This bill primarily reorganizes state juvenile justice by transferring the powers, duties, functions, records, funds, contracts, rules, and employees related to juvenile justice from the Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF) to the Department of Corrections (DOC). It adds a new section to chapter 72.09 RCW and amends multiple RCWs so that references to the department or secretary for the transferred functions refer to DOC. Appropriations and assets tied to those functions are to be transferred and credited to DOC on July 1, 2026, employees performing transferred functions move under DOC jurisdiction without loss of rights (subject to civil service law), and the director of financial management is given authority to resolve allocation and apportionment questions. The bill also addresses collective bargaining unit status for portions of bargaining units transferred to DOC and permits review by the Public Employment Relations Commission. The act makes numerous procedural and substantive changes to juvenile justice law. It amends detention and hearing procedures (including filing and hearing deadlines within 72 hours excluding weekends and holidays, notice and counsel requirements, and presumptive release on personal recognizance unless detention is shown necessary), revises definitions (for example, changing statutory references to the “department” to mean DOC for transferred topics), and modifies dispositions and treatment procedures (including rules for ordering and reviewing residential inpatient treatment, required examinations for substance use or mental health concerns, and conditions for suspended dispositions with community supervision). It creates or refines community-based options such as community transition services—with eligibility thresholds (served 60% of minimum term and at least 15 weeks of confinement) and supervision/monitoring requirements—and updates parole and parole-violation responses, including limits on short-term confinement, a narrowly circumscribed authority to impose longer confinement (up to 24 weeks) for certain juvenile parole violations related to specified sex-offense conduct, and mandatory shorter confinement where firearms or deadly weapons are possessed or used during parole. The bill authorizes parole officers to arrest juveniles under supervision and sets review timelines and procedures for assaults against staff and possible transfer to adult correctional facilities when a juvenile poses a continuing and serious threat. The legislation also establishes administrative and program changes: an institutional impact account to reimburse political subdivisions for criminal justice costs tied to crimes by institutional residents (with rulemaking required), requirements for DOC to develop or contract for risk assessment tools certified regularly, rules and standards for consolidated juvenile services and county detention facility operations, obligations for school-district contracts delivering education in facilities, reimbursement and leave rules for staff and juveniles (including authorized leave, emergency and medical leave, and parole conditions), and creation of an oversight board housed with the office of the family and children's ombuds to monitor department performance and issue annual reports. Several statutory excerpts in the available text are truncated or missing, and other listed amendments and the full effective date language are not present in the extracted material, so some implementation details and the complete set of changes across all cited RCWs are uncertain from these excerpts.

If enacted, juvenile justice operations now handled by the Department of Children, Youth, and Families would move into the Department of Corrections, which will take on day-to-day custody, parole, community transition services, treatment placement, facility management (including Echo Glen and Green Hill), existing contracts and rules, and new administrative duties like certifying risk-assessment tools and running community transition programs. Funding and any appropriations for those juvenile justice functions are shifted to DOC on July 1, 2026, the Director of Financial Management will reconcile and certify transfers of personnel, funds, equipment and records, and DCYF employees performing those functions will transfer to DOC with existing labor rights intact while bargaining-unit lines may be reviewed by PER. The most affected parties are DOC (which gains substantial new responsibilities, staff, facilities, contracts, and likely higher operating costs and legal obligations), DCYF (which will lose those functions and associated budget lines), transferred employees (who change employer and supervision though keep rights and benefits), counties and school districts (which must comply with continued education, detention, and contract standards and may seek or receive state reimbursements), and juvenile courts and victims (whose procedures, notices, and hearings remain but will be administered through DOC). Some implementation details and truncated provisions in the provided text are missing, so exact rules for certain transfers, operational limits, and timing beyond the July 1, 2026 appropriation shift are unclear.