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BECCA Guidelines 7/2024 4 <br />Becca Allocation Process <br /> <br />Each biennium, an appropriation is provided by the Washington State Legislature to the <br />AOC to offset the costs associated with the processing and case management of Becca <br />referrals. In the 2023-2025 Biennium, the appropriations equal $7 million per fiscal year. <br /> <br />The Legislature also provides the following direction through budget proviso: <br /> <br />“The administrator for the courts, in conjunction with the juvenile court administrators, <br />shall develop an equitable funding distribution formula. The formula must neither <br />reward counties with higher than average per-petition/referral processing costs nor shall <br />it penalize counties with lower than average per-petition/referral processing costs.” <br /> <br />Allocation of the funding is based on calendar year caseload data from each county for <br />CHINS, ARY, and Truancy filings. The CHINS and ARY filing data is available through the <br />online Caseloads of the Courts of Washington Reports. The source of Truancy filings is a <br />query from the Judicial Information System (JIS)/EDR Statewide database and limited to 0- <br />16-year-olds. <br /> <br />The AOC Comptroller maintains an allocation spreadsheet. The calculation is as follows: <br />• Sums three years of CHINS and ARY filings and calculates a percentage of the total for <br />each county. <br />• Sums three years of Truancy filings limited to 0-16-year-olds and calculates a <br />percentage of the total for each county. <br />• Applies a weighted allocation to the total funding, 46 percent of the CHINS and ARY / <br />54 percent of the Truancy filings. Allocates the total available funding based upon the <br />weighted allocation percentage. <br />• A small county base is established at $5,000. Where counties’ weighted allocation <br />results in less than $5,000 for the fiscal year, then those allocations are set at $5,000 <br />and all other counties’ weighted allocations are lowered to cover the small county base. <br />• Additionally, for FY 2025, adjustments were made to the formula in response to the <br />impacts of the COVID 19 Pandemic on case filings. The adjustments were to exclude <br />2020 and 2021 filings and implement a 5 percent stop-loss. These changes were <br />recommended by the Washington Association of Juvenile Court Administrators and <br />approved by the State Court Administrator. The recommendation is included as an <br />attachment to these guidelines. <br /> <br />Docusign Envelope ID: 831EAE7D-0D72-455B-A399-034EAD490632