At the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission’s June 4 meeting, members received presentations from Commission staff on the merits and drawbacks of moving the Department of Juvenile Justice to the Health and Human Resources Secretariat and the economic benefits of certain workforce and industry incentives. Staci A. Henshaw, the Auditor of Public Accounts, reported on her office’s work over the previous year, including the compilation of the annual Comparative Report of Local Government Revenues and Expenditures and monitoring localities for signs of fiscal distress.
Transfer of Department of Juvenile Justice: JLARC staff did not recommend transferring the Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) out of the Public Safety and Homeland Security Secretariat, finding that such a restructuring would be unlikely to improve access to services for youth involved in the juvenile justice system, and could hamper the agency’s ability to ensure public safety. Staff pointed out that relocating DJJ could inhibit the Department’s ability to coordinate with other public safety agencies, and its unique mission and specially-designed services could be overshadowed by the large and complex agencies already housed within the Health and Human Resources Secretariat. Staff also found that youth involved in the juvenile justice system benefit from the timely provision of services through DJJ’s contractor-coordinated service delivery model, which provides services such as individual and family therapy, anger management, and mentoring, as well as residential placements and services. Many of these youth are also being served by Health and Human Resources agencies, and staff did not find that such coordination across secretariats posed difficulties. To improve understanding of the effectiveness of specific services provided to individual youth, staff recommended that DJJ document the services provided through the regional service coordinator system and use the data to evaluate access to services and whether services are aligned with treatment needs.
Staff also offered several suggestions for alternative approaches toward the goals of improving access to services for court-involved youth and enhancing coordination among agencies:
- Codifying the Children’s Cabinet, which was previously established by Executive Orders to advise former Governors on policies related to children and youth.
- Creating a cabinet-level coordinator position.
- Increasing funding for the Virginia Juvenile Community Crime Control Act, which can be used for early intervention services.
- Increasing funding to provide embedded Community Services Board mental health staff at all Court Services Units; these staff can expedite referrals to CSBs or provide some services themselves.
- Revisiting certain recommendations from previous studies, including a 2020 recommendation to require local Children’s Services Act programs to serve non-mandated youth.
Evaluation of Workforce Incentives: This report, undertaken as part of JLARC’s mandate to perform ongoing review and evaluation of economic development incentives, considered the costs and benefits of the Virginia Jobs Investment Program, the Virginia Talent Accelerator Program, the worker training tax credit, and an assortment of targeted sales tax exemptions for certain industries. Staff offered several recommendations to improve the Virginia Jobs Investment Program and the Virginia Talent Accelerator Program and recommended that the Joint Subcommittee to Evaluate Tax Preferences review the sales tax exemptions and consider whether these exemptions achieve policy goals other than economic development.
Auditor of Public Accounts Review of Prior Year Results: Ms. Henshaw updated members on the status of the Comparative Report, pointing out that 22 localities had yet to submit their required information as of the end of May and that an increasing number of localities have been unable to submit their financial reports by the December 15 deadline in recent years. She explained that localities attribute these issues to difficulties in hiring and retaining financial staff and audit firms’ limited capacity, and warned that similar problems in state agencies have resulted in late or inaccurate submissions of financial information used in compiling the Commonwealth’s annual financial reports. Ms. Henshaw also reported on her office’s monitoring of localities for potential financial distress; this process uses a review of certain financial indicators or qualitative factors to detect local financial trouble. Concerns regarding the finances of the Town of Tangier sparked discussion among Commission members about how similar entities could be assisted with financial management, whether by the counties in which they are located or by the state; members also indicated a desire to have further discussion about the ability of very small units of government to provide services.
VACo Contact: Katie Boyle