Maine is violating the Americans with Disabilities Act by unnecessarily institutionalizing children with mental health and developmental disabilities, the Justice Department said June 22.
The state has a shortage of community-based services that would allow those children to stay in their homes, the department said. The result is that many children are placed in the state-run juvenile detention facility Long Creek Youth Development Center, which the department said has become "a de facto children's psychiatric facility," and sometimes in out-of-state facilities.