Close Maine’s Children’s Prison – Mainer

photograph/Patrick Bonsant

Three years in the past, a coalition of younger folks, group organizations, and advocates organized to launch Maine Youth Justice. After the deaths of younger folks contained in the Lengthy Creek Youth Improvement Middle in South Portland, in addition to of these launched from the ability, it was clear that the one path ahead was to battle for the closure of Maine’s final youth jail and for the reinvestment of its working prices into group sources for younger folks. 

As one of many marketing campaign’s founders, I’ve spent the final three years watching lawmakers hearken to younger folks’s collective trauma and lived expertise from incarceration, whereas the legislators proceed to take a position tens of millions of {dollars} in taxpayer sources into the very violent methods that harmed us. I used to be 12 years outdated the primary time I used to be launched to the juvenile justice system and have spent my whole grownup life combating Maine Youth Justice care and sources for younger folks. Youth are in danger each single day Lengthy Creek stays open. 

Lengthy Creek by no means taught me something. It claims that it’s a “growth heart,” however the one factor it’s growing is post-traumatic stress dysfunction. What I wanted as an alternative of Lengthy Creek was somebody to have helped me that first day — somebody who believed my aspect of the story earlier than leaping to conclusions. As an alternative, I watched youth ripped from their communities, positioned in isolation, and receiving little or no care. Children have to really feel cared for, not as if they’re simply one other case with numbers on the prime. 

When younger individuals are incarcerated, we start to see ourselves as society treats us — as outcasts, driving us additional right into a life unsupported by our group. The trauma doesn’t cease as soon as you allow detention. Your loved ones and mates have all moved on. There isn’t a catching up in your schooling and the state offers few sources to assist the acclimation. Younger folks depart incarcerated settings so traumatized that they’ve misplaced an understanding of human interplay, together with the way you deal with battle or join with folks. There isn’t a going again to the way it was earlier than incarceration and we as younger individuals are caught coping with the ache that was pressured upon us in a failed try at justice. 

We can not proceed to waste tens of millions of {dollars} to take care of a jail that harms susceptible younger folks. In 2020, 30 p.c of Mainers experiencing homelessness have been 24 or youthful. Marginalized communities like LGBTQ youth and youth in poverty have been additionally 120 and 162 p.c extra prone to expertise homelessness, respectively. If we really care about supporting youth, we should be investing state sources in community-based housing applications, not prisons. We want investments in schooling, healthcare and assist applications for Maine’s youth. What we really want is a plan to shut Lengthy Creek and renovate the 40+ acres of property in South Portland into housing and a mental-health useful resource hub. 

Governor Janet Mills continues to be an impediment in constructing a future the place all Maine youth thrive. Whereas younger folks and communities have referred to as on Gov. Mills to shut this facility, she has continued to disregard us. That is one thing that causes concern as she runs for a second time period in workplace. We now have the sources to put money into our most susceptible communities, to really save lives, and Gov. Mills is trying the opposite manner as an alternative of working with us on options. Gov. Mills should hearken to our calls for by making a plan to shut Lengthy Creek. 

The battle to shut Lengthy Creek has been happening for many years, with numerous numbers of younger folks, their households, and their communities unnecessarily harmed by reliance on incarceration. 

Maine spends $42 million a 12 months to incarcerate and police youth; 2022 is greater than ever the opportune time to finish this nightmare and construct one thing new. 

Skye Gosselin is a twenty-three-year-old activist from Biddeford and the Organizing Director for Maine Youth Justice. She is without doubt one of the founders of the marketing campaign and leads a statewide youth political schooling program for youth impacted by the felony authorized system. Skye believes younger individuals are the consultants on what they want and envisions a world the place youth are listened to as an alternative of remoted.