your interests. So we go in and develop this very individualized plan. We give them voice and choice in the plan. So you have a voice in the plan, you have a choice in the plan. We think that helps us to get more buy in. The second thing we do is have a tool. We call it life domain charts, we call it bubble chart at other times. But it Looks at all the life domains that everybody has needs in. Housing, health, mental health, spirituality, all these areas. And ask them to identify, you know, what, what are your needs in these areas. And it's amazing what people will tell you when they trust you and they know you're helping to address their needs from their perspective. And they start telling you things that the court or the probation officer didn't know, the child welfare worker, because they didn't trust them. And it's amazing what we've heard over the years. And then we develop a plan and then we have a flex fund to be able to help support some immediate needs for that family. You got to get quick wins, some early wins. So sometimes that may be helping them get the lights turned on in Tarrant County, Texas. When I first started in this field, well, I started in New Jersey, but later on did the game work in Tarrant County. I had on speed dial a window repair company because every home I was going to, the kids, they, their windows had gotten shot out because there's drive by shooting or when I went into the homes, the issue was there were several siblings in the home, but they were all sleeping. Three kids in the same bed. They happen all the time. So we were there. I had a direct line to the mattress company that would help us get some beds into the home that day. Just those really immediate basic needs that we help them to meet, helps reduce recidivism, helps to get them buy in, helps to deal with those. We call them social determinants for health now. But before they were called that they were just basic needs, all these other areas that affected people's lives and their well being. So all of that we think is just essential to have that very individualized plan that they buy into. And then once they're enrolled in the program, we do a family team meeting where we invite in the school police at times probation, child welfare. We ask the families who supports you that you want to invite to the meeting. And I could give you a lot of stories which I won't get into, but of how that's worked out so well just by doing that individualized plan that the family buys into. Now we change it over time. You know, it's a plan, but it changes often. But it helps to get a roadmap on where we're going for the next four to six months with that family.
- [24:04]
John Toole
Gary, you've captured so much practical application that again, from our perspective, I don't want people to listen to my opinion because they could devalue it for a variety of reasons. But if we are speaking to the approaches that have this research base that demonstrate the success for how we work with youth and families to achieve positive outcomes, which are captured in everything that you spoke to right there, then we should pay attention to that. And obviously you guys do. I love the reference. I think, you know, I operated as a probation officer for nearly two decades, and in that time, as I look back, I'm not sure I operated on things that were currently research based. I operated on some instincts about accountability and application of court orders as the approach we took. There's a large variety of folks who work with our young people who are still in that mindset. What you've captured here and the language of we know the file, we need to get to know the person. We need to get to know the family, we need to get to know the community. We need to plan with them as engaged in that plan. And I think what you captured in your commentary was that we need to truly develop a relationship.
- [25:19]
Gary Ivory
Yes.
- [25:19]
John Toole
Builds the trust.
- [25:21]
Gary Ivory
That's right.
- [25:21]
John Toole
That allows them to realize we are a partner with them in applying opportunities for success. I think what you captured there is such an important component and probably largely why YAP is so fundamentally successful in interacting with youth, families and their communities. I applaud the way you've captured that and hope our audience can take some of those key principles that you articulated away with them. As I transition into the next question, clearly it's part of the community. It's part of a partnership with the community.
- [25:55]
Gary Ivory
That's right.
- [25:56]
John Toole
What role do you see the community as playing? I think they're almost integrated as one when we speak to this. But what's the role of the community in providing services and opportunities for these youth? How do you bring that to life in your work?
