Adron Gardner / Gallup Independent
In 2014, the Juvenile Detention Center in McKinley was still being used. McKinley County received $400,000 from the liquor excise tax fund for the Juvenile Substance Abuse Crisis Center at the Juvenile Detention Center.
The 2017 closure of the McKinley County Juvenile Detention Center was largely viewed as a positive. New Mexico, which has shrunk its juvenile detainee population by nearly a third in the past decade, has moved away from needlessly imprisoning youth ahead of court dates.
But the lack of a juvenile detention center in Gallup, N.M., is actually harming area youth and families. When an at-risk kid, which can include a youth in care, is detained in McKinley County, they’re sent more than 120 miles north to the San Juan County Juvenile Services Center in Farmington, N.M. It essentially isolates a youth from their family and legal support.
“It has created a lot of issues because of the additional time it takes everyone to gather for face-to-face contact with the child,” said David Pederson, chief deputy district attorney for the 11th Judicial District in Gallup. “All of the parties are separated as opposed to being available here locally, where you can meet easily and more frequently to try to come up with a game plan for what’s going on with kids.
“One of the things that we’ve always emphasized in children’s court is trying to get the family involved as a support mechanism for kids that are in trouble,” Pederson said. “A lot of our kids are from sparsely populated rural areas. The distances out here are bad enough under the best of circumstances.”
The termination of the McKinley County Juvenile Detention Center models a statewide trend that has seen New Mexico shutter nearly half its county-run juvenile delinquency centers due to fewer juveniles in detention. Children, Youth and Families statistics show that the state’s juvenile detention population fell from 4,137 in 2010 to 1,459 as of Oct. 31, 2019. There were approximately 40 McKinley County youth in state protective services as of Dec. 31, 2019, according to CYFD’s 360 Quarterly.
Though a family-based approach is the preferred method of youth rehabilitation — CYFD is pushing to place more foster and at-risk youth with family members — the few remaining detention centers have become overburdened, which has presented complications for vulnerable kids, families and children’s court attorneys.
[Related: New Mexico Legislature Racks Up Successes, Losses, Compromises for Foster Youth]
[Related: Las Cruces, New Mexico, Legislator Helping Fight Childhood Trauma]
[Related: N.M. Legislature Also Worked on Intersecting Foster Care Issues]
[Related: Occupancy Tax Has Potential to Help New Mexican Kids, CYFD Expert Says]
Alec Orenstein, managing attorney at the Law Office of the Public Defender in Gallup, says the current situation also squanders taxpayer dollars and strains law enforcement resources.
The McKinley County Juvenile Detention Facility, which Pederson helped establish as a former state representative, was a medium-security correctional facility located north of Interstate 40. The facility closed for good on Aug. 6, 2017, according to a Gallup Independent report.
8 hours of transportation
As a result, when a youth from Gallup or the surrounding area is arrested, they’re transported to the detention center in Farmington, which takes about two hours by car. The case, however, remains in McKinley County so whenever there’s a hearing, the youth is transported two hours back and forth each way.
“It’s a little nuts,” Orenstein said. “McKinley County sheriffs sometimes drive up two hours [to Farmington], they drive back two hours [to Gallup] with the kid, they do a court appearance, drive back up two hours with the kid and then they drive two hours back home. It’s a huge waste of money and resources.”
The youth are the ones who ultimately lose, he said.
“It’s so important for us to meet with them face to face, not just to talk about the case, but there’s often competency issues that we have to suss out and we talk to them about their family life and their history,” Orenstein said. “It’s tough to give effective representation when we’re unable to visit them or we’re sitting in a witness room trying to have a rushed first interview.”
During a Nov. 12, 2019 presentation before the Legislative Health and Human Services Committee in Santa Fe, N.M., Traci Neff, juvenile services administrator with the San Juan County Juvenile Services Center, expressed concern for the youth who have been affected by the closure of the McKinley County facility as well as the Cibola County Detention Center, which was about two hours south of Farmington near Grants, N.M.
Neff laid out the case of a McKinley County kid who was housed at the San Juan facility for 57 days. The young person traveled back and forth from Farmington to Gallup for court appearances five separate times, often spending eight or more hours in a vehicle or a courthouse.
On one occasion, according to Neff, the youth woke up at 4:30 a.m. for a court appearance in McKinley County, left for Gallup about half an hour later and didn’t return to Farmington until 8:56 p.m. “Sixteen hours he was gone,” Neff said.
“It’s only going to get worse at these facilities continue to shut down,” she said. “Families don’t visit because they can’t.” CYFD data from Jan. 1 to Oct. 31, 2019 shows that 1,104 out of 1,459 youth were detained in the youth’s own county. The remaining 355 youth were detained from other counties that don’t have a facility.
There are currently six juvenile detention centers operating in New Mexico. Soon, there might only be five.
Last month, Santa Fe County officials looked into shuttering Santa Fe’s juvenile detention center and transporting the remaining population to the Bernalillo County Juvenile Detention Facility in Albuquerque, N.M. During the 2020 Legislature, Sen. Gerald Ortiz y Pino, a Democrat, introduced Senate Memorial 15, which recommended counties start researching cost-sharing options, juvenile detention alternatives and improving children’s court processes and procedures. The legislative declaration of intent didn’t gain much traction.
“I wish I had a clear crystal ball to predict where this is headed,” Pederson said.
This story is part of a Youth Today project on foster care in New Mexico. It’s made possible in part by the May and Stanley Smith Charitable Trust. Youth Today is solely responsible for the content and maintains editorial independence.
