WAYS TO CARE FOR AN AILING FOSTER SYSTEM FEDERAL FUNDS COULD HELP KEEP MORE KIDS AT HOME.Byline: Troy Anderson Staff Writer Following years of scandals and heartbreak in the nation's largest child-protective system, Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. County officials and child advocates hope a new director and innovative ideas will dramatically improve the lives of local foster children. ``We spend $1.4 billion annually on foster care in Los Angeles County,'' said Andrew Bridge Andrew Bridge is a Broadway lighting designer, who has worked on many Broadway productions, including The Phantom of the Opera. He has won the Tony Award for Best Lighting Design three times: in 1998 for Phantom of the Opera, 1995 for Sunset Boulevard, and in 1999 for Fosse. , managing director of child welfare reform programs at the private Broad Foundation in Los Angeles. ``We are not getting what we should for that $1.4 billion. And for the first time, Los Angeles County is beginning a constructive conversation to change that.'' The proposed reforms by the county and state are set to begin next year. Congress plans to take up legislation in the summer that could radically change the way the child welfare system is funded. President George W. Bush has proposed a $5 billion-a-year flexible block grant that could be used to help keep families together - rather than placing their children in foster care. Most of the funds are now used to pay for the care of children in foster care. ``It's not going to cure everything,'' said Wade F. Horn Wade F. Horn is an American psychologist who received unanimous confirmation (under President George W. Bush) in 2001 as the Assistant Secretary for Children and Families. , assistant secretary of the U.S. Administration for Children and Families The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) is a division of the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). It is headed by the Assistant Secretary for Children and Families, which from 2001 to 2007 was Dr. Wade F. Horn. . ``States could still choose to spend the money on things that don't matter. ``But for a state with innovative leadership that wants to invest in services that have proven effective in preventing child abuse and neglect, this would give them the flexibility to do that and reduce the need for costly (foster care) intervention later on.'' Critics are skeptical about whether officials will follow through with their plans, citing innumerable failed attempts to reform the system in the past. Critics also expect heavy opposition from what they call the private ``child-abuse industry,'' which has grown wealthy and powerful over the years off the $20 billion-a-year child welfare system, a two-year investigation by the Daily News found. A recent state Department of Social Services social services Noun, pl welfare services provided by local authorities or a state agency for people with particular social needs social services npl → servicios mpl sociales report found the indirect costs Indirect costs are costs that are not directly accountable to a particular function or product; these are fixed costs. Indirect costs include taxes, administration, personnel and security costs. See also
tr.v. mis·treat·ed, mis·treat·ing, mis·treats To treat roughly or wrongly. See Synonyms at abuse. mis·treat and foster care, such as juvenile delinquency juvenile delinquency, legal term for behavior of children and adolescents that in adults would be judged criminal under law. In the United States, definitions and age limits of juveniles vary, the maximum age being set at 14 years in some states and as high as 21 , adult criminality and lost productivity to society, total $95 billion annually. At the heart of the system's failures, state officials admit in documents, are ``perverse financial incentives'' in federal and state laws that encourage local governments to earn money by placing and keeping too many children unnecessarily in foster care. ``Financial incentives, inherent in the state and federal government structure, are encouraging the retention of children in foster care until they reach adulthood,'' researcher Julia K. Sells wrote in a report on child welfare privatization privatization: see nationalization. privatization Transfer of government services or assets to the private sector. State-owned assets may be sold to private owners, or statutory restrictions on competition between privately and publicly owned for the San Francisco-based Pacific Research Institute think tank. ``States are actually profiting from keeping children in the system because they continue to receive federal funds Federal Funds Funds deposited to regional Federal Reserve Banks by commercial banks, including funds in excess of reserve requirements. Notes: These non-interest bearing deposits are lent out at the Fed funds rate to other banks unable to meet overnight reserve .'' David Sanders David Sanders is an Associate Professor of Biological Sciences at Purdue University[1]. His expertise concerns gene therapy, cancer research, biodefense, and pandemic influenza. , director of the county Department of Children and Family Services, said experts estimate that as many as half of the county's foster children could have been left in their parents' care if the appropriate services had been provided to the families. This year, the county settled a class-action lawsuit with the American Civil Liberties Union American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), nonpartisan organization devoted to the preservation and extension of the basic rights set forth in the U.S. Constitution. of Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, that called for improvements in the mental-health treatment foster children receive. It also led to the closure of the long-distressed MacLaren's Children Center in El Monte El Monte (ĕl mŏn`tē), city (1990 pop. 106,209), Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1912. A residential, industrial, and commercial city in the San Gabriel Valley, El Monte manufactures furniture, electronic equipment, semiconductors, - the site of numerous horror stories of abuse, neglect and even death over the years. ``Throughout this case, there is a stream of tales of sadness, desperation and despair,'' U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz Howard Matz is a judge on the Central District of California. Howard Matz was appointed a United States District Judge by President Bill Clinton in 1998. