The Community Justice Network for Youth (CJNY) is a program of the W. Haywood Burns Institute (BI). This publication outlines the foundation and beliefs that ground CJNY’s work. As a support network, the CJNY enhances the capacity of community organizations who collectively share one vision: To promote the availability of effective and culturally-appropriate programming for youth of color and poor communities. The CJNY helps to develop real solutions to replace the “cradle to prison pipeline” created by zero-tolerance policies in schools, a lack of opportunities in poor communities and the failure of public systems.

The W. Haywood Burns Institute and the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (ACLU-NC) have released a report that explores how racial, ethnic, and gender disparities in access to education, employment, and housing impact the contact people will have with the criminal justice system.

In The Keeper and the Kept, James Bell, Laura John Ridolfi, Michael Finley and Clinton Lacey challenge our nation's overreliance on detention and offer an introduction to the BI method.

In this first publication of our forthcoming series, we reflect on the failure to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in the juvenile justice system in the 20 years since Congress first mandated that States "address" disproportionality.

Spanning the years 1500-2007, it is designed for participants to understand the history of detention.