TOLEDO, Ohio — A program that provides music education at the Lucas County Juvenile Court received the approval from county commissioners to continue to make a difference for local youth.
The juvenile court partners with the Toledo Symphony and county commissioners for the program.
"We have these resources that are available and people that are willing to engage and help us with our youth," Judge Robert Jones said. "It's important to take advantage of those resources, and obviously, the Toledo Symphony is one of them."
While this isn't a new program, it was paused during the pandemic and brought back in recent years with the court realizing it makes a difference.
"Several years ago, we realized that if you want to do great things for kids, you have to build it into your budget and we didn't want to have difficulty in doing that," Court administrator Said Orra said.
This project is what they've found to be highly effective.
"We have a fairly long established relationship with the Toledo Symphony working with our Youth Treatment Center and with our community treatment center," Jones said.
He said the symphony provides a variety of musical instruction for the youth in the criminal justice system.
"They'll do some choir work, they'll work with them on singing, and they will also work on individual musical instruments with the children and the youth," Jones said.
The program costs the jail about a total of $28,000 each year, which Orra said is worth the price.
"We have a lot of kids that express a lot of interest in the music lessons and want to continue and we support them in doing that," Orra said. "It's really about: what are the types of activities, prosocial activities, that we can expose youth to and have them engage the community with?"
An opportunity Jones said a significant number of the kids they work with may have never experienced, and can help them through their treatment.
"They're juveniles and they are still going through adolescent brain development and still growing and maturing as people," Jones said. "And one of the ways that I think it is beneficial and helpful to make a connection with them is through music."
The commissioners signed off on funding for the program on Tuesday.
Since 2023, the Youth Treatment Center has worked with 82 youth and the Community Treatment Center has worked with 23, which Orra said all were involved in the music program.
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