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Advocates tell Judiciary Committee Raise the Age data gaps hinder planning
Summary
The state's child-and-family advocate and deputy advocate urged the Judiciary Committee to rely on improved, disaggregated data to assess Raise the Age impacts and said existing counts of filings, custody and probation are incomplete or inconsistently presented.
Matthew Bernstein, child, youth and family advocate for the state of Vermont, told the committee his independent office — created two years earlier — was charged with systemic advocacy and with examining how Act 201 (Raise the Age) is being implemented. "We're about 2 years old, Independent state office that engages in systemic advocacy on behalf of children served by DCF," he said, and urged the committee to separate concerns about the broader juvenile system from the narrow change taking effect April 1, 2025.
Bernstein said statewide data presentation has been inconsistent and at times blending different categories (for example, delinquencies across ages and categories), complicating an accurate assessment of whether phase…
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