Police say fewer young people are becoming victims or encountering officers during curfew hours. A 2-2 committee vote exposed disagreements over civil liberties, parental responsibility and what the city offers teenagers after dark.
WS Chronicle | Staff Report
Winston-Salem’s youth curfew began as a temporary response to late-night gatherings that police said were putting young people and the wider community at risk.
Nearly three months later, the city has early evidence about what happened after the restrictions took effect.
What remains unsettled is how much weight that evidence should carry.
The City Council’s Public Safety Committee deadlocked 2-2 Monday on a proposal to extend the Youth Protection Ordinance beyond its Oct. 12 expiration, sending the issue toward the full council without a recommendation.
Chairwoman Annette Scippio and Vice Chair Regina Ford Hall voted yes. Council Members Scott Andree-Bowen and Vivian V. Joiner voted no.
The split did not amount to two clear sides.
Scippio defended the curfew as a public-safety measure that also places greater responsibility on parents.
Andree-Bowen remained opposed because of the restrictions the ordinance places on young people’s civil liberties.
Joiner, who supported the curfew when it was adopted, changed her position after questioning whether Winston-Salem has done enough to provide young people with safe alternatives during evenings and weekends.
Hall, who opposed the ordinance in June, voted to move the proposal forward so the full council and public could continue the discussion.
The city record confirms that the extension was the Public Safety Committee’s main agenda item Monday. The official minutes remain in draft status.
The City Council meets again at 6 p.m. Monday, Sept. 21.
The current ordinance remains in effect until 6 a.m. Oct. 12.
Police make the case for continuing the curfew
Police Chief William Penn Jr. used Monday’s discussion to argue that the ordinance has become more than a way to clear teenagers from public spaces late at night.
Penn told committee members that nearly half of police encounters involving unsupervised young people occur between 2 and 6 a.m.
He also said no juvenile has been charged only for violating the curfew. Young people who faced charges under the ordinance were also accused of another offense.
Police have emphasized warnings, rides home and referrals as alternatives to automatically sending a juvenile into court. Officers are also expected to ask a young person’s age and reason for being out and determine whether one of the ordinance’s exemptions applies.
Earlier this summer, Penn reported that police encounters involving young people as either victims or offenders had fallen 26% during the ordinance’s first 42 days, particularly during curfew hours.
He also said Winston-Salem had not experienced another of the large social-media-driven youth gatherings that helped prompt the original ordinance.
Monday’s presentation added another measure: youth victimization.
Penn told committee members that police data showed fewer young people becoming victims during curfew hours compared with the previous year.
The city has described protecting teenagers from victimization as one of the ordinance’s purposes, alongside reducing disorder and criminal activity involving young people.
J-RISE extends the response beyond the police encounter
The department has also developed a follow-up program for families encountered through the ordinance.
Penn described J-RISE, or Juvenile Response Intervention Support and Engagement, as an effort to connect young people and parents with community resources after a warning or charge.
The program can link families with organizations including the Boys and Girls Club, YMCA and Police Athletic League.
An officer’s involvement does not necessarily end after a teenager is taken home. Through J-RISE, police can follow up with families and attempt to connect young people with programs or other support.
Penn told committee members that some parents charged under the ordinance later expressed appreciation for the intervention and assistance they received.
Hall asked whether parents charged in connection with violations already had histories with law enforcement. Penn said at least five did.
The program adds another measure by which the curfew can be evaluated: not simply how many young people police encounter, but whether those encounters lead families to services that reduce future risk.
Andree-Bowen says the civil-liberties concern remains
For Andree-Bowen, the department’s new information did not resolve the concern that led him to oppose the ordinance in June.
He again voted no.
Andree-Bowen acknowledged Winston-Salem’s broader decline in violent crime but argued that the curfew still comes at the expense of the civil rights of the young people it covers.
He also asked whether the encounters that led to the ordinance were concentrated in particular neighborhoods.
Police said they were spread across Winston-Salem rather than limited to one district.
Andree-Bowen was one of three council members who opposed the ordinance when the full council approved it in June. Hall and Council Member James Taylor Jr. also voted no. The measure passed 5-3.
His position Monday was consistent with that earlier vote: lower incident numbers did not outweigh his objection to restricting the movement of an entire age group.
Joiner changes her position
Joiner’s no vote marked the clearest change from the council’s June debate.
She supported the temporary curfew this summer.
On Monday, she questioned whether Winston-Salem has paired the restriction with enough opportunities for young people during evenings and weekends.
Her concern focused on what happens outside the enforcement window.
If the city continues restricting where teenagers can be late at night, Joiner argued, it also should consider whether young people have enough safe places to gather, participate in activities and spend time during evenings and weekends.
She also questioned one of the statistics presented by police.
Penn cited national data showing elevated overnight traffic-fatality risks for 16- and 17-year-old drivers.
Joiner asked whether adult drivers experience a similar increase during those hours, raising a broader question about whether the risk is unique to teenagers or part of nighttime driving generally.
Her vote shows how the policy discussion has changed since June.
Council members now have to judge the ordinance after watching it operate, rather than deciding whether it is worth trying.
