AUGUSTA -- The number of Maine juveniles detained and committed into youth custody is three times lower than the national average, according to new data from a national youth foundation.

The number of violent crimes committed by Maine juveniles also is three times lower than elsewhere in the nation.

The data is included in the annual Kids Count report by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a private charitable organization "dedicated to helping build better futures for disadvantaged children in the United States."

The Kids Count report tracks the rates of children living in poverty, percentages of children without health care and, new this year, the rate at which youths are detained for committing violent and nonviolent crimes.

Barry Stoodley, associate commissioner of the Maine Department of Corrections, said the most recently compiled data, collected from 2006, suggests Maine outranks several states in numbers of youth detained for criminal activity and recidivism rate, which indicates how often an offender repeats criminal behavior.

"This is very good news," Stoodley said. "The lessons outlined in the data book are lessons this state embraced years ago."

Those lessons included not ignoring the "critical role of families" when it comes to juvenile delinquency, the "wholesale incarceration of juveniles" awaiting trial for nonviolent crimes and the often undefined line of when to prosecute a minor as an adult, according to the essay in the 2008 data book.

"It's not often that youth who commit crimes in Maine are prosecuted as adults," Stoodley said. "Our mission is to leave these youth in a better place than they were in (before entering the juvenile justice system)."

Records from the Kids Count data indicate an estimated average of 210 juveniles younger than 18 were detained and committed into law enforcement custody on any given day in 2006.

Of that number, 132 were in custody for nonviolent crimes.

Additionally, the foundation's research indicated that Maine has the second lowest percentage of high school dropouts, the sixth lowest teen birth rate, and 10th lowest rate of low birth weights.

While officials agreed there was much to cheer about, they acknowledge the number of Maine children living in poverty has increased.

Researchers said the number of children in extreme poverty --classified as 50 percent below the federal poverty line -- has inflated by over 3,000 minors, according to the most recently compiled and published data.

The federal poverty line is defined as a family of four living on an annual income of $22,200 or a family of three living on an annual income of $17,600, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Maine Children's Alliance President Elinor Goldberg said "there is no question" the numbers of Maine children living in poverty has risen even higher than the statistics gathered in 2006.

"Do we think it's high? Absolutely," Goldberg said. "The cost of living has been increasing, but wages have not been increasing."

Goldberg said the Maine Children's Alliance has been researching solutions and methods to ease impoverished conditions of the more than 22,400 juveniles in Maine living under the federal poverty line. The youngest children of those thousands, she said, are often the ones living at the highest rate of poverty.

"How we can reduce poverty and provide means for these children who are already living in it is the real conversation," Goldberg said.

The increasing percentage of children living in impoverished conditions also affects other rates in Maine, particularly infant mortality, Bureau of Health Director Dr. Dora Anne Mills said.

A summit on Maine youth living in poverty is to be held in November in conjunction with efforts to reduce hunger throughout the state, Goldberg and other officials said Thursday.

Meghan V. Malloy -- 623-3811 Ext. 431

mmalloy@centralmaine.com