Federal audits of state CPS agencies done summer '02.

Federal law requires that states make diligent efforts to place children with relatives or loose federal funding. However, ongoing USDHHS audits have disclosed that 13 of those state child protective agencies examined failed to comply with this requirement.

For example, in 33% of the cases in Nebraska, that state agency had "made no efforts to explore the possibility of relative placements or had conducted only a limited exploration.." (USDHHS, 2002:Pg 9). To be in substantial compliance, federal law requires that state agencies prove they have made "diligent efforts" to locate relatives explore the possibility of placement with relatives in at least 90% of its cases. Nebraska's 67% is considerably below that requirement.

Other states discovered in the CFS audits to be in substantial non-compliance and as "needing improvement" in making diligent efforts to locate family members for placement were:

Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Conn., Indiana, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvana, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

USDHHS has withheld millions of dollars in Title IV-E funding from states in violation. The funding is being withheld pending the states making changes and proving they will be in substantial compliance with these requirements in the future.

Congress ordered the USDHHS state by state audits in the Omibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993. Public Law 103-66 authorized the Department to review State child and family service programs in order to assess compliance with the State plan requirements set forth in titles IV-B and IV-E of the Social Security Act (the Act).


The requirement that states seek placement with relatives first is one of six components to Child Outcome in Permanency, Section 2 of the audit. This section measures state agency performance in providing visitation for foster children with their parents, preserving family connections for foster children, supporting a relationship between foster children and their parents, efforts to place siblings together, and placement of foster children in proximity to their parents. Incredibly, only 5 of the 31 state agencies examined were in compliance with this section.

http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cb/cwrp/staterpt/index.htm

Nebraska, for instance, failed in 4 of the 6. The auditors found that that state agency failed to make efforts to provide parental visitation in 29% of the cases reviewed. Further, Nebraska failed to make efforts to maintain the parental bond ("family connections) in almost half - 45% -- of the foster kid cases.

Federal law requires that states make diligent efforts to locate relatives and explore placement possibilities with them first. Further, states must make ongoing efforts to provide parental visitation for children in foster care and maintain the bond between the kids and their extended family members.

As the audits have disclosed, the states have done a very poor job of complying in these areas. They will have to make major changes in policy or lose substantial amounts of federal bucks.

BTW, while we are talking about Nebraska, did you know that in 1999 83.7% of the 1,972 children exiting foster care were reported to the federal government as "missing"?

http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cb/publications/cwo99/statedata/ne.htm

The mid-western state reported that 5.1% were adopted, 11.1% were reunified with their parents, 0.1% exited to "other" places and 83.7% wandered of into some kind of giant donut hole.

Readers interested in reviewing the federal, CFS audits of 31 state child welfare agencies can go to:

http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cb/cwrp/staterpt/index.htm

This post was written by Doug.  Fosters might wish to consider this before accepting placements. 

Parents who have children in the *stranger foster care system* in the above mentioned states might wish to contact family members to foster their children, if they already have not done so.  You may have grounds for a Federal lawsuit if your children were disallowed being placed with family.  Consult an atty in your state about that.