- [26:11]
Gary Ivory
Partnering with community starts from day one. I want to give you an example. Again, I'll give you an example of Tarrant county because it has a profound impact on our organization. First of all, we hire people from the community as advocates. All of our advocates come from communities, neighborhoods we serve. Before we go in, we'll ask a question. Where are your referrals coming from? What neighborhoods? What communities? What housing developments? When I started to gain work, it was mainly in public housing that a lot of the gang activity was happening. We wanted to hire people from within that or in close proximity to it. So we partnered with the community to hire people from the community to do the work. And that's given them an opportunity to give them jobs that historically they haven't had. Because they've been devalued. Community members sometimes are devalued in being able to solve these problems. We need the professionals to come in. You know, I did a lot of work with John McKnight. We oftentimes talked about this, that the people that sometimes can do the greatest work in the community are the people that live in the community. And sometimes people are surprised that we can hire advocates from those neighborhoods. There are people that can work in those neighborhoods. So that's the first thing is hiring people from the neighborhoods. Second, we start doing resource mapping in a neighborhood saying what are the resources? Where are the places, the people, the institutions that we can link them to? We call it community linkage, where we link them to those indigenous resources in the community. So it may be a house of worship of any faith. By the way, we're not faith based at all, but we, when it's staff and families support it. We link them with a faith based community. We may link them to a recreation center. A lot of times they burn bridges in those places because they did something to harm someone. We believe in a restorative approach. So we go back in and say, I know that Johnny or Susie may have gotten in trouble here, had a problem here, or they had a fight here, an altercation, but can we come back? And with an advocate, they're willing to bring them back and allow them to come back to that center in that facility. So we think that's important, restorative justice. The third is where sometimes there's some services that we pay for that may be in the community. So we have a flex fund in all of our contracts to where, or an ancillary fund where we pay for those immediate needs of a family. So we've helped kids, they need counseling or something and they don't, they can't get that through another means. We'll use our own flex fund to pay for that kind of thing. So we partner with community, we partner with small businesses to employ our young people at that level. And then we partner with public, you know, governmental entities at that level as well. So everything we do is driven by our community oriented approach, community engagement, and really mapping out those resources. We work with parenting centers and all kind of resources that help our young people.
- [28:55]
John Toole
And Gary, there's an important term I think you're speaking to more broadly with all of the focus of your work truly is the empowerment of the youth and the family to extricate them from a bad situation or to benefit positively benefit from their place in their community. Yes, I don't want to steal your thunder.
- [29:17]
Gary Ivory
Yeah.
- [29:18]
John Toole
But I'm going to ask some of the positive outcomes or success that you've realized. But certainly your Data reflects that 92% of the youth you work with in YAP. Yes. Remain in the community. That's an extraordinary percentage given some of the youth situations that you work with.
- [29:40]
Gary Ivory
That's right.
- [29:41]
John Toole
Are there other examples that you would want to highlight that reflect that all of this that you've captured up to this point truly produces success and outcomes?
- [29:50]
Gary Ivory
It does produce success, John, and we've seen that time and time again. I will just say the John Jay School of Criminal justice did a study on our program found again, as you mentioned, 92% of those kids successfully are in remaining community after they've they're formed, they're discharged and a year out, 86% don't recidivate once they're out of the program. So that's the success that it has. And we tend to begin to work with the deep end of the system. We're working with primarily post. Well, some pre adjudication as well, but primarily post adjudication. And kids who this is not their first offense for the most part. So they're high risk or high need. And so we're getting those kind of outcomes because of the intensity of the model, the intentionality, the focus on. I didn't mention earlier, John, but the two generation approaches, a lot of folks call it where we're working simultaneously with the caregiver and the participant. That's important. And we're looking at economic opportunities for both trying to create as much economic mobility as possible. Economics has a lot to do. That's why when I used to have these gang involved kids in the program, I used to try to get them all some economic opportunity because there's not many of them at that time, not all kids but me, them go sell drugs or something in an underground economy. And I always used to say 30 years ago we got to steer these kids away from the underground economy. And secondly, we have to get them to where before they were doing CVI when I was doing a lot of community work, I saw that we had one youth on a positive path. They were doing well, they were working, attending school. We had them on a great path. And then all of a sudden they got with one of their peer groups and they would do something that put them in jeopardy. Right. A violated probation or something. And so I just found out then we have to help to mobilize the community as well. I mean, I was Doing community mobilization work as well as the work with kids, because I found out that you can't improve the conditions for young people unless you also improve that neighborhood. Some sense I've always called the inoculation strategy. We always want to inoculate the young person so that they don't make bad choices based on their environment, these environmental factors. And I just found out that we have to engage more young people than the ones that may be in the program because those are having a big influence on all young people in the community. So that individualized approach works, but you also have to deal with those other young people in the community, and you're.
