BILL ANALYSIS Ó SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair 2015 - 2016 Regular Session SB 1031 (Hancock) - Juvenile justice information system ----------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- |--------------------------------+--------------------------------| | | | |Version: April 6, 2016 |Policy Vote: PUB. S. 7 - 0 | | | | |--------------------------------+--------------------------------| | | | |Urgency: No |Mandate: No | | | | |--------------------------------+--------------------------------| | | | |Hearing Date: May 2, 2016 |Consultant: Jolie Onodera | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File. Bill Summary: SB 1031 would require the Department of Justice (DOJ) to develop a design structure and implementation plan for the California Juvenile Justice Information System (CJJIS) by January 1, 2018. This bill would require the DOJ to establish and implement the CJJIS on or before July 1, 2019. This bill appropriates an unspecified sum from the General Fund to the DOJ for the purpose of funding the development of the design structure and implementation plan for the CJJIS. Fiscal Impact: CJJIS development and plan : One-time General Fund appropriation of an unspecified amount for the DOJ to develop structure and implementation plan. The estimated cost to the DOJ is unknown, but potentially in excess of $1 million. CJJIS implementation : Unknown, potentially major one-time costs in the millions of dollars and ongoing costs in the millions of dollars (General Fund) to the DOJ for new SB 1031 (Hancock) Page 1 of ? infrastructure, enabling and supporting integrated statewide data collection and reporting by agencies to the system, including additional staffing, training, data collection, analysis, monitoring, upgrades, storage for the operation and maintenance of the system. Local agency reporting : Potentially major one-time and ongoing costs for local agency reporting (including but not limited to law enforcement, county probation, county child welfare agencies), potentially in the millions of dollars annually statewide, given the breadth of information to be reported into the system. To the extent the new system requires local agencies to upgrade their existing IT infrastructure to enable integration, additional costs could be substantial. The manner in which DOJ solicits participation from agencies to report data could impact whether these costs remain a local responsibility, require state reimbursement through the state mandates process (General Fund), require state funding pursuant to Proposition 30*, or possibly require funding from a combination of all three. To the extent local agency expenditures qualify as a reimbursable state mandate, agencies could claim reimbursement of those costs (General Fund). While costs could vary widely, for context, the Commission on State Mandates' statewide cost estimate for Crime Statistics Reports for the DOJ reflects eligible reimbursement of over $13.6 million per year for slightly over 50 percent of local agencies reporting. Courts : Potentially minor to significant one-time and ongoing costs to enable integrated reporting of required data for this system. *Proposition 30 (2012) exempts the State from mandate reimbursement for realigned programs including the provision of "public safety services" such as child welfare services, and providing services to and supervision of juvenile offenders. Additionally, the related reporting responsibilities of local agencies for these public safety services are exempt from mandate reimbursement. However, legislation enacted after September 30, 2012, that has an overall effect of increasing the costs already borne by a local agency for public safety services apply to local agencies only to the extent that the State provides annual funding for the cost increase. The provisions of Proposition 30 have not been interpreted through the formal court process to date, however, to the extent the local agency costs resulting from this measure are determined to be SB 1031 (Hancock) Page 2 of ? applicable under the provisions of Proposition 30, local agencies would not be obligated to provide the level of service required by the bill above the level for which funding is provided by the State. Background: Although existing law requires the DOJ to collect data pertaining to the juvenile justice system for criminal history and statistical purposes, as reported by the California Juvenile Justice Data Working Group within the Board of State and Community Corrections (BSCC) in its report entitled, "Rebuilding California's Juvenile Justice Data System: Recommendations to Improve Data Collection, Performance Measures, and Outcomes for California Youth," California falls woefully short of what is needed: Increasingly across the nation, state and local juvenile justice systems are expanding data collection capacity to support effective and evidence-based practices and to promote positive outcomes for justice-involved youth. Respected national organizations-like the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and the Council of State Governments-have joined with leaders in philanthropy to advance technology and new outcome measures in juvenile justice. Several factors help to explain this growth of interest in data-driven approaches to juvenile