Los Angeles County Probation Department

Detention Services Bureau

The mission of the Detention Bureau is to protect the community while maintaining a safe, clean, healthy, secure environment for minors detained at the juvenile halls; and while detained, to provide programs designed to address their needs, as well as to decrease their ability and desire to commit criminal acts.

Los Angeles County Probation Department's Detention Services Bureau (DSB) provides intake housing, and transportation services for minors detained in the three juvenile halls. With a population that fluctuates between 1,500 to 1,800 minors per day, the juvenile halls provide secure housing for both pre-adjudicated and post-disposition wards of the juvenile court. Additional accommodations are made for minors detained at juvenile halls pending trial in adult court.

The Los Angeles County Juvenile Halls provide the following programs and services:

On-Site Services

The Detention Services Bureau provides comprehensive medical, dental, mental health, educational and religious services, to all minors housed in its three juvenile halls. Minors are also provided with counseling, mentoring, tutoring, and daily recreational opportunities.

Behavior Management Program (BMP)

The Behavior Management Program is a collaborative effort between the Los Angeles County Probation Department, the Los Angeles County office of Education, the Department of Mental Health and the Department of Health Services. It is an activity-rich and highly structured programming model that is designed to provide minors with information and services to meet their physical, emotional, social and educational needs that will assist them in making appropriate decisions to avoid re-offending. The program identifies rules/expectations and reinforces positive behaviors through a mechanism that links rewards, incentives, and consequences to the minor’s behavior, and encourages progress toward achieving identified short-term goals. The program also utilizes a skills training curriculum of interactive exercises that train minors in the essential coping, adapting and functioning skills they need to experience success in life. Through skills training minors are provided with information that allows them to replace ineffective and maladaptive emotional and behavioral responses with more effective and skillful responses.

Promoting Healthy Families

This is a program operated under the auspices of the DSB Behavior Management Program. The program is operated through the Family Resource Center located at each juvenile hall. The program targets the parents of the youth detained in the juvenile hall facilities by promoting family reunification through a broad range of services that address the multiple needs of the youth and their families. The emphasis of the program is on developing a support network for the family in which the family is empowered to handle difficulties with the youth, and the youth is empowered to cope with family, peer, school, and neighborhood problems.

The Los Angeles County Probation Department and the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health along with Community Based Organizations offer parenting workshops to parents of detained youth, recognizing that family is a key factor in the pro-social development of youth. Through this interagency collaboration, the Promoting Healthy Families program seeks to create a support system for the families of detained youth to better assist them in their reintegration into the community. The program provides youth with an application for a Los Angeles County Library card and referral to the library branch closest to their residence. The program encourages literacy activities, by providing youths with a list of after school tutoring services, computer lab workshops, homework help and GED assistance through the Los Angeles County libraries. Further, the youths’ parents and siblings are also referred to library services, which promote a healthy family lifestyle while encouraging family literacy.

Operation Read

Is a reading initiative that provides one-on-one tutoring to minors after school. The program emphasizes learning through phonics, writing activities.

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