- [32:21]
John Toole
Not in this alone. Even if we just speak to it in terms of the community, in terms of where these youth are situated when you interact with a lot, as you said, on the other side of adjudication, they may be subject to ongoing supervision and oversight by the court.
- [32:35]
Gary Ivory
That's right.
- [32:35]
John Toole
Probation agency collaboration, I think you and I agreed early on, is critical to success. How well or how do you collaborate with probation in providing these supportive services? Gary?
- [32:48]
Gary Ivory
The collaboration is essential. So the first thing we do is meet with probation, typically the chief, and ask them about the group of young people in their system that have the most complex needs. We used to call them the famous kids, the ones that the commissioner or the chief knows by name. They know them by name. And so those are the kids that we want to work with. That's who we have a history of being successful with. But once we know who that population of young people are and where they live, what zip codes are they coming from, and we have a contract and all that, we want to come with probation and the probation officers at all levels and let them know. And it looks different in different jurisdictions. So in some jurisdictions, they put kids on minimum supervision when they refer to us, because they want us to go, and we're doing 10 to 15 hours a week for the most part, that's how it's pretty high dosage. And so the probation officer kind of backs off, and we kind of go in and help support, support that young person, and the probation officer comes in as needed. Now, that's how some jurisdictions like to work with us. For others, kids may still be on some high level of supervision by probation officer or parole officer. I know a name can be different in different jurisdictions, but some of them like to be closely involved. But for the most part, I think the partnership is, let us go and deal with everything in community with them, make sure we're taking care of their Probation conditions, have them check in with their probation officer. You know, it may be once a month. They may have been on weekly contact with the young person. But then when we're involved, they move back to once a month. And then we're letting them know we go with kids to court if they have to go to court. Because we do a lot of detention alternatives. So in detention alternative, we want to make sure they reappear in court and that they don't have to be detained while they're awaiting a hearing. And so we will go see them several times a week, transport them. We do a lot of transporting because our philosophy is do for, do with and cheer on first. We'll do it with you at first to teach it. We'll do it for you initially, do it with you and then cheer you on for you to do it. But we find that working with probation and getting us to have an agreement regarding how we want to work and what their expectations of us are and have that communication between our advocate and the probation officer, again, that looks different in different jurisdictions is just critical. And make sure we're coordinating if there is a court hearing that we're coordinating. So when our staff appear in court, there's not a conflict between what the probation is saying, a parole officer, and what we're saying. Because we're always going to start with the strengths of the young person. That's just who we are. We're clear that we're there to advocate for that kid. And so that's how we do it. It looks different in different jurisdictions, but that coordination, collaboration and defining the roles of what the advocate is going to play, it looks different, different places, but we always work out an agreement. So there's that's role clarification.
- [35:51]
John Toole
A couple things I want to highlight from what you've just said. One, this strengths based approach in some jurisdictions gets translated to a soft approach, when in fact, you and I both know when we're talking about strengths based, the adolescent science, the positive youth development, that's strengths based is what yields the greatest opportunity to change the pattern of behavior and move out of the justice system successfully. Another thing you said, when I speak about collaboration, I often comment on the fact that it's not just a concept, it's a practice. And in practice, it truly becomes a partnership. And what you described, when I asked you about these relationships with probation and other stakeholders, you described a partnership that direct contact, that coordination with even the most basic levels, that's critical. I want the audience to know that's the way you operate, because I would imagine some agencies would say so. So how do I partner with them?
- [36:48]
Gary Ivory
That's right.
