Youth Prison Population Down, Costs Up

Lincoln Hills School and Copper Lake School. Photo from the Wisconsin Department of Corrections.

Milwaukee County is on track to have the lowest population of youth in state juvenile prisons in a decade.

Meanwhile, the state keeps raising the rate it charges to incarcerate youth, eating into savings that could be used on youth corrections and programming at the local level.

The Wisconsin Department of Corrections charges counties a daily rate for every youth incarcerated in the state juvenile corrections system. At the start of the state’s fiscal year in July, the daily rate increased $22 to $1,268.

At the end of August, there were approximately 19 youth held in state correctional facilities, which represents a historically low population of youth from Milwaukee in state prisons. It puts the county on track to have the fewest children ordered to serve a sentence in a state prison during the past decade.

Officials in the circuit court system and the county’s Division of Children Youth and Family Services (CYFS) — which oversees the county’s Vel R. Phillips Juvenile Justice Center — have worked together to lower the number of youth sent to state prisons. The state-run facilities have a poor reputation and were the subject of an FBI investigation for abuse.

In 2015, the total for the year was 109 Milwaukee youth incarcerated in state prisons. By 2021, the number was down to 32. In 2021, an uptick in youth coming into contact with the justice system began following the massive social disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The county’s juvenile facility was frequently at or above capacity in 2022 and the number of Milwaukee youth ordered to state prisons also began to increase. But by 2023, the number was coming down again.

“Even though the Average Daily Population (ADP) of youth detained in the State facilities has declined dramatically by over 70% since 2015, the daily rate has nearly tripled ($301 to $1,246) during this same period which has created an unsustainable financial situation,” according to a recent CYFS report.

The division anticipates the state will increase the rate again next July, according to its 2025 budget request.

The county’s long-term goal is to eventually have zero youth ordered to state facilities.  The county is currently building out a $31.3 million addition to the Vel R. Phillips Juvenile Justice Center, 10201 W Watertown Plank Rd., which will house an expanded incarceration alternative program. The expanded program should allow the county to keep most of the youth sentenced to periods of confinement in Milwaukee County. However, even after the expansion is built, any serious juvenile offenders found guilt of crimes like homicide, sexual assault or firearm-related crimes will still be ordered to a state facility.

CYFS officials expect the new facility will be finished by the end of 2025 and accepting placements from the courts by early 2026.

Related Legislation: Juvenile correction population report