South Burlington police chief: system needs backstops, not only restorative programs amid Raise the Age debate

Chief Sean Burke, chief of police in the city of South Burlington and a member of the Vermont Association of Chiefs of Police executive board, told the House Judiciary Committee on Jan. 22 that Vermont’s juvenile and young-adult justice system lacks effective “backstops” for people who refuse treatment or otherwise decline to change behavior.

“We desperately need the funding to operate our community justice centers,” Burke said, adding that community-based restorative practices can work for those “willing to accept responsibility for their actions.” He also warned that a subset of youths who do not engage with services know that family-court probation ends at adulthood and therefore have “no incentive to change their behavior.”

Burke said the problem shows up in multiple ways: juveniles waiting in police department lobbies because there is “no place to go,” probation that disappears when a person turns 18, and subsequent escalation of offenses into young adulthood. He cited a recent multi‑county shooting incident as an example of youths with prior interventions who continued to offend: “Some of these people that were involved in this have been involved here in South Burlington with law enforcement interventions… but there's no incentive. They know nothing is gonna happen.”

Burke described the population as small in raw numbers but high in community impact. He said some counties might have five to 10 such youths, while larger counties like Chittenden could have “40 people,” and those individuals consume disproportionate enforcement and court resources.

At the same time, Burke explicitly supported restorative and community-justice work for compliant youths. “Anyone that is willing to take responsibility for their actions should be afforded an opportunity for a restorative practice,” he said, noting South Burlington’s Community Justice Center has “tremendous outcomes.” His testimony urged the committee to fund and expand pre-charge diversion and community justice options while simultaneously designing a short-term backstop to address those who will not comply.

Committee members asked questions about whether better accountability mechanisms in juvenile proceedings could be paired with developmental-science‑based reforms for the broader age group; Burke said he recognized the developmental arguments but cautioned that “we have people now that are creating harm in the community and there needs to be some type of intervention.” He recommended pilots for enforceable supervision and continued evaluation of adult pretrial-supervision pilots.

Burke also raised systems issues beyond direct juvenile policy: family court and Department for Children and Families (DCF) capacity constraints, clogged court dockets and the need for greater resource investment for behavioral health, substance-use treatment and secure placements where appropriate. He said incarceration should remain a judicious option where necessary to prevent immediate community harm but that the system should aim to pair that with restorative opportunities where possible.

The chief repeatedly framed his remarks as practitioners’ observations rather than a proposal for a single statutory change: expand community‑based restorative programs and pre‑charge diversion for those who engage, and identify a credible, resourced backstop for those who do not.

Burke finished by encouraging the committee to think about the entire ecosystem — pre‑charge diversion, family court capacity, and adult court backstops — rather than treating Raise the Age as a single, isolated reform.