CHARLESTON – The West Virginia State Conference of the NAACP says some state government agencies have failed to collect data regarding juveniles and the justice system as required.
The NAACP filed a verified petition for writ of mandamus November 14 in Kanawha Circuit Court against the West Virginia Department of Homeland Security, the West Virginia Department of Human Services and the West Virginia Department of Education.
In the petition, the NAACP says West Virginia’s juvenile confinement rate and the inequities along racial lines are far above the national average.
“The West Virginia State Conference of the NAACP has long advocated for the state to address racial inequities in how young people of color are being treated in schools and carceral settings, including racial bullying, school suspension, and truancy concerns in West Virginia,” President Loretta Young said. “This data is an important tool in that work and by not collecting it, the state is hindering the NAACP from fulfilling its mission.
“West Virginians deserve to have a government that fulfills its obligations – to know that when the state Legislature passes a law near-unanimously and the governor signs it, the state agencies follow that law, just the same as ordinary West Virginians do.”
The NAACP says, each year, about 4,000 juveniles appear before a judge for offenses, including missing too many days of school or running away from a foster home. It says “many youth become entangled in West Virginia’s juvenile justice system for years.”
A decade ago, The confinement rate for West Virginia children was 330 for every 100,000 children, well above the national average of 152.
In 2015, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin signed Senate Bill 393 that prioritized community-based services and diversion programs as an alternative to incarceration. The bill requires state agencies to collect data about juvenile justice outcomes in the state to help leaders ensure reforms are data-driven and based on evidence.
But the NAACP says these state agencies have not been collecting the juvenile justice data, making it more difficult to know if the state’s efforts to address its crisis of incarcerated youth are working as intended. The petition asks the court to compel state agencies to establish procedures to collect the data as required by law.
“West Virginia’s Legislature adopted, along bipartisan lines, a clear requirement that state agencies collect essential data to understand whether the crisis of incarcerated youth and racial inequities in the state has abated,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which is representing the NAACP. “Our suit filed on behalf of WV NAACP will ensure this critical measure is implemented.”
Mountain State Justice Inc. also is representing the NAACP.
“When West Virginia’s Legislature moved to address the crisis in the juvenile legal system in 2015, it clearly understood that data-driven, evidence-based programs were essential to any reform,” MSJ staff attorney Lesley Nash said. “The collection of underlying data is clearly an important element of this process, and Mountain State Justice is proud to work with the West Virginia State Conference of the NAACP and the Democracy Forward Foundation to hold the state accountable for its failure to fulfill its data collection obligations under the statute.”
In the petition, the NAACP says the respondent state agencies have had ample time to establish policies and procedures and to collect data, but “they have taken no action to do so.”
“These agencies’ failure to abide by their duties deprives West Virginia policymakers and policy advocates of data that would help them advocate for and enact maximally effective policies to improve the lives of West Virginia’s youth and their communities,” the petition states. “Because the respondent agencies failed to comply with their mandated, non-discretionary duties, mandamus should issue to require them to do so.”
The NAACP also seeks attorney fees, court costs and other relief. It is being represented by Nash and Lydia Milnes of MSJ and by Jessica Anne Morton, Aleshadye Getachew and Robin F. Thurston of Democracy Forward. The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Maryclaire Akers.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 24-P-508