(BALTIMORE, MD—September 13, 2004) Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Audrey J.S. Carrion is leading an effort to better understand the needs of girls who live in the City. Judge Carrion, who heads the Baltimore City Circuit Court’s Family Division, is chair of the Baltimore City Task Force on the Needs of Girls, an organization that promotes quality gender-responsive programming to meet the needs of young females. 

“The task force has spent the past two years exploring ways to develop valuable programs that will assess and provide the resources necessary to meet the needs of this population,” said Judge Carrion. “Our goal is to encourage those individuals who are involved with girls to be more receptive to the fact that girls are different from boys, and that they have different needs.”

On November 16, the task force will sponsor a daylong conference titled, “ ‘Don’t Just Paint it Pink’: Responding to the Needs of Girls in Baltimore City.” The conference, which will be held from 8:00 am to 4:30 pm at Loyola College’s graduate center in Timonium, is expected to attract more than 150 local and regional service providers to include representatives from the state’s Department of Juvenile Services, the Department of Social Services, Baltimore City public schools, Baltimore City Police Department, Baltimore City’s sheriff’s office, the Office of the Public Defender, the Office of the State’s Attorney and other organizations.

“We hope to make them aware of why programs and services should be tailored to meet the needs of girls,” said Judge Carrion, “and also to make them more knowledgeable of the adolescent development of females.”

The conference will also discuss reasons why girls and young women are entering the juvenile justice and child welfare systems in greater numbers. A 1999 special report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics conveys that the number of women offenders has more than doubled in recent years.  Judge Carrion said the members of the task force are hopeful the conference will convince individual service providers to develop a curriculum to take back to their specific agency.
“We look at the conference as a unique opportunity to give these service providers the tools to become familiar with best practices and lessons learned,” she said.  

Funding for the conference is provided by a $25,000 grant from the Maryland Judiciary’s Department of Family Administration. The task force is comprised of representatives from the Office of the Public Defender, the Office of the State’s Attorney, Baltimore City public schools, the City’s Department of Juvenile Services and the Department of Social Services, Baltimore Mental Health Systems and court staff, including Master Claudette Brown and Rosemary Anderson, the social services coordinator for the juvenile docket.

For more information on the task force or the conference, please contact the Court Information Office at 410/260-1488. Members of the media are invited to attend the conference.  Cameras are welcome.