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West Virginia agencies face lawsuit over lack of juvenile justice data collections

(Capitol Notes - Graphic Illustration/MetroCreative)

CHARLESTON — Alleging that West Virginia corrections, education and human services officials are not following state law requiring collection of data on juvenile justice outcomes, the state NAACP filed a lawsuit Thursday.

The suit was filed by the West Virginia State Conference of the NAACP against the West Virginia Department of Homeland Security, the state Department of Human Services, and the state Department of Education in Kanawha County Circuit Court. The state NAACP conference is represented by Mountain State Justice and the Democracy Forward Foundation.

The NAACP alleges the departments named in the lawsuit are not abiding by the provisions of Senate Bill 393, introduced in 2015 on behalf of then-Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin and passed unanimously by the state Senate and House of Delegates.

“The West Virginia State Conference of the NAACP has long advocated for the state to address racial inequities in how young people of color are being treated in schools and carceral settings, including racial bullying, school suspension, and truancy concerns in West Virginia,” said Loretta Young, president of the West Virginia State Conference of the NAACP, in a statement Thursday.

SB 393 was the end result of a 2014 task force created by Tomblin to review the state’s juvenile justice system. In 2013, West Virginia, Arkansas and Idaho had some of the highest juvenile incarceration rates in the nation according to the American Civil Liberties Union, with West Virginia having 276 out of every 100,000 youth in the state incarcerated.

“In 2015, troubled by the problems plaguing a juvenile legal system that confined youth at a higher rate than any other state in the country, West Virginia’s state legislature overwhelmingly passed, and the governor signed into law, Senate Bill 393,” attorneys for the NAACP wrote. “This statute prioritized community-based services and alternatives to detention for youth who become involved with the juvenile legal system. Ultimately, the legislature intended to improve youth outcomes such as rates of recidivism and truancy.”

Among the bill’s provisions, it required the Division of Juvenile Services, the former Department of Health and Human Resources and the Department of Education to track and record outcomes of truancy diversion programs operated and funded by the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the programs in reducing unexcused absences.

The bill required the state agencies to collect data on the number of youth that successfully complete truancy diversion programs, the number of juveniles referred to the court system, and the number of juveniles who successfully completed a program but go on to accumulate five or more unexcused absences.

The bill also required the agencies to establish procedures to collect data on the number of minority children who come into contact with the juvenile justice system. The agencies were required to collect data on the race and gender of juveniles arrested or referred to the court system and entered into diversion programs and the results of those cases.

“To improve those youth outcomes, they had to first be measured and understood,” the attorneys for the NAACP wrote. “The statute required multiple state agencies to jointly establish procedures to collect and compile data — and to actually collect and compile that data — on the effectiveness of various programs for youth that they fund and administer, as well as data on disproportionate contact with the juvenile legal system disaggregated by race and gender.”

But according to the NAACP, the three agencies have not taken any actions to comply with the law nearly a decade after its passage. The mandamus lawsuit calls on the court to require the departments to abide by the provisions of SB 393 and begin collecting the required data.

“…These agencies have had ample time to establish policies and procedures — and to collect data — in compliance with those requirements. But they have taken no action to do so, despite clear statutory requirements,” the attorneys wrote. “These agencies’ failure to abide by their duties deprives West Virginia policymakers and policy advocates of data that would help them advocate for and enact maximally effective policies to improve the lives of West Virginia’s youth and their communities.”

According to a 2023 report by the state Department of Education, 31% of students referred for disciplinary incidents in public schools were Black despite Black students representing 4% of the student population in 2022. Multi-racial students represented 24% of referrals, 18% were white, 17% were Hispanic/Latino and 10% were other racial minorities. Of those suspended, 20% were Black, and the rate of referred Black students who were suspended was 64%.

Black students made up 8% of all students suspended, with 10% of Black students involved in incidents resulting in suspensions. It showed 11% of all instructional days lost due to suspensions were for Black students. Of those Black students suspended, 50% were in in-school suspension while 50% were in out-of-school suspension.

In her statement, Young said the additional data required by SB 393 would help the NAACP and other groups be able to develop solutions to address any disparities

“This data is an important tool in that work and by not collecting it, the state is hindering the NAACP from fulfilling its mission,” Young said. “West Virginians deserve to have a government that fulfills its obligations — to know that when the state legislature passes a law near-unanimously and the governor signs it, the state agencies follow that law, just the same as ordinary West Virginians do.”

“West Virginia’s legislature adopted, along bipartisan lines, a clear requirement that state agencies collect essential data to understand whether the crisis of incarcerated youth and racial inequities in the state has abated,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward. “Our suit filed on behalf of WV NAACP will ensure this critical measure is implemented.”

Requests for comment from the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Human Services were not returned. The Department of Education declined to comment.

Steven Allen Adams can be reached at sadams@newsandsentinel.com.

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