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Below is the HillCo client report from the July 24 House Select Committee on Child Protection hearing.
 
The House Select Committee on Child Protection met to examine regulatory policy and contract oversight within the child welfare system; improvements to the screening, assessment, training, and support of potential foster and kinship families; and the ability of children and youth within the system to report maltreatment.
 
Contract Oversight and Regulatory Policy Within the Child Welfare System
 
April Ferrino, Analyst, Legislative Budget Board

  • GEER report helped identify risk areas and errors relevant to Texas – foster care redesign will impact who provides foster care services and how they will be provided
    • Kansas, Nebraska and Florida plans have been used as foster care models for Texas
  • Chair Dawnna Dukes:
    • Were the recommendations established in the GEER report implemented and did LBB receive copies of the contracts beforehand? There has not been a detailed follow-up report on the Kansas, Nebraska and Florida child protection plans – the recommendations in the 2013 report still remain active
    • How do agencies determine the readiness of contracts? LBB recommends the Florida process- a readiness team of local and out of state contractors from the area would conduct the assessment
  • Contract monitoring risk area recommendations:
    • Require DFPS to collect data for early identification of lead contractor problems and report to LBB and Office of Governor (not adopted)
    • Require DFPS to provide contract management staff with training to conduct financial analysis of contractors (adopted)
    • Require HHSC to contract with SAO to conduct audits of lead contractors as necessary (not adopted)
    • Require DFPS to report performance measures that compare legacy and redesigned systems (adopted)
    • Limit the provision of services a lead contractor can provide to not more than 35 percent of expended amounts (not adopted)
    • Require DFPS to develop an assessment process to determine readiness of lead contractors before services delivery begins (not adopted)
    • Recommendation to require DFPS to develop sufficiently detailed contingency plans for continuity of foster care services (not adopted)
    • Recommendation to require guardians ad litem to report to the court if court-ordered services are not provided
  • Rep. Cindy Burkett:
    • What measures are being made to ensure guardian ad litems are appropriately advocating for their children? Judges have the power to decide the level of services needed for children
  • Financial monitoring of lead contractors has been identified as a concern for the Sunset Commission
  • LBB staff is monitoring the implementation of Rider 29

 
Kelly Furgeson Linder, Assistant State Auditor, State Auditor’s Office

  • SAO final audit plan will be submitted in the fall – SAO regularly audits residential child care providers, including child placing agencies and residential treatment centers (most recent audit in 2013)
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • There should be standardized oversight over contracts negotiated by the State; suggested creating a more rigorous training process for negotiating contracts
    • Texas lost federal funding due to contract errors involved with the previous Accenture case- the legislature should never be inferior to a contract negotiated by the State
    • What red flags does SAO look for in contracts? Is it random? Complaint information from the public, internal audit reports and contract history are qualitative factors that are reviewed when working on audits; higher dollar value involved in audits draw greater levels of SAO attention
  • Audits are primarily based on financial errors rather than poor quality of service
  • Rep. John Frullo:
    • Does SAO second guess contract negotiations? State law and regulations are observed and SAO audits against those criteria – there is not a reevaluation process

 
Wayne Wilson, Deputy Executive Commissioner of Procurement and Contracting, HHSC

  • PCS requires contractors to reach out to certain identified Historically Underutilized Business (HUB) and post potential business opportunities in trade journals – based on the Comptroller’s rules not in the statute
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • noted HUBs are not likely to have subscriptions to trade journals so therefore do not meet the good-faith standards created in the original statute
    • noted the requirement of a 70+ grade on CTPM exam for Texas contract managers certification should be tougher
    • noted HB 22 (2005) consolidated procurement activities – Accenture case had a negative impact on the quality of service delivery to clients
    • Is cost-benefit analysis performed to compare performance of private entity services? Not to my knowledge
    • Is cost neutrality and opportunity considered before services are outsourced
  • If resulting contract is over $10 million, PCS sends a draft RFP to CPA Contract Advisory Team
  • SB 1681 has led HHSC to work with Comptroller’s Office to get HHSC contract managers certified and create a contract managers guide to provide technical assistance and standardization
  • Rep. James Frank:
    • How does the consolidation of various agencies into one provide equal/additional services to children than before? RFPs outline the specific contracts based on requirement of procurement projects – the integrity of the process is still kept in tact

