This is a summary of a report issued in May 1998, by the Comprehensive Strategy Task Force of Jacksonville, Florida. 

In 1993, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention of the United States Department of Justice issued the Comprehensive Strategy for Serious, Violent and Chronic Juvenile Offenders, which set out key research findings and specified a number of critical policy assumptions to guide effective programming. The strategy is guided by five general imperatives: 

• Strengthen the family in its role to instill moral principles, and provide guidance and support to children; 
• Support core social institutions in their roles to develop capable, mature, and responsible youths; 
• Prevent delinquency because prevention is the most cost effective approach to combating youth crime; 
• Intervene immediately and effectively when delinquent behavior is first manifested; and 
• Control and identify the small group of serious, violent, and chronic offenders through a range of graduated sanctions, including placement in secure facilities. 

The strategy rests on a risk-focused prevention model which is based on known risk factors existing in a community. Complementing the prevention component is a risk-focused continuum of sanctions for juvenile offenders covering immediate responses for minor misconduct, an array of intermediate sanctions for serious habitual offenders, and effective, secure treatment programs for the violent few. 

Under the sponsorship of the Jessie Ball duPont Fund, Jacksonville has sought to involve a wide array of officials and community leaders in the implementation process, seeking collaboration and community consensus from both sanctions and prevention perspectives. In June 1996, the duPont Fund invited over 100 community leaders to explore the possibility of implementing the strategy in Jacksonville. After presentations and discussion, participants voted unanimously to begin the implementation of the strategy. During the summer and fall of 1996, a Community Advocates Board was formed consisting of approximately 40 community leaders who were charged with responding to suggestions made by strategy volunteers, and ultimately with advocating strategy recommendations. 

A Comprehensive Strategy Task Force was formed and charged with strategy implementation. Work began in November 1996, with a two-day training session after which the task force divided into a Prevention Team and a Graduated Sanctions Team. The teams began the work of gathering and assessing data, studying and prioritizing risk factors and risk indicators, identifying and assessing effective programs, and exploring promising approaches.

One intent of this group was to discover and analyze emerging local and national research in the area of juvenile crime, and to apply that research to the local situation in a forthright and open process, utilizing as many resources as possible. The number of participants speaks loudly to the openness of the process, and the conclusions themselves speak directly to the dedication and effort of everyone involved. 

Jacksonville's effort on the prevention side has largely consisted of prioritizing the most prevalent risk factors facing Jacksonville youth, analyzing how those factors compare to state and national statistics, and identifying specific local programs and strategies which address the priority risk factors. The sanctions team gathered and analyzed local, state, and national data about crime in general, and about juvenile crime in particular, assessed the decision-making process in the juvenile system, and studied programs available to local juvenile authorities. 

The task force reported its initial findings to the community in July 1997. This report was followed by a series of smaller community outreach activities designed to collect feedback and gain local support. The implementation of the strategy in Jacksonville will continue to be a joint effort of the City of Jacksonville, the Jessie Ball duPont Fund, the State Attorney's Office the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office and other local agencies. 

The strategy is based upon the identification of a community's priority risk factors from the 19 national research-based risk factors shown below. It assumes that resources will be directed to those programs which deal either directly with these risk factors, or with protective factors, which buffer the risks. Thirty years of national research has revealed that reducing these risk factors, and/or increasing these protective factors, reduces the incidence and severity of juvenile crime.

Based upon available data related to Jacksonville, the task force selected five priority risk factors upon which the strategy's prevention efforts would focus. This report presents rationales for each, along with indicators, comments, and promising approaches. 

• Economic deprivation
• Family management problems
• Early academic failure
• Lack of commitment to school
• Availability and use of drugs 

As a basis for the task force's sanctions work, data was collected and an inventory of sanctions and structured decision-making instruments was made. These findings were explored and evaluated by the three sanctions subcommittees: data collection, structured decision-making, and programs. More than 50 sanctions presently exist, and structured decision-making instruments, developed at the state level, have been developed and are in current use. The task force supplemented the data and inventory with presentations by local judges, at-risk youth, and staff from the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice. More than 15 pre-existing studies and reports were reviewed along with current research. Additionally, a survey of juveniles serving time in jail was conducted, along with a state-wide survey of state attorneys concerning procedures for filing delinquency petitions.

After 18 months, much work remains to be done. The task force's goal of reducing delinquency by 40 percent, by the year 2015, recognizes the need for joint community efforts and a comprehensive strategy to reduce priority risk factors, and to increase protective factors for children. The risk factors must penetrate the implementation of the plan on both sides; the prevention component of this strategy is integral to success in sanctions. Programs and services must be designed to implement and improve protective factors, in order to reduce the risk factors. 

Under the task force's plan, the Mayor, State Attorney, and Sheriff should establish and co-chair a Comprehensive Strategy Board as a collaborative effort to identify, monitor, and promote juvenile prevention and rehabilitative services, and to advocate for children. The board would include the president of the City Council, the chief judge of the Fourth Judicial Circuit, the Public Defender, the chair of the Duval County School Board, and representatives from other relevant agencies and community institutions. The board will be staffed by a team lodged in the City of Jacksonville's Department of Community Services, which builds upon and collaborates with existing agencies through the Human Services Council. The board will organize interested agency and community volunteers into working committees which should address the needs for community dialogue, prevention, sanctions, legislation, monitoring, evaluation, and updating. These committees will provide ongoing monitoring, evaluation, and information sharing among public and not-for-profit agencies. They will: