KY struggles to staff juvenile justice centers, with nearly 1 in 3 jobs left open

The Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice is temporarily reassigning different kinds of employees to serve inside its detention facilities as youth workers, who ended November with a nearly one-in-three job vacancy rate.

In a statement on Monday, DJJ said 17 of its community services staff members have agreed to fill vacant youth worker positions “to ensure youth safety within the facilities.” Youth workers are trained to provide security in the detention facilities, including physically restraining youths when necessary.

Typically, community services staff serve as case managers for youths who are committed to state custody or who are on probation, working with them and their families. Any of the temporary fill-ins who have not trained as youth workers won’t be left alone with youths or participate in restraints, said DJJ spokesman Jason Reynolds.

Also, in November, DJJ ordered the temporary closure of one of its facilities — Green River Youth Development Center in Butler County — due to staff shortages, officials said. Some staff and all youths were transferred to other facilities.

As of Nov. 30, DJJ reported employing 317 youth workers statewide with 145 open positions — a 31 percent vacancy rate. For youth worker supervisors, DJJ reported employing 48 with 13 open positions — a 21 percent vacancy rate.

The Herald-Leader reported last month that DJJ has accelerated the hiring process for new youth workers. It now sends them directly into detention facilities for on-the-job-training rather than having them spend their first three weeks learning basic security skills at the DJJ Academy in suburban Louisville, as it previously did.

DJJ runs two dozen detention facilities around Kentucky that house roughly 235 youths who are awaiting a court appearance or serving sentences. A youth worker starts at $30,000 a year.

In September, the Herald-Leader published a series of stories that disclosed serious incidents of physical abuse, inappropriate sexual contact and neglect inside these facilities. One of the recurring problems cited by DJJ reports and outside critics was a lack of staffing adequate to safely handle situations involving the youths.

In a March 28 internal report at the Kentucky Personnel Cabinet on state agencies with unusually high turnover rates, DJJ disclosed that it lost 402 employees in 2020. Many of those voluntarily quit — “This type of work is both mentally and physically demanding,” DJJ wrote — while others were fired for alleged wrongdoing.

At the Northern Kentucky Youth Development Center in Crittenden, for example, seven employees were fired, four employees were terminated from initial probation and incoming youth were temporarily relocated after internal investigators looked into “allegations of issues,” according to the Personnel Cabinet report.

The McCracken Regional Juvenile Detention Center in Paducah “had back-to-back riot issues in 2020 resulting in the Kentucky State Police being called,” according to the report. As a result of the two violent episodes, five employees were fired, three resigned with prejudice and six were terminated from initial probation.

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