Parents, grandparents criticize foster care system

By Dave Ranney
KHI News Service
Nov. 30, 2009



TOPEKA — Several members of the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Children’s Issues said they’re convinced the state’s foster care system is broken.

“The system is not working,” Sen. David Haley, D-Kansas City, said during the committee hearing Monday.

“I can’t go to the grocery store or buy gas or go out in public any more without someone telling me stories about the system and what’s wrong with it,” said Sen. Oletha Faust-Goudeau, D-Wichita.

“In the five years I’ve been in the Legislature, the number and the intensity of the complaints I have received on this has increased,” said the committee’s chairman, Rep. Mike Kiegerl, R-Olathe.

Rep. Bill Otto, R-LeRoy, said he couldn’t help wondering if the 1996 decision to privatize most the state’s foster care responsibilities was a mistake.

“I can’t help but think we were in a better situation when it was under you,” Otto said, directing his comment to Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services Secretary Don Jordan.

Jordan assured the committee that while the system is far from perfect, federal surveys have found it to be one of the best in the nation.

He told Otto the system was privatized because then-Gov. Bill Graves and most legislators were convinced that private contractors would do a better job than SRS, which, at the time, was being sued for failing to meet the needs of the children in its care.

Committee members spent the next three hours listening to parents and grandparents describe how their children and grandchildren had been put in foster care and how, in most cases, they hadn’t been able to regain custody.

Few were able to explain why they had lost custody in the first place, saying they hadn’t been given a clear explanation.

Most of the grandparents said they had been denied custody because they were too old.

Most of the parents blamed their troubles on former spouses who, they alleged, had sexually or physically abused their children. None of those who spoke were able to explain why they, too, had been found to be unfit for parenting.

No one on the committee asked any of the speakers to sign confidentiality waivers that would allow SRS officials to discuss their cases.

Jordan said he sympathized with those who have become entangled in the system but asked legislators to realize that in many cases, when parents and grandparents say they can’t find anyone who will explain the decision-making process, they’re actually saying they haven’t been able to find someone who agrees with them.

Court documents, Jordan said, almost always make it clear why a child was removed from a home.

Several parents said they and their children had little or no legal representation during custody proceedings.

One parent’s account of a courtroom experience prompted Otto to say: “The five-minute rule appears to be pretty standard; by that I mean the GAL (Guardian Ad Litum attorney) doesn’t see the children until five minutes before the hearing starts.”

Jordan did not dispute the criticism. A GAL or Guardian Ad Litum attorney is appointed to represent the interests of the child in cases where the state moves to take custody.

“This is an area that (the state) ought to be spending a lot more money on,” he said. “GALs are not paid nearly enough to spend as much time on these cases as they should.”

The attorneys, he said, are appointed and paid by the courts, not by SRS.

Jordan said he knew of cases in which parents later disputed facts they had “stipulated to” in court.

“When you ask them why they would do that, they say their (court-appointed) attorney told them not to contest anything because they didn’t want to do anything to make the judge mad,” he said.

But Jordan also told the lawmakers that SRS is bound by federal confidentiality laws that prevent the agency in most cases from sharing details that could paint a better picture of how cases were handled.

“Oftentimes, what we can’t tell you would make us look better,” he said.

Faust-Goudeau said despite that explanation she remained frustrated that parents and grandparents might not have a clear understanding why their children and grandchildren were in custody.

“Everybody seems to be passing the buck,” she said.

The committee reconvenes Tuesday.

http://www.khi.org/news/2009/nov/30/parents-grandparents-criticize-foster-care-system/

SRS fails to tell police of abuse cases
Comments (33)
Recommended (6)
BY TIM POTTER
The Wichita Eagle

Wichita grandparents say SRS failed to protect grandson
Coffeyville couple sues SRS worker after granddaughter's beating death
Grandmother: How did SRS lose child?
Former SRS investigator: Boy's death was preventable

