DAYTONA BEACH -- Shifting more money to help families -- whose children otherwise would be taken away by social agencies -- would help save on the billions of dollars alleged child abuse costs the country each year, a study released Tuesday shows.

Local experts agree it's less costly to provide services to families in their homes instead of the long-term impacts of separating children from their families and placing them in foster care.

New national studies show alleged child abuse and neglect cost an estimated $103.8 billion in 2007 because of long-range implications to children and families, including hospitalizations, mental health counseling and costs to law enforcement, jails and court systems.

Advocates are calling for Congress to give states more say in how about $7 billion in federal funding is spent instead of the majority being restricted to paying for foster care services. The studies were conducted by Prevent Child Abuse America and Kids Are Waiting, a project of The Pew Charitable Trusts, two nonprofit child-advocacy groups.

Jim Hmurovich, president and CEO of Prevent Child Abuse America, said there are too many adverse effects of abuse on children being in foster care, "not to mention the human suffering that the child goes through." He said it's better to spend the money to prevent the alleged abuse from occurring in the first place.

Local officials hope state funding isn't cut this legislative session for child welfare services and a prevention program that works with at-risk families.

Healthy Families Florida, a home visiting program that contracts locally, received $30.5 million last year to operate its program statewide. The program helps parents with everything from discipline techniques to getting children immunized and attending doctors appointments. More than 13,000 families were helped last fiscal year, including 476 locally.

"We've seen families grow and flourish," said Dixie L. Morgese, executive director of the local contractor, Healthy Start Coalition of Flagler and Volusia Counties.

Local child welfare officials are also starting a new program in July intended to reduce the number of allegedly abused or neglected children being removed from their homes. On average, 40 local children a month are removed; the goal is to reduce that to 25.

Here's how the program will work: If the alleged abuse is not egregious, state investigators will connect families with social workers who visit homes several times a week for parenting training and counseling. A crisis response team does that now, but the new program will be more intense and will cover more families, officials said.

Too many studies, officials say, show children placed in foster care have higher risks for everything from pregnancy to committing crimes.

Those statistics "show us if we can keep the family together and solve the problem, we can do better for kids," said Ron Zychowski, president and CEO of Community Partnership for Children, which provides local foster care and other services.

In one of the studies released Tuesday, it shows that the main reason children entered foster care in Florida based on 2005 statistics was because the parent allegedly had a substance abuse problem.

Florida currently has more flexibility than other states when it comes to spending federal dollars on prevention after receiving a special waiver in October 2006. State officials couldn't say how much of that federal money is now being spent on prevention, but said child welfare agencies spent 5.7 percent of their total budget on prevention in fiscal year 2006-2007, compared to 3.2 percent the year earlier.

"We want to provide appropriate services so if a child can safely remain at home, that can be done," said Don Winstead, deputy secretary for the state Department of Children & Families.

deborah.circelli@news-jrnl.com

At a Glance

A national study released Tuesday shows the annual estimated cost of alleged child abuse and neglect in 2007 was $103.8 billion. The cost includes foster care, hospitalization for abuse injuries, mental health counseling, special education for abused children, law enforcement, legal and jail services for adults and juveniles and long-term loss of income for a child later on in life for having been abused.

· Average yearly cost per alleged victim of abuse: $66,775

· Average yearly cost per tax-paying family: $1,340

· Average cost per day nationally: $284.2 million

SOURCE: Prevent Child Abuse America

http://www.news-journalonline.com/NewsJournalOnline/News/Headlines/frtHEAD05013008.htm