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As they await decisions by legislators, providers fearing the worst have crowded information meetings, fired off letters to lawmakers and begun to search for back-up funds. Some say they've already lost staff and warn that if the money doesn't come in from the state, many teens will either end up at costly youth detention centers or not get the needed help.

Triangle programs

In the Triangle, the programs affected range from teen courts where youth go before their peers to explain misdeeds to group homes for young people. A structured day program for suspended middle school students in Wake, the only one of its type in the county, receives all of its funding from JCPC and would have to shut down immediately, said Regina Hardaway, who runs the program, a part of the Haven House nonprofit that serves 175 children a year.

On a recent day, four students, ages 11 to 14, were at the center, completing their homework and going over social skills. They also spend two days a week doing community service projects such as cleaning out horse stalls for a therapeutic horse-riding program or visiting with elderly residents of local assisted living homes, Hardaway said.

The staff keeps close track of the children once they leave and have seen only a small percentage of them who have been suspended again within a year, Hardaway said. Many likely would be at home -- often alone and unsupervised, if not for the structured day program.

Parent Sheilda Silver was overjoyed to find out she could send her son to the program after he was suspended when he and a group of boys were found playing with a box cutter that another child had brought to school

Her son had never been in trouble before, she said. She took away all of his privileges because of the suspension, but she worried about whether he would fall behind in school.

"This program can give him a little more structure than I can," Silver said.

And that structure, she hopes, will ensure this is the last time he gets into trouble.

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