 
John Specia, DFPS Commissioner

  • Texas contract is much different than Florida since DFPS maintains contract management
  • Sunset Commission recommendations for checks and balances will be implemented in the near future – the legacy system and foster care redesign will be specifically addressed
  • 35% of DFPS expenses or $482,375,038 is spent on contracts (i.e. drug testing, home visiting, etc.)
  • Additional FTEs will not be necessary for home visitations
  • RCCL is proposing additional changes to standards related to children with primary medical needs, normalcy for children, and integrating trauma-informed care into minimum standards
    • Financial statement reports (pay stub verification) is a new check and balance of foster parent income to make sure parents are not reliant on foster care subsidies for stability
    • 50% of foster care parents are eligible for social security benefits and do not conflict with income review
  • CCL upcoming initiatives include human trafficking initiative (HB 2725), minimum standards review, basic skills development and business planning process
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • What are the criteria for risk assessment?
  • Rep. Jessica Farrar:
    • Does DFPS have enough resources to monitor 300 private child-placing industries
    • More resources are not needed at this point – specific requests will be coming soon
  • Rep. Farrar:
    • How often are residential homes inspected for compliance? 38,000 homes are visited annually (surprise or scheduled) and more regularly if under investigation
  • Rep. Burkett:
    • No one can get rich in the foster care system; why does DFPS always overspend on foster care selection? Area has traditionally been overspent and approved by the Governor

 
Public Testimony
 
BRAVE Angel Reach

  • Over-medication of violent children is not the solution to dealing with effects of abuse
  • Children are hesitant to report abuse in fear of retaliation
  • Rep. Frank:
    • Random visits and drug testing are a good way to identify flaws in the system

 
Texas Alliance of Child and Family Services

  • Residential child care licensing, Youth for Tomorrow, and contract supervisors create three levels of oversight involved in child care – only applies to 60% in substitute care
  • Normalcy is strived for in group homes and will hopefully be achieved with the passage of new legislation

 
Citizens Commission on Human Rights

  • Trusteeship should maintain a level of cleanliness similar to that in nursing homes
  • Posters with emergency help numbers should be visibly posted in residential foster care homes

 
Chuck Oeeter, Giocosa Foundation

  • Documentation shouldn’t focus on how difficult children are to manage, rather it should focus on how they’re getting better

 
Judy Powell, Parent Guidance Center

  • Contract providers, therapists, etc… should be given transparent guidelines and repercussions for failing to follow regulations/guidelines as well as acceptable remedies for common problems

 
Johana Scott, Parent Guidance Center

  • Increase preventative services for parents that will help to alleviate protocol violations (daycare services, etc…)
  • We need a policing mechanism in place to monitor and report contractor/subcontractor foster care providers’ contract violations
  • Rep. Frullo:
    • What type of communication is there between administrative figures in the foster system? Often times there’s not enough and Bystander Effect sets in and impedes communication because of too much administrative oversight

 
Lisa Black and John Specia, Department of Family and Protective Services

  • Rep. Dukes:
  • In response to Mrs. Scott’s testimony, can you tell us what measures are in place to ensure adherence to foster care contracts by private contractors/subcontractors? If violations take place case workers contact contract managers to report violations and have the contract enforced; contractor behaviors do change after these reports are made
  • Rep. Frank:
    • What are the benefits from privatization and does it work?
    • Answer John Specia- I think it would work a lot better than doubling the size of the agency and running every foster home out of Austin; we need permanency for children and we need to work on keeping children closer to home and getting them back with their families; we need wraparound services that provide in home care rather than moving children to different homes
  • Rep. Tony Dale:
    • Why do we move children so often? Sometimes it’s not a good match, sometimes there’s abuse and neglect within the home, sometimes the foster parents have an emergency within their own family, and sometimes children’s need are too great to be met within their foster homes

 
Susan Racette, Self

  • Every county should have a CASA program

 
Linda Litzinger, Self

  • Are foster care contracts any different for children with disabilities?
  • Answer John Specia- we require additional oversight of contracts for children with special needs and lower the number of children with disabilities that can be in one home from 6 to 4

