The New Jersey Office of the Attorney General contracts with WRI to staff and provide technical assistance and capacity building to municipal juvenile delinquency prevention efforts in select cities, including Trenton, Camden, and Vineland, as part of the State’s crime prevention efforts.
The projects include staffing a coalition of stakeholders from each municipality, and the county as well, to analyze and identify trends that can be addressed to reduce and prevent juvenile crime. These efforts review the risk and protective factors in their municipalities leading to or protecting against juvenile delinquency, discussing issues and potentials solutions with experts, practitioners, and users of the various systems that juveniles come into contact with. Based on the data and information analyzed, along with identification of strengths and weaknesses existing in each municipality, the efforts develop and implement a plan to reduce and ultimately prevent youth from getting involved with the juvenile justice system. WRI collects, analyzes, maps and presents census, education, child welfare, and crime data, as well as researches and presents evidence-based promising practices from across the country. WRI also helps implement solutions, track results, and evaluate outcomes.