‘Roadmap’ Meeting Tonight

The Florida Department of Juvenile Justice will host a town hall meeting tonight in Pensacola.

Part of a series of such community meetings around the state, the local event will be an opportunity for department officials to discuss the new Roadmap to System Excellence. The so-called Roadmap lays out a plan for “reducing juvenile delinquency through effective prevention, intervention and treatment services that strengthen families and turn around the lives of troubled youths.”

The new approach by the department is an effort to steer juveniles away from the criminal judicial system, where the recidivism rate is high.

“In a nutshell,” DJJ Secretary Wansley Walters told the IN recently, “the direction we’re moving is trying to be much more proactive keeping kids in school and out of the justice system.”

Tonight’s town hall will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. in the Paul and Jean Amos Performance Studio on the campus of Pensacola State College.