Teenagers heading to the Navy Yard in D.C. this weekend face another police-enforced curfew under a temporary law meant to discourage “youth takeovers,” or large gatherings of young people spurred on by social media.
The emergency legislation that established a citywide curfew and allowed police to set up additional juvenile curfew zones is set to expire April 15.
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is pressing the D.C. Council to extend the legislation and to put a permanent law on the books. But some youth advocates say the answer isn’t more curfews.
“I am a firm disbeliever in the curfews,” Penelope Spain, co-founder and CEO of Open City Advocates, told WTOP. “Curfews simply do not work here.”
Her organization provides legal defense for young people in D.C.’s juvenile courts after sentencing.
Spain said curfews “do a lot more to cause harm than they do good,” arguing they are a waste of city resources and often ensnare young people into the juvenile justice system.
Curfews, she said, send the message that teens are “not part of the fabric of the District of Columbia,” and fail to solve the real problem: a lack of safe, welcoming public spaces for teenagers.
Spain joined a group of other justice reform advocates on Thursday afternoon to share a proposed public safety agenda they intend to share with the incoming mayor and council. She suggested bringing teenagers to the table to help make decisions on future initiatives and programs geared toward their age group.
“If they’re not going to be listened to, then they will find a way to be heard,” she said.
Ron Moten, a longtime D.C. youth advocate and violence interruption specialist, agreed that teens need places to go, and said efforts in those areas should include youth initiatives that help teens learn conflict resolution and make them accountable for their behavior in public.
He told WTOP that curfews can be useful as a temporary fix, but enforcement should not fall to police alone.
“They shut down all the places that we had that young people can go for … youth activities because a few acts of violence,” he said.
Moten said a youth curfew National Harbor helped because it was paired with adults who could communicate with young people.
“Most of them just want to have something to do, and they’re mad that we allow a few bad people to mess it up for everybody,” Moten said.
He also wants to see more regional cooperation on youth programs, because the teens the D.C. curfew targets are coming in from Maryland and Virginia, too.
This weekend, a youth curfew zone is in effect for the Navy Yard area from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m.
In an interview with Interim D.C. Police Chief Jeffery Carroll earlier this month, he said officers act as a “visible presence” during the time of the curfew, and mostly are there to direct large groups to disperse.
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