- [36:49]
John Toole
Another, if you don't mind, commentary is in our extensive history of system reviews with probation and youth justice system. Certainly now we're often hearing about workforce challenges and inability of certain probation officers being able to supervise my level of caseload. I can't possibly imagine a better partner in those challenging times than the work that you do in supporting what probation and what the courts are trying to achieve with youth in the community. So I don't just want to be an unabashed supporter of your work, but it seems to be, why shouldn't we be, given the approaches that you take? And I think both you and I also probably aligned when we first met because of our optimism.
- [37:33]
Gary Ivory
Yes.
- [37:34]
John Toole
Of challenges and obstacles for us are probably just mere opportunities for success. I guess I've got to juxtapose that with my question, but what are the challenges facing your work and your success?
- [37:47]
Gary Ivory
Yes, there are. There are lots of challenges. As optimistic and as hopeful and as encouraged as we are by the stories, by the partnerships that we have, by the evidence that this work. There are always challenges. In some jurisdictions, I call it stacking services. I'll ask to look at the referrals. And, you know, these kids are sent to eight different things they have to do to complete probation or court orders. And some of those I would, you know, just ask the general public that adults couldn't do and keep a job. And how do we expect some young people and even family members and then the whole, you know, in so many cases, fees get in the way because they're so fee driven. These families are already poor. Now, I do believe in restorative justice. I believe victims should be compensated for harm that's been done to them. So I'm not being critical of that. But these are challenges. I think with all the resource constraints, a lot of times systems are getting a little. Some are getting even more punitive into where they feel as if the only response is to get kids in out of home care. And because they can't, they don't think they're a resource in the community. They don't think any plan is going to work. And be honest, a lot of them have tried a lot of different things. So I just think that if I had to summarize what those biggest challenges we're seeing across the country are, it is sometimes a belief, the belief about can these kids, can they be released to the community without jeopardizing public safety? Some places have a philosophy that only a probation officer or parole officer can. Their role can keep these kids safe and do what's needed to keep communities safe. And I think, I think they're necessary, but I just think the partnership with these. It could be our model or any other models. There are other effective models out there. But partnering with folks that know what's going on in the home, the community, to hire people that are from that neighborhood and community really get it. We just think that's essential to be able to achieve good, lasting outcomes. Another thing is just making sure we get the critical resources. Some communities that don't have a lot of resources, especially in urban exurban communities, but there's not as many resources. Sometimes they resort to having fewer options for young people so they don't have an option like YAP in their community. And we think that's actually unfortunate. So they need something that's YAP like. Again, there are other people that are great at doing community based services. We're not the only Coca Cola in the desert, but we think that these approaches work regardless of what state or county.
- [40:19]
John Toole
You know, I walked past something I wanted to highlight and give you a chance to at least comment on. Yes, your range of services and you've casually referenced it, I believe, but yes, only about half of your services are provided to youth involved in the justice system. I think is an.
- [40:33]
Gary Ivory
That's correct. You're correct.
- [40:35]
John Toole
But you're also providing school based services. You're also providing behavioral health and. Which is referenced, I believe, but for us in particular, yes, collaboration is critical. But we focus at the National Resource center on dual status youth and your partnership in providing child welfare services as well. Recognizing this same connection between those youth who are often duly involved in child protection and youth justice as well, your services provide a range for all of those arenas as well. Am I correct, Gary?
