By Laura Pace
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Auberle to Run Two-Year Pilot Program to Help 63 Mon Valley Youths

It makes more sense to spend time, energy and money before an at-risk youth commits crimes than to give him counseling after the fact.

It's that idea that drove the Youth Crime Prevention Council, Pittsburgh Social Venture Partners and the Allegheny County Probation Department to look for a program to help keep boys away from crime.

The program they picked is called Stop Now and Plan, or SNAP, for short. And the McKeesport agency Auberle will run the two-year pilot program.

"The interest is in trying to do things to prevent further, more serious behavior," said John Litz, chief program officer at Auberle.

The two-year program, which is expected to cost $800,000, will be funded by foundations and grants. It's expected to help 63 boys, from nine towns in the Mon Valley, who are defined as the top 2 percent of most at-risk boys. The program will serve boys 6 to 12 years old.

Kevin Evanto, spokesman for Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato, said the county has heard of steady increases in juvenile crimes from several branches, including the district attorney's office and Shuman Juvenile Detention Center.

"There's clearly a need to address the issue," Mr. Evanto said, noting early intervention could save money, based on what county officials learned by looking at other areas where the program has been implemented.

"We do see a potential to save upwards of $4 million in court and detention costs," he said.

Created by the Child Development Institute in Toronto, SNAP has been around for more than 20 years. It is used in many cities in Canada, as well as Stockholm, Sweden, and Oslo, Norway, but this program will be the first in the area.

Most of them are designed to address recidivism but do not address at-risk kids beforehand.

Mr. Evanto said Auberle was selected because of its reputation and experience.

"I think what really made Auberle stand out is having more than 50 years experience in working with young people who are abused, neglected, who've found themselves in trouble. They have a great deal of experience and we thought they'd be a perfect organization to undertake this pilot program."

The center will begin training people from Auberle in the fall, with the program to get under way in January.

Referrals will come to Auberle from parents, police, schools, Allegheny County Children, Youth and Families and probation officers. Boys who will be included are those who have been fighting, setting fires or causing other problems, because studies show such children often move onto more serious crimes, said Diane Stanoszek, director of clinical services at Auberle.

"They become the violent criminals down the road," she said.

The boys will then be enrolled in a specific, 12-week curriculum, and the staff will be given teaching tools.

The boys will be part of a cognitive behavior therapy program, a method of counseling, Ms. Stanoszek said.

"The primary emphasis is for them to think before they act," she said. "Can you walk away? Can you better express your feelings?"

The families are also included because doing so helps stop the behavior. Otherwise, the boys are likely to continue to offend with the offenses becoming more serious, the victims becoming hurt and the whole thing becoming more costly, Mr. Litz said.

The sessions will be videotaped and program officials will provide consultations along the way.

The boys will have 20 minutes of recreation to help team-build with their peers because they sometimes learn better from each other than from adults.

The program also will have natural consequences if kids don't participate properly. Some of the kids could be court ordered to the program. Others may have to attend as a condition of probation. Failure to participate could lead them back to punishment, such as juvenile hall.

But it's about trying to avoid even getting to that point.

"They make it fun. Hopefully, the kids will want to keep coming back," she said.

The program will be run by two family workers who will go into the children's homes and two child workers in the schools. It's effectiveness will be evaluated by a team lead by Rolf Loeber, a juvenile delinquency expert from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

Mr. Litz said the SNAP program was chosen because of its track record of effectiveness.

"We want this across the county," Ms. Stanoszek said. "My goal is to get a minimum of 63 kids to successfully complete this program."

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