By David N. Krough, TJJD Communications —

Whenever youth or staff have an urgent concern or complaint, they can place an immediate call about it using the blue phones installed within all the dorms at TJJD secure facilities.

Their grievance is recorded directly at the Incident Reporting Center (IRC), located within the TJJD offices in downtown Austin.

Anyone involved with TJJD or a juvenile justice detention center in Texas, can call the hotline (866-477-8354) that is answered by the IRC. That includes youth committed to TJJD or detained at the county level, their families, employees and the public. Virtually anyone can report violations and suspected crimes.

“The IRC Specialists are the tip of the spear and the IRC is the cornerstone for protection of youth and staff in the juvenile justice system,” Office of the Inspector General Chief Daniel Guajardo said. “The hotline system is intended to provide the youth in custody, and their families, a culture of transparency and access to report incidents or concerns directly to the OIG.” 

Phones in the IRC are staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week in the IRC offices near the Capitol. There, staff file the reports into the database for the OIG’s office to review for resolution or investigation.

“We might not be dispatching police and EMS and fire departments to the facilities, but it’s the first line of contact,” IRC Supervisor Oscar Rodriguez said. “We’re the ones who find out about the incidents and we’re the ones who go ahead and push that report to the facilities. Without the hotline there, a lot of people wouldn’t be able to get their problems resolved.”

The current computer system used at the IRC has been in place since 2021 and incorporates not just the Office of the Inspector General, but the Youth Rights Department, the PREA (Prison Rape Elimination Act) section, State Programs, Medical Services and Human Resources. All of these departments can access reports.

Each report goes to the appropriate department and OIG investigators from the facilities, if an investigation case is warranted.

“The calls can honestly range from kids complaining that they didn’t get their snacks today, or ‘everybody else got 10 nuggets and I got nine nuggets,’” to reports of youth or staff assaults and PREA cases, Rodriguez says.

Most calls to the IRC from staff involve major incidents, such as fights, contraband being found, or potential PREA cases. Prevention of sex abuse in TJJD facilities is a top priority.

“Being that the blue phones are in every pod of each dorm, it is a great asset for the youth as it is accessible to them as needed,” Youth Rights Supervisor Mayra Garza said. “IRC is available seven days a week which aids my department on the weekends or state holidays when our team is not able to respond immediately. IRC-generated reports are sent to us via email and a Youth Rights staff member assigns the complaint for an investigation, making this a successful way of reporting.”

Rodriguez says sometimes parents will call worried that their kids aren’t getting their medication or concerned about facility conditions. Calls of that nature are referred to the Youth Rights Department.

“We’re not an info line,” Rodriguez said. “We don’t have a lot of information when it comes to the outcomes of the reports or outcomes of investigations. We just take the reports and we go ahead and disseminate them wherever they need to go.”

The IRC takes calls from county facilities across the state, as well as those of TJJD.

“We do have a backup cell phone in case the system goes down, Internet goes out,” Rodriguez said. “All the calls will come directly to our backup cell phone in case something, happens.”

Rodriguez says a lot of people have a perception that they are a giant dispatch center, but his team is actually a staff of five to six people handling a tremendous volume of calls each day.

The numbers can range from 150 calls in a 24-hour period up to 300 calls over 24 hours during an especially busy period, said Rhonda Rolison, a senior police communications officer at the IRC. 

“We try to make sure not to keep anybody waiting for too long, but if the emails are piling up and if you’re the only person working here, I always, tell them, ‘answer your phone over your emails’ because the emails can always be, we can always get back to them as soon as we can.”

In addition to filing their reports for all calls, more serious incidents such as PREA (potential sex abuse) allegations or a youth being taken off campus for reasons such as injury or illness, require notifying OIG and facility investigators.

Recently, IRC staff got a chance to tour TJJD secure facilities to actually see the layout and how the phones worked for youth inside. Rodriguez said that gave everybody a better picture of what the facilities are like.

“(Staff) are very good at what they do,” said Rodriguez, who has been with TJJD for 10 years.  He has been in the supervisor role for nearly two years.

“I love my team. I love what they do,” he said.

OIG Chief Guajardo says the professionalism of the IRC specialists “meets the core values of the OIG, ‘Justice, Safety, Integrity,’ and provide outstanding service to Texas.”