By John McGreevy, TJJD Communications

Kaci Singer is the Deputy General Counsel for County Matters for the Texas Juvenile Justice Department, and when she tells you her job comes with many different tasks and responsibilities, she isn’t kidding.

“I answer all the questions for the Legal Help Desk,” she said. “That’s where anyone in the juvenile justice community, including the public, can send juvenile-related questions and we give them technical advice. We do not give legal advice. I’m also the supervisor of the Policy Division, so I supervise the people who do all of the policy for the agency and standards development.”

Singer also trains the new attorneys working at TJJD and handles hearings and appeals.

We told you she wasn’t kidding. But that’s also her favorite thing about her job. “I get to do so many things and I get to make decisions that have an impact on the kids and the people working with them and provide services to them,” she said.

Singer began her career in juvenile justice in 2001, most of which has been at TJJD and before that at the Texas Youth Commission and Texas Juvenile Probation Commission. She’s a graduate of Baylor University and the University of Texas School of Law, a former chair of the Juvenile Law Section of the State Bar of Texas and of the Jury Service Committee of the State Bar of Texas. She is a member of the board of the Juvenile Law Foundation, a non-profit entity that provides educational scholarships to justice-involved individuals.

In an age where people wind up with the careers they have through any number of unexpected turns, Singer is exactly where she wanted to be. “I went to law school wanting to do juvenile justice and I was able to come out of law school getting to do that,” she said.

“I’ve loved being part of legislative work groups and working on legislative changes that were needed. I loved working on the juvenile records redesign in 2017, getting to be a part of redesigning the laws of juvenile records and giving greater protection to the kids than they had before.”

“I wish the public knew what a support system we (TJJD) are for the juvenile justice field,” she said. “While some of us are not in the trenches, day to day, the support we provide to the people who are helps them be better able to help the kids.”

Between a job like hers and being the mother of two children, free time isn’t something she has a lot of, but she described an ideal day off as “being able to get together with my friends for brunch, just getting to hang out and have no responsibilities at all – as opposed to a realistic day off, which is just running errands.”

By Barbara Kessler, TJJD Communications

For 20 years TJJD psychologist Kathryn Hallmark has been assessing and counseling young people who became entangled in the juvenile justice system. She has worked with hundreds of youths, committing thousands of hours to puzzling over how they ended up at TJJD and how they can find their way onto a safer, healthier path.

It’s high-intensity work filled with heartbreaking setbacks, re-routes, repairs and rewards -- and amazing breakthroughs and glorious victories.

How does she keep up the pace?

“It’s a fascinating job. There are some things that are tiring, the paperwork, but meeting the kids and the parents and figuring out how they ended up on the developmental highway they did (with a detour to TJJD) is just fascinating to me.”

“I like to analyze the situation,” Hallmark said, to find the patterns and connections that led a youth astray and help them identify their mistakes and emotional triggers so they can take better control of their life.”

“I like to see the kid recognize that he’s not a bad person but that he got stuck and can get unstuck,” she said.

That reward “seeing the lights go off” never gets old, and has sustained her through posts as a treatment services manager at the Mart and Giddings campuses, followed by a decade as a psychologist leading violent offender and sexual abuse treatment programs at Giddings State School.

“ Kathryn has aided in the healing and therapeutic journey of countless youth,” said Dr. Evan Norton, director of Integrated Treatment and Support. “She brings a multitude of skillsets to the table and isn’t afraid to meet a kid where they’re at, to increase their likelihood of success. I have many fond memories seeing the unorthodox and creative ways she’s gotten kids out of their shells.”

With her training in DBT (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy), CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) and TBRI (Trust-based Relational Intervention), Hallmark is a frequent “expert consultant” and a respected member of the treatment team, Norton said.

She’s also an expert in conducting group therapy for capital offenders. Known colloquially as COG (Capital Offender Group) and developed at Giddings, the program has been recently updated to be more trauma informed. It is a structured approach to helping youth unravel the hurts they’ve endured to better understand the harm they’ve done.

As important as her degrees and certificates are the personal gifts Hallmark brings to the work – compassion, patience, and dedication. These qualities keep her grounded and motivated as she weekly pores over the files of the youth she treats, absorbing their history and connecting to their stories to help them find answers.

“I have to be familiar with their patterns, life history and criminal history. . . I look at the feelings they had when they were children and some of the traumatic situations they went through and I can just feel how they ended up here,” Hallmark said, speaking from her corner office famously painted a startling pink and provisioned with cushiony seating. “I have a lot of empathy for them.”

“Once they hear that I can see goodness in them, then they perk up.”

She cements these connections to the youth by keeping the mood light, a technique known as “playful engagement” that seems to come naturally to the high-energy therapist. “If you’re playful and supportive of the kids, they can be playful with you and then when it is time to get serious, you have a connection.”

Having such a high-demand job (and a degree in psychology), Hallmark knows that she must take care of the caregiver. On Saturdays you can find her at home practicing yoga, sipping herbal tea, or curled up with a science fiction book by Orson Scott Card or Isaac Asimov, or maybe a novel with a spiritual bent like “The Shack.”

By Patty Garza, Community Relations & Family Coordinator, Ayres House and South Parole

Ayres Halfway House, in San Antonio, has been blessed to partner with “Stichin for the Journey,” a group of San Antonio area quilters with remarkable talents and big hearts.

Last year this generous group donated a quilt to every single youth at Ayres House.

What staff thought was a onetime donation for the beds at the house turned into an ongoing relationship. The amazing quilters kept quilting and donating. They wanted each youth to get a new quilt to keep for themselves to take with them as they transition home.

They wanted each youth to know that one person spent multiple hours making something specifically for them.

They wanted all the youth passing through Ayres House to know that someone cared.

Each of these quilts can take anywhere from 20-50 hours to complete and cost $300 to $500 to make. Each bears a “care message” designed just for Ayres House youth. It says, “Stitched for you piece by piece by someone who cares.”

When youth go home after their rehabilitation time in TJJD, life doesn’t miraculously fall into place. A youth continues to face many challenges and barriers. Stichin for the Journey (SFTJ) hopes that on those hard days, they’ll see their quilts and remember that people do care about them.

Seeing the Stichin group, led by Debbie DeCamp and Rebecca Rindhal, deliver five new quilts at the end of January for newly arriving youth touched everyone at Ayres House.

“It’s really great to see what Mrs. DeCamp and her colleagues are doing for the youths by donating these quilts. It really does put a smile on their faces. They seem to understand just how much work goes into them. They even asked her about the whole process when she came in,” said Katelyn Brambila, an intern who works at Ayres House.

“The most heartwarming thing I witnessed during Mrs. DeCamp’s last visit had to be one of the youth’s excitement to see her. He had been wanting to see if she would be able to add a patch to his quilt. The patch said something along the lines of ‘made with love by someone who cares’, Brambila said. “That might seem like a small ask, but it was clear that it meant a lot to him to have that patch on his quilt, and I know it made him happier.”

“I was amazed by her generosity and loving compassion for the youth,” said another Ayres intern, Teniola Okeyemi. “Her dedication to youths shows them that they are cared for.”

Okeyemi asked DeCamp about why she started quilting and how the quilts were made.

“As I and other staff members, as well as some of the youth, sat with her and watched her sew, her storytelling lit up the room with smiles and laughter,” Okeyemi said.

Ayres House staff are beyond grateful for these gifts and the continuing support of the quilters of Stichin for the Journey.