After years of steadily decreasing populations across the County’s in-custody juvenile facilities, the County of San Diego’s Probation Department has closed the last remote camp program and moved the youth to a more centrally located Urban Camp facility in Kearny Mesa.
For more than 20 years, juveniles aged 14-18 attended rehabilitative programs at Camp Barrett, located in rural Alpine. They learned life skills, coping skills, and Career Technical Education. The goal of Camp Barrett was to provide the juvenile with the training and skills necessary for successful transition and reintegration into society. The rural camp had the ability to house 125 boys, but recently had an average daily population of just 60.
But the location and age of the rural camp presented unique challenges, especially for families wanting to visit their in-custody child. By utilizing open units at the Kearny Mesa Juvenile Detention Facility, Probation is moving the youth and programming to special areas of Juvenile Hall that have been reconfigured into home-like settings while a new permanent Urban Camp is constructed as part of the master Juvenile Justice Campus.