Law enforcement agencies don't always receive child abuse reports so they can determine whether a crime has occurred, resulting in "many cases where the opportunity for criminal prosecution is missed," a state report says.
The report faults the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services (SRS) for sometimes failing to forward abuse reports to law enforcement agencies.
The review, recently released by the Kansas Attorney General's Office, said another "systemic problem" involves "turf battles" that hurt communication between agencies that investigate child abuse.
And a third problem area: In some foster-care cases, SRS has failed to inform the Kansas Department of Health and Environment of abuse reports, as required by law. KDHE licenses day care homes and family foster homes.
The report urges dual reporting of suspected abuse by the public and by mandated reporters, such as school staff and health care personnel. It calls for reporting suspicions not only to appropriate state agencies but also to local law enforcement.
Attorney general spokeswoman Ashley Anstaett said she couldn't comment on where turf battles have occurred because the cases are confidential.
Regarding how often reports don't get sent to law enforcement and where that has occurred, Anstaett wrote in an e-mail, "We have found this in numerous counties (certainly more than 1/2 a dozen)." She said she couldn't be more specific partly because of confidentiality issues.
The review covered 1,010 child cases and 446 cases involving vulnerable adults.
Still, she said, "It should first be noted that through our review it was found that information is shared and reported appropriately in the vast majority of cases."
The purpose of the review is "to point out possible challenges and recommend improvements," she said.
The findings come from an annual report published last month by the attorney general's Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation Unit, covering the period from July 1, 2008, to June 30, 2009. The unit's mission is to work with state and local agencies to raise awareness of abuse and exploitation of children and vulnerable adults and to bolster reporting and prosecution, Attorney General Steve Six says on the agency's Web site.
City, county policies
The Wichita school district usually reports suspected abuse to police and SRS, said district spokeswoman Susan Arensman.
However, police wouldn't be notified in situations that appear less serious: for example, where a child hasn't bathed in a few days or wears the same shirt to school three days in a row, Arensman said. SRS would still be notified in the less serious cases.
When the school contacts police in more serious cases, it usually does it by calling 911, she said.
The public also can play an important role, said Wichita police Capt. Brent Allred. His advice is: "If you see something, if you believe something's wrong, a crime's being committed, a child's being abused or neglected, you need to call the Police Department."
In 2008, eight Wichita children died from abuse or neglect. In some of those cases, Allred said, relatives or friends knew something was wrong but didn't report it.
In Sedgwick County, "It would be unusual... to have an abuse case investigated by SRS and not brought to the attention of law enforcement," said Deputy District Attorney Ron Paschal.
That is because of the Exploited and Missing Child Unit, a partnership between SRS and law enforcement.
"In all cases involving serious abuse or neglect or sexual abuse, a social worker is teamed with a law enforcement officer from the beginning of the investigation and therefore both agencies are involved very early on in the case," Paschal said in an e-mail.
SRS has a liaison who works out of a DA's office, he said.
"Our office has daily communication with the investigative agencies."
SRS's role
Still, across the state, there is room for improvement, the attorney general's report said.
Its review found "many cases where the opportunity for criminal prosecution is missed."
It also says that the state agencies receiving abuse concerns should report possible crimes to law enforcement in a timely manner.
In some cases, SRS — which investigates child abuse and neglect reports and recommends to the court whether children should be removed from their homes — failed to forward allegations to law enforcement, the report said.
SRS spokeswoman Michelle Ponce said the A.G.' s review included 921 SRS child cases. Of the 921 cases, a sampling found eight cases in which SRS "substantiated" that abuse or neglect occurred but SRS did not report it to law enforcement, she said. Under the regulatory definition, "substantiated" means that SRS found "clear and convincing evidence to conclude that abuse or neglect occurred."
Three of the eight substantiated cases were referred to county or district attorneys, who can bring criminal charges. The other five substantiated cases weren't reported to prosecutors even though SRS policy dictates reporting all substantiated cases to prosecutors, she said.
It is not a social worker's job to determine whether a crime occurred, Ponce said.
Still, even the less serious cases get forwarded to prosecutors, and in the most serious cases, SRS staff are already working with law enforcement, Ponce said.
None of the eight cases in the review's sampling occurred in Sedgwick, Butler or Harvey counties, Ponce said. According to her, three cases occurred in Johnson County, and one each in Barton, Geary, Leavenworth, Saline and Wyandotte counties.
Examples of concerns
The A.G.' s report cited these examples:
* SRS determined that a step-parent had committed physical abuse. The worker photographed visible physical injury to the child. The incident was not reported to law enforcement, nor was a "child-in-need-of-care" recommendation made to the county attorney. Instead, the family received services.
* SRS found that the husband of a home day care provider had been physically abusive. "The worker documented the injury in great detail and photographed it for the record. The perpetrator admitted threatening the child and the child admitted being afraid of the perpetrator."
After the A.G.' s abuse unit asked about the case, "an SRS supervisor indicated that because the child suffered a 'moderate injury' and because the child was safe and enough facts were able to be documented, 'it was determined law enforcement involvement was not required,' " the report said.
It said the case was forwarded to KDHE, which moved to revoke the day care license as long as the perpetrator stayed in the home.
* Acting on a report from school officials, SRS substantiated physical abuse of a child. The injuries were photographed. During an interview by the SRS worker, the "perpetrator (the child's father) displayed threatening behavior to the worker, blocked the worker's exit from the home and indicated his child deserved what happened and he would do it again under the same circumstances."
The review found no record of SRS reporting the situation to police, although SRS indicated it was forwarded to the county attorney. When the A.G.' s unit inquired about the case, the county attorney had no record of receiving such a case.
KDHE involvement
The report said another key concern is that some abuse reports provided to SRS weren't sent to KDHE as required by state law.
The report cited two cases:
• In one, a child who had been found to be sexually abusive was put in a foster home with other children. "The child subsequently perpetrated again," the report said. After being informed of the situation by the attorney general's unit, KDHE recommended that a civil penalty be imposed on the "child placing agency." Child placing agencies are usually independent contractors through SRS, Anstaett said.
• In another case, a foster home was found to be in neglect. But the review discovered that the SRS finding was not sent to KDHE. After the attorney general's unit informed KDHE, the agency recommended action against the foster parent.
Despite those cases, the report said, "there seems to be an overall improvement in notification to KDHE."
In a statement, KDHE said it has a "good working relationship with SRS."
One example is the development in recent years of a centralized complaint notification system involving the two agencies, KDHE said.