justice, including: The need for evidence to guide the adoption of practices that are safe, effective and unbiased; The need to control justice system costs and the corresponding need to identify cost-effective alternatives to incarceration; An expanding national body of research on adolescent development that is changing federal and state juvenile justice laws and practices, and the corresponding need to use data and evaluation to adapt programs and practices accordingly; and Recognition that the fundamental purpose of the juvenile justice system is rehabilitation and that, in order to measure rehabilitation, juvenile justice systems must have adequate capacity to monitor youth outcomes. Regrettably, California has allowed its juvenile data systems to fall into a pattern of long-term decline. The SB 1031 (Hancock) Page 3 of ? technology supporting the state's main juvenile justice data bank is antiquated and cannot be upgraded. There is no state-level capacity to track recidivism or other important outcomes for justice system youth. California's state-level juvenile justice data banks are split between different agencies and are not integrated by design with county-level data systems. An overarching problem is that California has not made a significant state investment in modernizing its juvenile justice data capacity for more than two decades. While state data systems in other child-serving realms-like education and child welfare-have benefitted from major state investment and upgrades to meet contemporary needs, this has not been the case for a California juvenile justice system that processes more than 100,000 children as arrest, supervision or confinement cases each year. Proposed Law: This bill requires the DOJ to develop, with advice from the Chief Probation Officers of California, the Judicial Council, advocates for juveniles, and other stakeholders, a design structure and implementation plan for the CJJIS on or before January 1, 2018. Additionally, this bill: Requires the DOJ to establish and implement the CJJIS on or before July 1, 2019. Provides that the purpose of the CJJIS is to develop and maintain statewide statistical information, including information collected and shared by counties, which promotes the operational and program effectiveness of state and local juvenile justice systems in California in reducing the incidence of juvenile crime and recidivism among juvenile offenders. Requires the information system to be developed by the DOJ to include, but not be limited to, the following features: o Providing for the integrated and user-friendly collection and reporting of statewide juvenile justice SB 1031 (Hancock) Page 4 of ? data reflecting key demographic and case processing characteristics of children who come into contact with the juvenile justice system. o Providing data relating to the effectiveness of programs, practices, or other prevention and intervention strategies employed to respond to juvenile crime and reduce recidivism among juvenile offenders. o Facilitating and supporting the scope and quality of data describing the characteristics and needs of youthful offenders and the juvenile justice programs and practices necessary to effectively manage state and local resources invested in the juvenile justice system. o Supporting local juvenile justice agencies in developing and maintaining local juvenile justice data systems and in the collection and submission of local juvenile justice data to state agencies. Provides that in establishing the technology infrastructure for the development of the CJJIS, the DOJ is to adopt a set of goals and objectives consistent with this section, to be reflected in a system design which supports the direction for the information system. Appropriates an unspecified sum from the General Fund to the DOJ for the purpose of funding the development of a design structure and implementation plan for the CJJIS. Staff Comments: Given the size and complexity of the information system to be developed pursuant to the provisions of this bill, the Department of Technology's California Project Management SB 1031 (Hancock) Page 5 of ? Office (CA-PMO) may potentially be an appropriate entity to engage as a resource. The CA-PMO provides centralized project management of IT projects so that strategic benefits are realized through standardized frameworks, education, training, and tools and techniques based on proven best practices and lessons learned. While the CA-PMO was recently formed and is currently focusing on developing and testing its project management process and managing only a limited number of low and moderate complexity IT projects, to the extent they are able to take on more projects and higher complexity projects in the near future may be an option to consider. Recommended Amendments: To reduce costs, the author may wish to consider an amendment to delete the establishment and implementation of the program by July 1, 2019, and instead limit the bill to the development of a design structure and implementation plan by the DOJ. The author may wish consider an additional amendment to require the DOJ to develop a detailed cost analysis of the project, both for design and implementation, to supplement the plan, to be submitted with the plan to the Legislature for review and future consideration. -- END --