Sedgwick County Department of Corrections
Juvenile Detention Facility (JDF)
700 S Hydraulic | Wichita, KS 67211-2704
316-660-9750 | Fax 316-660-1670

We have moved...Our new address is 700 S Hydraulic, Wichita, KS 67211.
This is effective 03/30/06 for mail and deliveries from vendors.

JDF is a 24-hour juvenile detention facility for male and female offenders and alleged offenders who are awaiting court hearings or for placement by the state into residential facilities. The licensed capacity is 33 and the basic services are secure confinement, education, life skills classes, recreation and mental health counseling.

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Juvenile Detention Facility Construction

Construction on a new Juvenile Detention Facility is projected to begin in mid-December of 2003. Bids on the planning and construction phase have been recently received and an architect chosen. (Adobe Acrobat Reader Required).

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Posted on Mon, Nov. 24, 2003 
(Reprinted with permission of the Wichita Eagle)                                                               

A bigger jail for juveniles
Sedgwick County officials say that a new youth detention center will ease overcrowding and keep young offenders closer to their families.
BY LORI O'TOOLE BUSELT
The Wichita Eagle

On a typical day in juvenile detention, a quarter or more of the kids taken into custody in Sedgwick County will be sent to jails more than 140 miles away.

Cut off from families at a critical point in their life, the 10- to 17-year-olds are without the support system they may need to help get their lives back on track, said Mark Masterson, the county's director of corrections.

To him, keeping those kids closer to home will be the most important benefit of the new $16.2 million juvenile detention center scheduled to open in 2005.

Many of the youths won't see their family and friends, who may not have time, money or transportation to visit them in facilities as far away as WaKeeney, a western Kansas town 215 miles away.

It takes a toll on the youths, who can be in custody for reasons ranging from being a repeat runaway to being charged with murder, Masterson said.

But it also affects the families of those who are in custody for extended periods. The community may have to pay more, too, because the longer the youths stay in custody, the more likely they are to become repeat offenders, Masterson said.

"It's very difficult when you're trying to go through a rehabilitation to take care of kids the right way when they're out of county," said Stephanie Knebel, the county's manager of project services.

Construction will begin before the end of the year on the brick building, designed to house 108 residents -- more than three times the current number.

It will be built north of the current building at 1900 E. Morris, near Lincoln and I-135.

The county can use that space.

The detention center, nearly 30 years old, was designed to hold only 33 residents, a capacity the county outgrew in the early 1990s.

In 1996, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment threatened to fine Sedgwick County as much as $500 a day because it was violating its licensed limit of 33 youths in custody.

The state and county agreed Sedgwick County could temporarily hold 45 youths in its juvenile jail -- more during emergencies -- and send the rest to other counties.

The center's average daily population, calculated monthly, hasn't dipped below 53 this year. The monthly average of youths shipped out of the county has fluctuated from a few of 13 to as many as 41.

Last month's average daily population jumped to nearly 85, and the daily count has been as high as 96 this month.

Part of the jump is because the county's population continues to increase. Also, residential homes for troubled youths have been full, Masterson said, which means more kids must stay in detention.

County officials have been working to curtail the center's crowding with prevention programs and home-based supervision, among other programs that are cheaper than detention and don't jeopardize public safety.

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Posted on Tue, Nov. 25, 2003
(Reprinted with permission of the Wichita Eagle)                                                    

Editorial: Finally
County has long needed a new juvenile jail
FOR THE BOARD, RHONDA HOLMAN

The inadequacies of the Sedgwick County Juvenile Detention Facility have been well-chronicled for years -- 45 juveniles in a jail built for 33; dozens of kids shipped out to leased cells hours away; problems keeping juveniles separate and safe.

So it's great to see that the county finally is ready to begin construction of a $16.2 million, 108-bed juvenile detention center just north of the current facility, 1900 E. Morris, to open in 2005. Much as we wish a bigger juvenile jail was not needed, the reality is that it is needed, and badly. So are the other components of the three-phase $34.7 million project, including new juvenile courtrooms and district attorney offices.

It makes some sense that county officials didn't rush to build a new juvenile jail the moment consultants told them they needed one in 1997. At the time, the state was reforming its own troubled juvenile-justice system, which had aggravated local overcrowding. County voters had just rejected an expansion of the Sedgwick County Jail.

Plus, there were high hopes that a significant investment of county dollars in prevention and intervention would reduce the need for a new jail for young offenders. Those programs continue to show results and may be why original plans for a 130-bed facility could be scaled back.

County commissioners surely also were mindful that when crowded jails are made bigger, they somehow still fill up.

But few believed the county was doing more than delaying the inevitable. Moving ahead on a new facility was the right thing, even in this time of tight budgets. The community arguably has been too complacent in allowing troubled kids from Wichita to be jailed far from home. Sedgwick County should take care of its young offenders in Sedgwick County, especially because doing so allows easier contact with family and raises the odds of rehabilitation.

For similar reasons, officials should continue using some of the less-costly options, such as electronic home monitoring, they've come up with to cope with crowding.

Still, addressing the reality needn't change the community's goal: to work toward reducing the need for a place to jail juveniles.

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last update: 04/20/06
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