Reach Tim Potter at 316-268-6684 or tpotter@wichitaeagle.com.

Read more: http://www.kansas.com/news/story/1181958.html?pageNum=3&&&mi_pluck_action=page_nav#Comments_Container#ixzz0ffBxpkyp

CPS VULTURES

Foster Care ~ Destruction Of Families

Unnecessary, overburdened

Although officials in Reno County claim to be mystified at the obscenely high rate at which children are torn from their families in the county, there is a clue to why it's happening right in your excellent story "Review of SRS status is ongoing," Jan. 17. Tearing "ungovernable" children from their families and parking them in an institution with other "ungovernable" children for a couple of weeks may have been "cutting edge" in the 19th century.
Now, it's widely recognized as barbaric.

It doesn't matter how kind the staff may be or how pretty the building, it's still an institution and it's still inherently harmful. And the foolishness of placing a bunch of children with behavior problems together right at the age when they are most vulnerable to peer pressure should be obvious. There are far better answers in such cases, such as wraparound programs, in which intensive help is brought right into the home - 24/7 if necessary - and it still costs less than institutionalizing children. When a rate of removal is as sky high as Reno County's, odds are a lot of children are being torn from everyone they know and love when family poverty is confused with "neglect." In other cases, families may have real problems, but the right kinds of help could keep them safely together rather than subjecting the children to the enormous inherent trauma of foster care. One major study of 15,000 typical cases found that children left in their own homes fared better in later life even than comparably maltreated children placed in foster care. Other studies have found abuse in at least one in three foster homes. The record of group homes and institutions is worse. And it's not just the children wrongfully removed who suffer. The more that SRS caseworkers are overloaded with children who don't need to be in foster care, the less time they have to find children in real danger - so more such cases are missed.The problem is even worse than the official figures show. Unlike every other state, Kansas simply refuses to count a child as removed if he is sent home before the first court hearing. Add in those children and there is a good chance Kansas as a whole is the child-removal capital of America - and Reno County is, of course, far worse than the average for Kansas.

None of this means no child ever should be taken from her or his parents. But it does mean that foster care is an extremely toxic intervention that should be used sparingly and in small doses. Unfortunately, Kansas in general and Reno County in particular have been prescribing mega-doses of foster care, and the county's children are suffering enormously for it. Kansas needs to learn from places that have rebuilt their systems to improve child safety by emphasizing family preservation.

RICHARD WEXLER
Executive DirectorReformAlexandria, Va.

