Aug. 31, 2025, marked two years since the Joint Narcotics Enforcement Team (JNET) raided Green Hill School in Chehalis.
Green Hill isn’t just another juvenile facility — it is our state’s long-term detention center for kids and young adults from every single county in Washington. It is the final stop before prison, and the very place where rehabilitation is supposed to have its last, best chance.
In the two years since the raid, we have seen scandal after scandal unfold. Staff arrested for selling drugs and smuggling contraband. Staff accused of sexual misconduct with the very kids they were supposed to mentor. Civil lawsuits. Criminal investigations. Legislative hearings that produced plenty of outrage but not one single reform or fix.
And what is the state’s solution? To bring back Jennifer Redmann as superintendent. This is the same Jennifer Redmann who, during her previous tenure, presided over years of mismanagement, incompetence and coverups.
To put her back in charge is not only tone-deaf — it is dangerous. It signals to staff, kids, young adults and the broader community that nothing has been learned, that accountability is optional, and that history is free to repeat itself.
Let’s be clear: the kids and young adults inside Green Hill are not saints. Many have made mistakes. But they are still human beings. And the state has a moral and legal responsibility to provide them with structure, safety and a chance at rehabilitation. When staff exploit them, abuse them or feed them drugs, that chance is stolen. And when leadership looks the other way, the damage compounds — not just to those kids and young adults, but to our communities when they return home worse off than before.
The people of Washington cannot look away. We cannot let this fade into the background as just another scandal. The public must stay vigilant, keep watch, and demand better. Don’t be fooled by empty promises or recycled leadership. Green Hill’s kids and young adults have been short-changed for decades — robbed of education, robbed of safety and robbed of the kind of rehabilitation that could keep them out of adult prisons.
Enough is enough. Green Hill needs real reform, real oversight and leaders who will root out corruption, not cover it up. For the sake of these kids and young adults — and the future of our state — we must insist that Green Hill be run the way it always should have been: with accountability, integrity and the belief that no child is beyond redemption.
Don’t forget Green Hill. Don’t let this cycle continue.
From the heart,
Bo D. Rupert
Centralia