 
Screening, Assessment, Training, and Support of Foster and Kinship Families
 
Lisa Black and John Specia, DFPS

  • Foster and Kinship Screening, Training, and Support:
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • Is it true that there is only 8 hours of pre-service training required for private placement agencies? Answer Gail Gonzalez- yes, but there is additional training to the 8 pre-service hours for a total of 16 training hours
    • Is that really enough training? No, I think training in the realm of 35 hours, as required by PRIDE is more appropriate
    • Are we doing better in training case workers to understand that kinship care exists and is available? Yes, in the last 8 years we’ve had kinship care numbers double; this has in large part been facilitated by judges’ attempts to find relatives for kinship care placement
    • Do you see certain regions where a PCA is more likely to occur? No, I haven’t looked at it by region… my guess would be that more PCA is taking place in the Rio Grande Valley
  • Rep. Dale:
    • Is there training to make judges aware of kinship placement? Yes, we have been making efforts to make judges aware of kinship placement in their initial training
    • Does your organization participate in continuing education for family law attorneys? Yes, we are very active in continuing education for attorneys in family law

 
Systems for Youth to Report Maltreatment
 
John Specia, DFPS

  • We need a better mechanism for youth to report mistreatment in foster care; we have the vehicles available to make complaints but most foster care children aren’t comfortable making them
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • How long does it take to respond to reports of mistreatment? We investigate reports immediately
    • What’s the SOL on sexual abuse cases? 2-4 years after the child turns 18
    • Is there a centralized complaint collection database so that we can consolidate complaints made to school counselors, case workers, attorney’s ad litem, etc…?  Yes, if its abuse and neglect which require mandatory reporting
  • Rep. Dale:
    • What do Texas State Bar rules say about attorneys ad litem being paid to provide a service and failing to do that? You can make an ethical complaint to the Bar

 
David Reilly, Texas Juvenile Justice Department

  • System operations available to youth to report alleged mistreatment within the system:

 
Debbie Unruh, Office of the Independent Ombudsman TJJD

  • Organization, functions, duties and powers:
  • Rep. Frank:
    • Of the kids at TJJD how many are in the Foster system? About 95 are in non-state operated facilities and very few in foster care as CPS uses it
  • Rep. Burkett:
    • Are there any disciplinary actions taken in response to staffer misconduct discovered by Ombudsman inspections and interviews? The agency has rapid response to reported mistreatment
  • Rep. Frank:
    • How many ombudsmen are there? 7
    • What was the time period for the 2266 interviews? The interviews took roughly 10 months

 
Wendy Bagwell, Director of State Mentor Program (child placing program)

  • Safety and wellbeing of the foster children in the state of  Texas:
    • See Handout Page 104
    • Encourages agencies to conduct reviews of operations with a focus on opportunities for enhancement rather than citations
    • Encourages DFPS to adopt more uniform interpretation of CPS licensing standards
  • Rep. Burkett:
    • Does more stringent screening hamper finding foster homes? It does hinder bringing on more homes and has caused the loss of a number of foster homes.
    • What do you mean by criminal offenses? Convictions rather than arrests and the type of convictions given
    • Are frequent visitors family, vendors, etc…? Many times its church members and family
    • Do you feel unannounced visits have been beneficial? Yes, extremely
    • Are there any measures to deal with agency hopping (when a foster family doesn’t pass screening standards in a certain region and goes to another one with less stringent standards)? Many times the hopping is due to a failed criminal background check and that info is accessible across regions, thus thwarting attempts to agency hop
  • Rep. Frank:
    • Observation- we have state standards for foster facilities and foster organizations create additional standards to strengthen the screening process. Maybe it would be beneficial to use only state standards as a minimal threshold in order to increase foster approvals and create a less stringent/confusing screening process
    • What is the most common reason people are turned down as being foster parents? Background checks

 
Dan Johnson, President Pathways Youth and Family Services

  • Overview of program pertaining to screening, assessment, training, and support of potential foster and kinship families:

 
Public Testimony
 
Christopher Sharp, former foster child

  • Foster children need better access to secure mistreatment reporting; in reality, reporting by foster children is very infrequent and ineffective because foster children fear retaliation