Promises Broken By Kansas SRS Secretary Don Jordan

December 1, 2009, Kansas SRS Secretary Don Jordan agreed that he would do his best to investigate allegations of children removed from their parents custody.

To think that the citizens pay Jordan's wages and he so arrogantly has refused to live up to his own word is not surprising. Jordan had the audacity to insinuate that parents are liars without even looking into the cases as if Social Workers and the State of Kansas could do no wrong even with the Legislative Post Audit findings of falsification of documents by Social Workers.

After all, Jordan stated that the Sedgwick County DA bullied Social Workers into falsifying records to remove children from their parents custody. Jordan had stated that his office had even gone to the efforts to "train" his Social Workers into not being bullied into writing things they don't believe to place children in the custody of the State.

Jordan, as the head over all Kansas Social Workers that are employed by the State, this would make Jordan a mandated reporter as well and his failure to act on this has made him an accessory to crimes against children and families in Kansas.

Bill proposes end to state's privatized foster care

Bill proposes end to state's privatized foster care

Comments (18)
Recommended (7)
BY DAVID KLEPPER
Posted on Thu, Jan. 14, 2010

Eagle Topeka bureau
TOPEKA — Legislation to end Kansas' privatized foster care system is the latest volley from lawmakers who say the state lacks oversight over the contractors managing such child welfare services.
Dozens of parents who lost custody of their children have complained to lawmakers in recent weeks that the state and its contractor caseworkers remove children without giving sufficient reason or the chance to appeal.
The legislation would stop the state from signing new deals with the foster care contractors. The Johnson County lawmaker behind the new legislation said it's meant to force contractors to answer questions if they want to keep the state's business.
"We're certainly going to get their attention," said Rep. Mike Kiegerl, R-Olathe.
"There's a lack of oversight, a lack of transparency. Nobody ought to have the kind of power these caseworkers have."
The contractors and Kansas' Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services say they're happy to address lawmakers' concerns. They note that local police and judges also play a key role in deciding when a child should be removed.
SRS officials promised to investigate the specific complaints raised by parents. But they stand by the state's privatized system, which was the first of its kind in the United States when it began in 1996.
"We feel like we have made a lot of accomplishments since privatization," said SRS spokeswoman Michelle Ponce.
Kyle Kessler, a spokesman for contractor KVC Behavioral HealthCare, said his company will "provide any information that is requested."
News of Kiegerl's bill pleased Kathy Winters, an Olathe woman who lost custody of two grandchildren in 2008. She contends the state and its contractors have been slow to respond to her concerns.
"We've hit brick walls so many times," Winters said. "Now we're getting somewhere."Read more: http://www.kansas.com/news/story/1135764.html?mi_pluck_action=comment_submitted&qwxq=854231#Comments_Container#ixzz0ceF6P32N

Overhaul of Kansas foster-care system urged

http://www.kansascity.com/115/story/1682382.html?mi_pluck_action=comment_submitted&qwxq=7349812#Comments_Container

Overhaul of Kansas foster-care system urged
By DAVID KLEPPER
Posted on Wed, Jan. 13, 2010 10:55 PM
The Star’s Topeka correspondent
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Dozens of parents who lost custody of their children have complained to lawmakers in recent weeks that the state and its contractor caseworkers remove children without giving sufficient reason or the chance to appeal.

The legislation would stop the state from signing new deals with the foster care contractors. The Johnson County lawmaker behind the new legislation said it’s meant to force contractors to answer questions if they want to keep the state’s business.

“We’re certainly going to get their attention,” said Rep. Mike Kiegerl, an Olathe Republican. “There’s a lack of oversight, a lack of transparency. Nobody ought to have the kind of power these caseworkers have.”

The contractors and the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services say they’re happy to address lawmakers’ concerns.

They note that local police and judges also play a key role in deciding when a child should be removed.

SRS officials promised to investigate the complaints raised by parents. But they stand by the privatized system, which was the first of its kind in the United States when it began in 1996.

“We feel like we have made a lot of accomplishments since privatization,” said SRS spokeswoman Michelle Ponce.

Kyle Kessler, a spokesman for contractor KVC Behavioral HealthCare, said his company will “provide any information that is requested.”

To reach David Klepper, call 785-354-1388 or send e-mail to dklepper@kcstar.com.