Hall remains skeptical but votes to keep the proposal moving
Hall moved in the opposite direction, at least procedurally.
She opposed the curfew in June and repeated several of those concerns Monday.
Hall said the ordinance was initially developed too quickly and without enough opportunity for community feedback.
She has also objected to the 10 p.m. start time, arguing that 11 p.m. would better accommodate high school games and other legitimate activities that keep teenagers out later.
She nevertheless voted yes Monday.
Hall said moving the proposal forward would allow the full City Council and residents another opportunity to address the policy before it expires.
Her vote did not signal that her objections had disappeared. It kept the proposal alive for a broader public debate.
Scippio focuses on parental responsibility
Scippio offered the committee’s strongest defense of continuing the ordinance.
Drawing in part from her experience caring for a 14-year-old, she argued that the rules still allow young people to participate in legitimate nighttime activities.
The ordinance includes exemptions for juveniles who are with a parent or authorized adult, traveling to or from work, attending supervised school, religious or recreational activities, responding to emergencies, exercising First Amendment rights, attending college or meeting several other conditions.
Scippio placed parental responsibility at the center of her argument.
In her view, the ordinance gives the city another way to hold adults accountable when young people are unsupervised in public during the early-morning hours.
She also challenged the idea that expanded recreational programming alone would address the behavior police are encountering.
Young people wandering the city at 2 a.m., she argued, are not necessarily the same teenagers who would attend an organized recreation-center program.
The exchange with Joiner revealed a deeper disagreement over prevention.
One approach focuses on intervening when young people are already in risky situations late at night.
The other asks whether more investment in youth activities and gathering spaces could reduce the likelihood of those situations occurring in the first place.
What the curfew allows and prohibits
Winston-Salem’s ordinance applies to people 17 and younger in public places and establishments from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.
It is not an absolute prohibition on teenagers being outside during those hours.
A young person may be outside with a parent, guardian or authorized adult; while traveling with permission; commuting to or from work; responding to an emergency; attending or returning from supervised school, religious or recreational activities; exercising First Amendment rights; attending college; or under several other exceptions.
Parent-directed errands are permitted until 10:30 p.m.
Adults who knowingly help a juvenile violate the ordinance can face misdemeanor charges and fines of up to $500.
Juveniles may be referred to juvenile court, although police said when the policy was adopted that warnings, transportation home and diversion would generally be emphasized first.
The ordinance followed a series of large gatherings and disturbances earlier this year.
During the original debate, Penn told council members that social media had helped organize what police called “teen takeovers” in Winston-Salem and elsewhere.
In one June incident, police cited 11 juveniles, mostly for underage drinking. Several young adults were also arrested, including one accused of carrying a concealed weapon.
The Public Safety Committee initially recommended the curfew 2-1, with Hall absent, before the full council approved it.
Young people raised concerns from the beginning
Questions about youth resources were part of the debate before Monday.
When council considered the ordinance in June, high school senior Phoenix Sampson-Young told elected officials that young people had largely been absent from the conversation and questioned what resources were being provided to address the causes of youth behavior rather than simply restricting movement.
Joiner’s concerns Monday echoed part of that argument.
The city’s response now includes J-RISE, which was designed to connect some families with community organizations and other support.
How many families have entered the program, how many received services and what happened afterward remain important measures of whether the intervention component is working.
Those outcomes matter because a curfew can be judged by more than the number of teenagers officers encounter after 10 p.m.
Its effects also include what happens to young people and families after those encounters.
The 26% decline has limits as a measure
Police have evidence that the period after the curfew began looked different from the period before it.
The reported 26% decline in youth encounters is one part of that evidence.
The reported drop in youth victimization during curfew hours is another.
Neither figure alone establishes how much of the change was caused by the ordinance.
School schedules, police deployment, arrests, community programming, weather, special events and normal fluctuations in incidents can also affect the numbers.
A fuller public accounting would include the raw number of youth encounters before and after the ordinance, how many involved suspected offenses and how many involved victims, the number of warnings and charges, how often officers transported juveniles home, and the number of families referred through J-RISE.
Geographic and demographic information would also show how enforcement has been distributed across Winston-Salem.
Those details become more important as the city considers extending a policy that was initially adopted as a temporary response.
The next debate moves to the full council
Monday’s tie left the Public Safety Committee without a recommendation.
The proposal remains alive.
The City Council is scheduled to meet Sept. 21, when residents are expected to have another opportunity to address council members about the ordinance.
The current curfew expires Oct. 12.
Material connected with the extension would continue the ordinance into 2027, although the exact proposed expiration date should be verified against the final ordinance language before publication.
Council members now face a different decision from the one before them in June.
The original vote came after a series of highly visible incidents and centered on whether a temporary curfew was worth trying.
The next vote will come with early enforcement data, a youth-intervention program, new questions about recreation and community investment, and at least two committee members whose votes Monday differed from their positions during the original debate.
The dispute is no longer simply whether Winston-Salem should have a youth curfew.
It is about what the city has learned from having one, what the early numbers can actually establish and what role police, parents, government and community organizations should play after the temporary ordinance expires.
That discussion now returns to the full council.