Los Angeles County plans to reopen a shuttered juvenile hall in Sylmar and to shift girls in its custody to a facility in the Santa Monica Mountains to meet a court-ordered mandate to depopulate its troubled Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, according to a request to state regulators.

The request offers an early insight into the county’s latest strategy to address the failings at Los Padrinos, just hours before the deadline to submit the plan to the court and its public unveiling.

Last month, Superior Court Judge Miguel Espinoza ordered L.A. County to come up with a way to safely depopulate Los Padrinos without causing “harm to the youth” or a “danger to the public” and to submit the plan to him by May 2.

Nicole Rommero of the Justice & Safety Division of the County Counsel’s Office, in the request to the state on Thursday, May 1, indicated the county does not intend to empty Los Padrinos and will try to bring the facility back into compliance with a lower population. Currently, there are about 270 youth at the Downey juvenile hall.

“Consistent with Judge Espinoza’s order, Probation is seeking to depopulate Los Padrinos so that Probation is better able to care for the youth that remain in Los Padrinos and accordingly achieve legal and regulatory compliance there,” Romero wrote. “This is part of a larger Probation-related facilities plan that we anticipate will better leverage existing staff and services.”

L.A. County Probation’s request asks the Board of State and Community Corrections, the agency responsible for overseeing California’s juvenile halls, to inspect Barry J. Nidorf Juvenile Hall in Sylmar to permit it to house an undisclosed number of “predisposition” boys and young men. Predisposition refers to those accused of a crime, but whose court cases are still ongoing.

Barry J. Nidorf used to hold about 100 predisposition youths before state officials forced it and Central Juvenile Hall to close in July 2023 as a result of the poor conditions brought on by a staffing crisis that continues to plague the county to this day. Los Padrinos was reopened at the time to consolidate the populations from both juvenile halls at one location in the hope it would allow for more efficient use of the limited staffing available.

Though it no longer houses any predisposition youth, Nidorf continues to have about 50 to 100 “post-disposition” youth in the separate Secure Youth Treatment Facility on the property.

Los Angeles County’s request to the BSCC also asks for approval to house predisposition girls at Campus Kilpatrick in the Santa Monica Mountains. In February, Probation Chief Guillermo Viera Rosa previously stated his intent to relocate girls to that facility, but the plan drew sharp criticism from the public and the Board of Supervisors. That part of the plan would require the county to remove the young men housed there now and disrupt what many consider the best-run facility within the county’s system.

The new plan deviates from that proposal in February in that the county no longer plans to close Camp Paige, which currently houses about 30 youth in La Verne. If approved, L.A. County will use Camp Paige and the Dorothy Kirby Center in Commerce to house youth who have “been ordered to camp, suitable placement or other facilities at the conclusion of their cases,” according to an email to the BSCC.

Los Padrinos, once seen as a chance for a fresh start for the beleaguered Probation Department, almost immediately descended into turmoil after it reopened in July 2023 as a result of the department’s inability to get its officers to show up for work. As conditions got worse, more officers continued to call off or took leaves to avoid the dangerous and excessively long shifts.

The facility has experienced two violent escape attempts, drug overdoses and dozens of “gladiator-style” fights allegedly staged by probation officers. A grand jury indicted 30 officers for their alleged roles in the fights in March.

Los Padrinos was required under state law to close in December after repeatedly failing inspections over the past year, but county officials refused to comply, saying there was nowhere else to send the youth. The Public Defender’s Office, along with other defense attorneys, filed a slew of challenges to the continued use of the facility, one of which ended up before Judge Espinoza as part of a juvenile murder case.

Espinoza, following four hearings and the county’s failed appeal of the BSCC’s declaration that Los Padrinos is “unsuitable,” issued his order to depopulate in April, but left open the possibility that the juvenile hall could continue to be used, albeit with a lower population, if it could pass a new inspection.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.