A Franklin County presentation on juvenile services and detention reviewed recent caseload trends, the county’s share of joint juvenile funding and the effect of state grant changes.

County presenters said the Benton‑Franklin split for the juvenile center budget moved to roughly 64.22 percent Benton and 35.78 percent Franklin for the upcoming year. Juvenile‑services staff described multi‑year increases in referrals and a concerning rise in more serious crimes: presenters pointed to increases in violent incidents, an uptick in unlawful firearms offenses and higher robbery counts in recent snapshots. “There seems to be a trend of more violent crimes, more serious crimes,” the presenter said, noting unlawful‑firearms instances rose from 24 to 42 in a recent comparison and robberies from 14 to 19.

Staff added that the average length of stay in detention has climbed where cases are more serious and require longer adjudication timelines. The presenters also discussed grant funding: they said the statewide BECCA fund allocation for the Benton‑Franklin region was reduced, from roughly $350,000 to $50,000, creating an apparent $300,000 shortfall the county had to address by reducing staff and altering program plans. “They decided to, in their wisdom to take our BECCA funds … drop it to 50,000, a $300,000 shortfall,” a juvenile center presenter told the board.

Programs and budgets: Juvenile programming includes juvenile drug court, diversion, functional family therapy (FFT), dependency petitions and other court‑ordered services shared with Benton County at the juvenile justice center. Presenters said some program lines (for example, juvenile drug court) are budgeted per participant; others are covered through the joint facility budget and state grants. Commissioners asked for a clearer, itemized breakdown of the juvenile budget lines so county leaders can see staff counts and the Franklin County share of individual program costs. County staff said they will produce a line‑by‑line breakdown showing staffing costs, program expenses and grant offsets.

Ending: County staff said they will provide the commissioners with a detailed, itemized budget breakdown showing how the $2.917 million Franklin County juvenile allocation is allocated across personnel, detention operation and programming. No formal actions were taken during the workshop.