- [41:08]
Gary Ivory
Yes, yes, you are correct. And the reason for that is, John, is that Tom Jeffress always believed that we should be serving young people, emerging adults as well, and their families, and focus on the ones that are system involved at highest risk of out of home removal, regardless of the system that they come from. We're trying to improve systems, we're trying to do systems change. Actually. In 2006, we started programs in Las Vegas, Nevada and we were doing a detention alternative and found out that most of the young people we were working with had been sex trafficked. And so we started then a model where we started bringing in trained people who could help to support these young people because we Were dropping these kids off. Our staff were. And then a few seconds later, somebody would drive up a pimp or john and they pick these kids up. So we started. Had to do a lot of things. We got. We do a lot of work. Regarding CSAT now because it started off in Vegas, the need was these kids, just like we started. We didn't have a gang model, but that was the focus of the work in Texas. In Nevada, it became the C. SEC work that we do in other places. In New York State, the need primarily was and is focusing on child welfare Because a lot of the kids through the Department of Social Services were being sent to these residential placements at $500, $600 a day. And we could just do a better job and keep kids home and do it at 80, 90 a day instead of sending kids to a residential and they come back home. And then, you know, sometimes they're not better off than they were when they left. So that's why we do it. Schools. We found that a lot of kids, especially who are truant or have chronic absenteeism, we found a lot of those kids were at home taking care of their caregivers, their parents, or there were some other things that were leading them to not go to school. So we removed those barriers and these kids are interested in going to school and we work out a plan that will work for them. And lastly, I mentioned the way we got into behavioral health is we found that a lot of jurisdictions, this is when there were a lot of kids going to psychiatric hospitals. And there still is in some states, a lot of emphasis on that. And so we were saying we need to keep these kids the revolving door at a psychiatric facility. And so we tried to bend a medical model. It is medical model. We don't exactly like medical model, but we tried to bend it to fit more of a wraparound kind of approach and keep kids out of psychiatric hospitals. So our whole emphasis, regardless of the system, we think some of that can do harm when they're put in these out of home placements. Now sometimes they need to be stabilized and observed for a while. There are situations, let me be clear, where I've even said I've had situations where a kid was going to kill someone. I knew it. And I had to work with probations happened in Tarrant county to put a kid in detention for some time to keep them safe. And then we would work with them, get them out a couple days later and work with them again. So those things are necessary for brief stabilization, things like that. But Long term, that's just not a healthy way for our country to deal with young people with trauma and a lot of toxic stress.
- [44:23]
John Toole
I couldn't agree with you more. Again, the research supports that the best solutions are in home, in community. And until we exhaust all of those opportunities, we shouldn't be perhaps sometimes too quickly moving to those out of home placements. I also have to agree probably to be on the record. Certainly some youth present points in time dangerous and they need removal from the community. The whole approach that YAP Inc. Takes is that let's collaborate, let's examine the whole child, the whole family, the whole community and provide solutions within those communities. Those are longer term strategies. That's right. Success. Gary, I'm glad that you've captured all that, but I've got to ask now, so what do you see for the future, looking ahead, what are your hopes for the future of the organization that you've so capably led?
- [45:12]
Gary Ivory
Well, I see the future. First, we celebrate our 50th anniversary and we're just excited about that. People can visit our website. We're doing a big event in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in November this year. You go to yapinc.org and see information on that to our neighborhood advocate.org which lists all of our success stories. It's just impressive. So I think where we're headed from here is first we're really focusing both on trying to expand to impact as many systems as possible to change as many biographies. Tom always talked about not changing behaviors, but changing biographies. And so we're trying to change biographies. That's number one. And we've always done that looking, you know, we're forming more partnerships at the national level. John, again, I can't tell you how important it is to be following your work and talking with you. I'm awed by the work you do. You've been a thought leader for many decades. But no, I think we're going to continue to change biographies, change systems, develop more national partnerships with other people who provide services. We're doing more capacity building where we're teaching the model to other organizations. So it used to be that we just did the model, demonstrated it and did the contracts and did it ourselves in Chicago some years ago, we started partnering with other organizations, teaching them how to do it. And it's very difficult because we're working with the most complex needs, young people and families. A lot of people don't mind dealing with the kids that have the, you know, one issue that can need can be addressed in the community. But when you're really dealing with the deep end. You have to have highly skilled and trained people that don't give up on young people. That's really difficult work. So we're focusing on that. And then we again are doing the policy work so that we can deal with these potential Medicaid cuts that are coming up and a lot of those kinds of things, again, in a nonpartisan way.
