County close to having own juvenile diversion program

n version of a program that seeks to keep juveniles out of the justice system.
    “We’re getting everything finalized, but Chase will have its own in-house diversion program,” Assistant County Attorney Rory Roundtree said.
    Typically, in a diversion program, a juvenile charged with a nonviolent crime will be taken out of the court system and put through a program that could include community services, classes or essays, or some combination of those.
    There has been a diversion program in this area since 2001, run through Lutheran Family Services in Red Willow County. That program included Red Willow, Chase,
Dundy, Furnas, Hayes and Hitchcock counties.
    Roundtree said taking over its own diversion program would mean “you have more control over the program itself. You know whether or not juveniles are achieving the requirements of the program. It’s significantly more cost-effective and will allow us to do additional programs.” Those new programs would cover mental health and specific programming for juveniles.
    Chase County is in the process of securing memorandums of understanding with other parties involved. After that, necessary contracts will be signed and the county’s diversion program should be up and running “within the next two months at most,” Roundtree said.
    The memorandums of understanding will enable counties to run their own diversion programs but pool financial resources for the new features.

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