It's hard to believe after all these years that we finally have a responsible law in place that puts the weight of the law behind parents where it belongs, rather than behind defiant teens and their enablers. This is no panacea, of course, but it is a good, good start. It will not turn every child around, but it will help a great deal. Parents of kids on the wrong road still have a tough road to follow, and difficult action may still be necessary in many cases, but this gives us another tool. If needed, Family Court will be there through a Persons In Need of Supervision, PINS proceeding to back us up, to mandate treatment or rules for behavior or counseling or whatever is needed that the child is avoiding without Family Court's intervention. This common sense legislation was long overdue.

To us the biggest impact of this change is that it sends a message to our children that they need to follow parents' guidance and live under our guidelines until they are 18....that parents are in charge until age 18. Hearing they can achieve “freedom” in the midst of a rebellious adolescence is too enticing to some. No longer will children’s rights advocates, educators, law enforcement, counselors, or other professionals who work with young people be required or able to tell our children at the age of 16 they can do what they want when they want and live wherever and with whomever they want against our wishes. No longer will young people have the right at 16 years old to leave home just because their parents have rules they don’t like.

In addition, with the new law, the required compulsory education age can be enforced, so they won't be able to drop out of school as easily. Kids must remain in school until the end of the school year in which they turn 16; previously without a PINS age that extended past the 16th birthday, there was no way to enforce attendance past then. Furthermore, out of the state's 682 school districts educating 97.5 percent of our public school students, 540 districts have the local option by majority vote of the school board to increase their district's compulsory age of attendance to 17. Now that there's a PINS-to-18 law in place to enforce an increased age, perhaps more districts will be prompted to do that. Whichever age a district uses, it will be enforceable with the new PINS age.

Some have asked whether those who are already 16 would be able to avoid the new age limit of 18. There is no wording in the law that “grandfathers” those teens in to apply it differently to them. The law applies to all kids under 18, even those already 16 before JULY 1, 2002. Parents would therefore be able to use the new eligibility age to help get their children back home or away from predators or damaging influences and into care they’ve been avoiding through the loophole the prior age-limit provided. Many of these cases are in need of treatment for drug abuse or other mental health care, and Family Court could mandate that care through a PINS proceeding whether the child wanted it or not. We aren’t so naive, however, as to presume that the new law will be enough to successfully reunite a family with a child who’s been living under his own rules for an extended period of time just by having the police return that child home. The old law has already done untold damage to those teens. The biggest benefit will come in preventing that from happening from now on, or in securing treatment for those still under 18 who’ve avoided it by running away. However, generally speaking, whether a runaway child wants to come home or not will no longer be an issue. The issue is saving and protecting our young people and their futures.