KTLA News: "Opening of new Juvenile Justice Center in South Los Angeles" (1976)

government under one roof. >> The facility is a new one-story 18,000 square foot building. City and county officials as well as members of the community toured it during an open house session this morning. The building has two courtrooms, offices for the various agencies that will be cooperating in the team approach effort to reduce juvenile delinquency. The idea for the center came from Los Angeles Police Chief Ed Davis. This justice center will bring that crime rate down further. I think it's going to make the area that it serves because juvenile delinquency is the biggest part of the overall crime picture. It's going to make this uh the kind of a place that uh that movie theaters are going to move back into that sir and Robuck will move back into >> abandoning s Robuck closed not long ago and I think it's going to make this lovely place where where Kenny and I were raised uh and really the climate everything else this is the soil everything else here is the best it is. It's going to make it one of the safest places in the nation. Following the morning news conference, a ribbon cutting ceremony was held before a couple of hundred people in front of the center. [Music] 1 2 3 go. >> One more time. One more time. 11 different governmental agencies involved in the juvenile justice system will be operating under the roof of this one building at Central and 76. This is Stan Chambers reporting. One roof to change the cycle. This idea is new in America from the judge of the juvenile court. Judge Kenyon supported my approach to the treatment and to the counseling and to the rehabilitation. >> Uh the reception of the people in this area has been wonderful. Uh all of us in the on the so-called staff, we call it the staff, those working in the building here, uh have been just very pleased with the way people have treated us. Many people have come up and and said thank you very much for coming. Well, we feel the same way. Many of us have worked in government for many years and it is sometimes the most frustrating experience. The only frustrating non frustrating part of it is going home at night when you feel that you just can't get your finger on the problem. Now, we all recognize, those of us who work in government, that it isn't going to be just better government that will solve the problem. But we know that without better government, a more coordinated effort, we can't help at all in the area of juvenile crime. Then we talked about where would this be the toughest place to make it where would be the toughest place to make it work. That area was the so-called Watts area. If we could prove it here where we had a higher rate of crime at that time, many many youth murders, then this would be a kind of a model that could be spread elsewhere. Well, when I got back to work and we we had created a a juvenile justice ad hoc committee and I was presumptuous enough to appoint a judge uh in charge of the committee to develop this idea and right from the start this was delegated to Judge Kenyon and immediately uh everyone who participated district attorney's office the police the sheriff the probation and everyone and later we brought in public defenders were very very enthused about it and I know it's going to work because it has three years of of joint cooperative effort behind it in which all of the elements of the criminal justice system are dedicated. And what this is going to mean here is personalized justice. It's going to mean that the individual delinquent who comes in here or predinquent when he comes back again, he's going to confront the same people who know him as a person. The victim is going to get personalized service. The the witnesses are going to get personalized service. Even the police officers who come in as as participants and witnesses will will be known to everyone. And this thing of having to go down to some great big old central marble courthouse and get a different person, different functionary, different judge, different district attorney, different person every time, a different policeman. Hasn't worked at all. Nothing to do with preachers and all can do some prevention. But this will control juvenile crime better than any place in the world. I'm absolutely convinced of that. Fantastic. And you know when we had the dream and I close with this and the district attorney, Mr. Vandy Camp, not a bakery. It's our new district attorney. And Mr. Here here's Sherman BL. >> So, here we are. Wow. >> Three. Go. And when we say go, you cut. All right. [Music] You know, uh, mayor said that we said 11:00 and I guess [Music] [Music] [Music] I'm right on in. [Music] [Music] Oh my god. >> Yes. [Music]