 
April McWilliams, former foster child

  • Foster children need to be informed of their status and options, we need to make the process more transparent; foster children aren’t given enough say in how their foster matters should be handled
  • Rep. Frank:
    • Why didn’t you like your permanency program? The lack of transparency and not being informed of my options

 
Sandra Carpenter, Executive Director Angel Reach (kinship home assistance)

  • We need to expedite the foster application process

 
Lena Francis, Angel Reach

  • We need to provide a safe, trusting environment for foster children

 
Tyrone Obaseki, Mental Health Clinician Angel Reach

  • Foster/kinship families should be evaluated emotionally and mentally during the screening process
  • Rep. Frank:
    • Are you seeing the problems primarily in foster facilities or homes? Group homes with a high number of foster children

 
Samantha Bryant, Brave

  • Foster children should be informed of their rights

 
Deborah Dickerson

  • Grandparents who receive children from CPS need educational assistance on childcare
  • Rep. Frank:
    • What’s the difference between foster and kinship support? Kinship families do not receive the financial assistance that foster families do

 
Christy Rome, Self

  • We need a system that helps to screen out inadequate foster families and encourages quality families to step forward and become foster families; we can do this by reducing the costs of becoming a foster family
  • There are a number of requirements we could do away with in order to alleviate the burden of foster care on families; for example there are burdensome requirements for babysitters that foster families can use which is a large impediment and deters many people from fostering

 
Ashley Harris, Texans Care for Children

  • We need more consistent and stronger screening standards for potential foster families
  • We need to develop more standardized training and family screening processes across the state
  • Annual home screenings would help case workers to make better placements
  • The state must make efforts to reduce case workers’ caseloads to ensure adequate assistance

 
Andrew Homer, Texas CASA

  • Recommends a standardized assessment of caregivers, specifically an assessment of caregivers’ ability to attach to the children they work with (building trust)
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • How much time does an individual spend training to become a CASA volunteer? The minimum curriculum is 30 hours of coursework with additional time for court observation and continuing education
    • How often do CASA volunteers see the children they’re assigned? Usually once a month
  • Rep. Frank:
    • With the attachment screening are you suggesting a stripped down version of the assessment? Yes, we are developing a stripped down version that would be localized to Texas

 
Johana Scot, Parent Guidance Center

  • It’s ridiculous that foster parents aren’t required to have a GED but parents attempting to get their children back from the State are

 
Judy Powell, Parent Guidance Center

  • The State should implement a probationary period for foster parents where interactions with the children can be monitored to assess compatibility; this would allow potential foster parents to deduce what age group of children they are best equipped for

 
Chuck Oeeter, Giocosa Foundation

  • Can the department allow access to investigation records for potential foster homes prior to licensing? Maybe… open access to investigation records is included within the department’s recently proposed rule changes
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • Is there a way we can make this request a possibility? Answer John Specia: maybe… open access to investigation records is included within the department’s recently proposed rule changes

 
Angel Cook, Self

  • Request to make maltreatment report methods more available to children in State care
  • Presented defense to the “false” accusation that her 4 year old foster child died because of maltreatment in the form of food and water deprivation; the murder allegations stemmed from false testimony by CPS caseworkers
  • Rep. James:
    • During all of this, was there only one social worker involved with your children? No there were 5, but one in particular did a poor job

 
Bryan Cook, Self

  • Testimony in regards to the sexual and physical maltreatment during his foster care stay, and the lack of protective measures taken by caseworkers after reporting maltreatment

 
Justin Cook, Self

  • Testimony in regards sexual abuse by both his foster parents and fellow foster children, and the failure of his social worker to take any protective measures after receiving reports of the maltreatment
  • Requested accountability for social workers’ misconduct and failure to respond properly to maltreatment

 
Judy Powell, Parent Guidance Center

  • CPS has zero accountability which leads to rampant mistreatment and corruption
  • CPS should never require a placed foster child to call their foster parents mom and dad
  • Rep. Dukes:
    • Can you provide us with copies of report response letters from the office of the Ombudsman to parents?

 
Johana Scot, Parent Guidance Center

  • Can we rename the Ombudsman office?
  • Use the same investigational scrutiny on foster parents that is used on biological parents