- [46:57]
John Toole
It's a great vision. Gary, obviously you referenced there are some challenges. I love the focus and your vision around the policy work. We're constantly speaking to. How do we sustain these things? How do we memorialize them? So beyond the life of some great leaders, the next generation can continue this work. So I appreciate you sharing that vision. I've got to allow you to tell us. So if someone wants to get YAP involved in their community, briefly tell me what the steps are they could take.
- [47:26]
Gary Ivory
To get that started, to get involved. They can reach out. Email me. My email address is givory I v o r yap inc.org that's y a p I n c.org they could call the number 214-417-7614. They can go to yapinc.org and get more materials. And we would have a quick response.
- [47:50]
John Toole
And we, we should say is a great team that supports you.
- [47:55]
Gary Ivory
Yes.
- [47:56]
John Toole
To expand and export this. Very knowledgeable and very committed to the work of the organization. So I wanted to capture that. I have one closing statement that I want to highlight, but I also want to give you the last word on this part of the discussion. Gary, if you could change one thing about youth justice at this current time, what would you do?
- [48:18]
Gary Ivory
I think that one thing would be changing how. Just how we view young people. As young people have promise, they have strengths that we can leverage that and we can keep these young people from being removed from the home. That's just creating more trauma. Again, I also want to say, though some young people do need to be removed, the question is how long? Okay. And what supports once they return? I do not want to leave this call though, saying that not every young person can at all times be in a community setting. I personally experience where young people are doing harm to themselves or we'll do it to others. They're homicidal, suicidal, and they need to be removed from the home for a short time. But the question is how are they going to return, how soon, and are they going to be better off for the long term when they return? I think that the real pain point is when we're waving kids to adult court. That's always been a big thing I saw with my brother that happened to him when he was 15 to 16 years old. And I don't think I was born when that happened. But I later learned that it happened to him. And we don't want to destroy kids lives. I don't think any probation or parole officer anywhere in the United States wants to do that. But so often decisions that we make can have a long term, either deleterious or positive impact on these young people's lives. And so that's the main point.
- [49:53]
John Toole
I don't want to give you the last word, I don't want to stack on that. But I was having a conversation this morning, Gary, about legislative maneuvers to broaden the transfer of youth to the adult court jurisdiction. And while there is merit for some, once again I will acknowledge that broadening what that includes, yes, young people from opportunities to change the pattern of behavior and a youth justice system that values rehabilitation and treatment is a bad trend. And unfortunately, I think you and I both know we're seeing that in legislatures across the country. Gary, I think what I'm really thrilled about as we close this conversation is we get to continue our relationship and that's of great value to the RFK National Resource Center. I want you and all of your organization to know that I look forward to building that further in the future, but we're going to further it in the immediate future by your presence at our national symposium in San Diego, June 18th to the 20th. Obviously, folks can learn about our symposium event on our website, but you have agreed to be there to YAP Inc. To our participants in one of the workshop sessions and I hope as part of the audience that is engaging in the networking, communicating and the learning opportunity that we believe we've set up in this symposium event, I hope people take advantage of the knowledge that you're there and come to learn more about what YAP is doing in communities across the nation. I can't thank you enough for making time to join us today for this discussion, but also for the decades of work that you have led. I believe you are a true inspiration and I'm privileged to have the opportunity to talk to you today. Gary, thank you very much.
- [51:40]
Jody Martin
We're excited to invite you to learn more about Youth Advocate Programs, Inc. And other innovative youth justice approaches from across the country at our national symposium in San Diego, June 18th through 20th. Yap will be there along with many others sharing transformative practices that are making a real difference in the lives of children and families. This is a unique opportunity to connect, learn and contribute to a national movement dedicated to improving youth justice outcomes. For more details and to register, visit www.rfknrcjj.org. we'd love to hear your thoughts on today's episode. Share your feedback or ideas with us by emailing rfknrcjjfkcommunity.org and don't forget to stay connected by following us on LinkedIn @RFK National Resource center for Juvenile Justice. Thanks again for listening. We look forward to seeing you at the.