Get serious about fixing youth prison

It's hard to stomach, but rather easy to see, how the St. Charles youth prison got to be in the shape it's in today.

While Illinois policy makers were busy courting senior votes with $70 million a year in free transit rides, a 2007 report suggesting major changes in the St. Charles medium-security campus and in the state's approach to juvenile justice languished.

While legislators held a $40,000-a-day special session to try to pass a budget, housing conditions at St. Charles grew bad enough to contribute to two inmates escaping and another killing himself.

Yet we've still seen no indication this is anyone's priority. Last month, the state spent about $70,000 to replace suicide-enabling tubular steel bunk beds that were highlighted in a report by the prison reform group, the John Howard Association. But that's only a start.

After months of revelations of how bad things have gotten at the youth center, we need to see some resolve and clear action.

Stephanie Weber, executive director of the nonprofit Suicide Prevention Services in Batavia, told Daily Herald reporter Josh Stockinger for a story in Monday's paper: "I don't think the state of Illinois values human life. We are such a corrupt state. There is so much money going in the wrong direction. We need to do everything in our power to provide the very best to keep people safe."

We must remind ourselves that this facility houses children. And state law treats children different from adults, in part because their decision-making isn't as developed as an adult's. Children, whether criminals or not, need a different level of supervision, counseling, protection and care than adults.

"(There are) serious shortfalls in programming such as lack of full-day education at most facilities, lack of mental health staff at each facility and lack of 24-hour medical care," a 2007 report on the facility said. "Most of the facilities are outmoded, do not meet contemporary standards, are functionally obsolete and in poor physical condition."

The John Howard Association reported that one of the larger issues is the need for video monitoring and doors that allow greater supervision of the young inmates. These are issues that have yet to be addressed.

The Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice has its heads in the sand.

"While we recognize physical deficiencies at the aging facility, the conditions don't pose an immediate risk to youth," spokeswoman Januari Smith told Stockinger.

We acknowledge that the state of Illinois doesn't have a lot of financial wiggle room, but leaders need to decide to get serious about improving conditions at St. Charles. Perhaps it's such a low priority because it's not the kind of expenditure that's likely to get an avalanche of votes in return.

For the sake of the kids filed out of sight in that facility, we must change our thinking.