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Matz taught police science and clerked for a United States District Judge said when he approved the settlement. ``There is no doubt, there are almost no instances where someone said the system has worked well. ``But this settlement is a start. It's a very admirable change and innovative. The foster care system has proven to be totally inadequate and disgraceful so far.'' The investigation also found widespread misuse of taxpayer funds and some of the highest salaries in the nation among the nonprofit foster family agencies and group homes responsible for most of the 30,000 children in foster homes. The $1.4 billion DCFS DCFS Department of Children and Family Services DCFS Division of Children and Family Services DCFS Descriptional Complexity of Formal Systems (conference) DCFS Data Communication & Functional System budget, which has swelled from $103 million in 1985 when the department was created, pays to support a total of 75,000 children in the system and adoptive homes. In the private foster care agencies that oversee most of the children, some executives receive up to $310,000 a year in salaries and benefits and spend millions of taxpayer dollars for posh offices, expensive furniture and luxury cars, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. tax returns and county audits. County officials and child advocates acknowledge that reforms are needed to overhaul the way the county contracts with group homes and the foster family agencies that recruit foster parents and oversee children's care. Another key reform, according to child advocates and county officials, began in November when the Board of Supervisors voted to negotiate with the federal government for a waiver that would allow DCFS to use $250 million of its $1.4 billion budget on services to help keep children with their families, instead of placing them in foster care. Using a similar federal waiver and a program known as ``performance- based contracting,'' Illinois was able in the late 1990s to reduce its foster care population by half and prevent many needless foster care placements. DCFS recently renegotiated contracts with foster-family agencies and is in the process of negotiating a new contract with its group homes. The new contracts are expected to hold the agencies accountable for providing safe homes and good education for foster children. Under the current ``buck-a-head'' payment structure, the private agencies lose revenue when children are reunified with their families or put up for adoption, child advocates say. ``There are a lot of twisted incentives,'' said Benjamin Wolf, associate legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union in Chicago, which sued Illinois in the late 1990s and forced the state to use performance-based contracting. The innovative form of contracting improved children's lives and forced about half of the agencies to close because they couldn't meet the new standards. Los Angeles County Chief Administrative Officer A chief administrative officer (CAO) is responsible for administrative management of private, public or governmental corporations. The CAO is one of the highest ranking members of an organization, managing daily operations and usually reporting directly to the chief executive David Janssen said the county should have only 12,000 to 15,000 children in foster homes. ``We have way too many kids in our system,'' said Janssen, who was one of the first county officials to support reforms now under way. DCFS officials expect a tough lobbying campaign to get the federal waiver and don't expect a decision until March. ``We really think this offers an opportunity to start to fix the system,'' said Sanders, who took over as head of DCFS last March after the Board of Supervisors called for the resignation of the previous director. ``It's not the silver bullet silver bullet - magic bullet , but at least it's an opportunity to start the kind of major reforms we need to have in place.'' Like many of the reforms the state and county have agreed to, critics are skeptical about whether the proposed reforms will help much, noting that the child welfare system has long abused its power to break up families for its own financial gain. ``It's a money-changing game,'' said Beverly Hills Beverly Hills, city (1990 pop. 31,971), Los Angeles co., S Calif., completely surrounded by the city of Los Angeles; inc. 1914. The largely residential city is home to many motion-picture and television personalities. attorney Debra Opri Debra Ann Opri (b. 10 June 1960) is an American attorney. Opri successfully represented James Brown against a sexual harassment lawsuit by a former employee. Other high-profile clients include Michael Jackson's parents, Joe and Katherine Jackson, whom hired Opri to protect , who won a $75,000 settlement earlier this year from the county on behalf of a Pasadena man whose distraught wife pushed their two children off a courthouse roof, killing them, and then jumped to her death. She had just learned her children would be returned to foster care. DCFS had made a series of errors in the case that the father claimed led to his children's deaths. ``Instead of selling sprockets and gidgets, the children are getting sold,'' the lawyer said. Manhattan Beach attorney Sanford Jossen, who filed a class-action lawsuit in 2000 alleging staff at MacLaren Children's Center manhandled children and broke their bones, wrote in a court objection to the ACLU ACLU: see American Civil Liberties Union. settlement that it seduces the public into believing reforms are on the way, but in reality does little more than create a six-member advisory panel to make recommendations with no timeline for implementation. ``In this respect, history continues to repeat itself,'' Jossen wrote. ``Studies are done. Recommendations are made. Implementation does not occur. More delays result. The proposed settlement agreement creates the illusion of promise, but on closer inspections provides for nothing.'' Troy Anderson, (213) 974-8985 troy.anderson(at)dailynews.com A GROWTH INDUSTRY Budget growth shows the expansion of the child-welfare system at all levels of government. LOS ANGELES COUNTY: The budget* has grown from $103 million in 1985 to $1.4 billion in 2003. STATE OF CALIFORNIA: The budget** has grown from $642 million in 1986-87 to $4 billion in 2003. NATIONWIDE: The budget*** has grown from $673 million in 1988 to $7.6 billion in 2003. *County Department of Children and Family Services **State Department of Social Services ***U.S. Administration for Children and Families SOURCE: Daily News research CAPTION(S): photo, box Photo: Debbie Hagnes, center rear, husband David, daughters Kerri Tervort, center, and Lisa Matthews, far left, and Tervort's children Cameron, Cassandra and Christopher participated in Family Group Decision Making, a program to work out problems with a pastor and social worker. Tervort of Lancaster came to the attention of the county Department of Children and Family Services during a child custody The care, control, and maintenance of a child, which a court may award to one of the parents following a Divorce or separation proceeding. Under most circumstances, state laws provide that biological parents make all decisions that are involved in rearing their dispute with the father of her children, who alleged she had spanked the kids. Hans Gutknecht/Staff Photographer Box: A GROWTH INDUSTRY (see text) |
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