Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion items from writers who share our objective of widening the dialog about how public insurance policies have an effect on the day-to-day lives of individuals all through our state. Tyler Williams and Yusef Presley are youth leaders with Progeny.

Whereas September marks one 12 months since Cedric Lofton was tragically killed on the Sedgwick County Juvenile Consumption and Evaluation Middle in Wichita, Cedric’s household and group are removed from receiving the justice they deserve.

When the Sedgwick County Neighborhood Activity Pressure reviewing Cedric’s demise issued its suggestions earlier this 12 months, its members gave town and county 90 days to assessment them earlier than making budgeting choices. Officers will meet Monday, and we can’t let this date go by as one more instance of our leaders failing to take motion.

As previously incarcerated youths ourselves, we’re watching, and we’re ready.

We don’t want extra empty phrases and condolences — we’d like actual change to ship justice for Cedric and be sure that no one else’s life is senselessly taken. We want our leaders to step up and make long-overdue modifications to divest from youth prisons and spend money on community-based helps. In the event that they don’t, the abuse of younger folks and devastation of our communities will solely worsen.

When Cedric’s foster father dialed 911 final September, it was a name for help for his son, who was in a state of disaster. But, as an alternative of being met with compassion and help, Cedric by no means returned dwelling. We too have skilled the horrors of youth incarceration in Kansas, and we all know that Cedric’s slaying was the results of a systemic difficulty, not only one horrible incident.

Cedric was a foster baby, and we all know from firsthand expertise that youngsters like him throughout the foster care system will not be handled equally, and infrequently don’t have their primary wants met. Cedric’s life was taken that day with extreme drive by the very system meant to guard him, and it may have occurred to any certainly one of us.

Cedric’s demise demonstrated a failure on all ranges of a system that supposedly exists to help us. The extra time passes, the extra disturbing particulars we be taught in regards to the circumstances.

Earlier this 12 months, it was revealed that Wichita police modified solutions on a type that may have allowed them to take Cedric to a hospital as an alternative of the detention heart. An inspection of the Sedgwick County Juvenile Consumption and Evaluation Middle discovered that the power was ill-equipped to deal with youth psychological well being crises — in 2016. A number of lawsuits have additionally been filed on the federal, county, and state ranges to analyze his demise, however have achieved nothing up to now.

At each flip, officers failed Cedric, and so they proceed to fail younger folks throughout Kansas right now — particularly Black youths, who are greater than 4 occasions as prone to be detained or dedicated in youth amenities as their white friends.

We all know that youth prisons don’t work and value taxpayers an exorbitant sum of money, whereas community-based options similar to psychological well being helps and academic programming are far more practical and value much less. Our communities thrive when younger folks have entry to the fundamentals: housing, transportation, meals, and skill-building alternatives. Not when they’re put behind bars. If Cedric got the psychological well being care he wanted as an alternative of being taken to a detention heart, his household would nonetheless have the ability to hug him right now. 

We want metropolis and county officers to implement the entire job drive’s suggestions — however they’ll’t simply cease there.

It couldn’t be clearer that youth incarceration in Kansas solely harms younger folks. We have to shut the Sedgwick County Juvenile Consumption and Evaluation Middle and the Kansas Juvenile Correctional Advanced and as an alternative fund community-based options that really help youth. Incremental modifications will not be the answer to an inherently abusive system, and we all know a world with out youth incarceration is feasible.

Cedric ought to nonetheless be alive, and we can not enable his demise to be in useless. Metropolis and county officers, it’s now on you to get him justice and create a greater future for our youths.

By way of its opinion part, the Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who find themselves affected by public insurance policies or excluded from public debate. Discover info, together with easy methods to submit your personal commentary, right here.