A Review of the Status of DMC Efforts in Iowa and Virginia - April 2010

detention centers and from the use of the assessment instrument, and that the analysis of those
data will serve as a component of the evaluation of the state’s DMC efforts. The Virginia plan
provides no discussion of evaluation.
As noted previously, several localities in Iowa and Virginia are working with the Casey
Foundation on their JDAI initiative, and Newport News and Norfolk in Virginia have also
worked with the Burns Institute. While both of these initiatives have won praise from many
quarters, we would suggest that there is very little information available on the effectiveness of
either, and most of what is available comes from the organizations themselves.
In the JDAI summary report released in 2009, the Casey Foundation claims that JDAI has
resulted in: smaller detention populations; improved public safety; cost savings; reductions in the
number of minority youth in detention in a number of sites; improved conditions of confinement;
and stimulating broader changes in juvenile justice systems (Mendel, 2009). Regarding DMC
specifically, the report states that “[w]hile JDAI sites have not collectively reduced the overall
disproportionality of their detention populations, many sites have substantially reduced the
number of minority youth in detention” and that “[i]n a handful of sites, JDAI leaders have
substantially reduced disparities in the detention rates of white youth and youth of color”
(Mendel, 2009, p. 22). In support of the first claim, the report notes that 61 JDAI sites reported
detaining 873 fewer minority youth (an average of just over 14 youths per site) in 2007 than they
did prior to their becoming JDAI sites.
In a separate report citing the effectiveness of detention reform in reducing DMC, the
Casey Foundation notes that three model JDAI sites have reduced disproportionate minority
contact by a) lowering the proportion of youth of color in secure detention; b) evening the odds
that young people of color are detained following arrest; and c) reducing the number of youth of
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