1. First and foremost, our mission along with The CEI Task force is to provide culturally appropriate services to adequately meet the needs of  our Native American youth and families;

2. To establish better working relationships between Tribes and the State Juvenile Justice System;

3. To educate all OJA employees on the cultural sensitivities between all Tribal Nations.  OJA staff will gain an understanding  of the cultural differences and be sensitive to those differences while providing services to the families. 

4. To inform the Tribes of the services offered through the Office of Juvenile Affairs, i.e. prevention programs, federal funding options available to tribes, and the process of becoming involved with our agency.  Our goal is to enhance the services the tribes offer in a collaborative effort between OJA and the Tribes.

5. To provide assistance to the Tribes, if needed, to establish or enhance services they currently offer in the area of Juvenile Justice.

Native American juveniles represent over 16% of the juveniles in OJA custody.  Our hope is that by building these bridges, we can:

1. Work cooperatively with the Tribes to prevent juvenile tribal members from entering the Juvenile Justice System;
    
2. Assist the Tribes with options for repeat offenders;

3. To assist the Tribes, if needed, ways to build community programs that make the juveniles accountable for their actions to their Tribal leaders;

4. To assist the Tribes with additional resources  they can turn to when help is needed in either building prevention programs, or just calling for information when trying to locate placement assistance for juveniles (see our Tribal Liaisons listing for the liaison in your district).