Legacy of disaster underlies drastic dysfunction of John Bel Edwards’ agencies

With state agencies under historic challenges involving crime and abuse of children — toddlers dead after government and law enforcement failed to act, the juvenile justice system out of room for troubled youth — Gov. John Bel Edwards might well be accused of trying to shift the blame away from his appointees and his budget policies.

If he is, it’s not going to work. But it makes no sense to look at the specific issues without dealing with the broader context, and that is going to be challenging not only to the current administration but to whomever is elected next year to replace Edwards.

“There is no denying that child welfare agencies nationwide are facing very difficult and complex challenges and Louisiana is no exception,” Edwards said after particularly horrific cases mishandled by the Department of Children and Family Services.

In that statement, accepting the resignation of DCFS head Marketa Garner Walters, the governor — as so often — talked about the mechanics of the challenges facing a state department trying to help abused children.

“Those issues include staff retention, high worker caseloads, increased substance and domestic abuse, and sadly the tragic deaths of innocent children,” Edwards said. “While there are no quick solutions, it is urgent that we find new and effective ways of addressing the problems to make certain we provide the help our families need and deserve and to move our agency forward.”

If that seems a tad bureaucratic in light of the deaths of fentanyl-poisoned toddlers, it is: The conse

quences of these missteps and failures by agencies Edwards is in charge of haven’t been a few missed deadlines or an aggrieved politician here or there, but truly tragic losses to our state and its communities.

Life-long losses, starting from age 2.

But to borrow from the governor’s words, we can’t deny that he has a point, and many of his same words could apply to the virtual collapse of the juvenile justice system.

The agency drew criticism from judges and district attorneys when it served notice that there’s no room for more young offenders. Not that the agency has been doing a very good job of the difficult task of turning arrested kids away from a life of crime, despite good intentions.

What underlies the problems in both these areas of state government is a society under new stress.

That is reflected in conversations with district attorneys and judges in the courts, not to mention cops — and not just on the mean streets of bigcity New Orleans, but in places where one homicide in a decade used to be the norm but where now they’re looking at double-digit murders.

Talk to social workers and anti-poverty agencies, and their perspective is near that of officialdom. Although these folks are probably quicker to bring up the proliferation of guns in unstable hands, another larger reality that politicians often shy away from.

Families that were on the edge before — insert cataclysmic event of choice here, whether it be the pandemic, Hurricane Laura or whatever — have been damaged. And once they topple over the myriad lines of bad behavior or child neglect, they make headlines like the ones from DCFS and the Office of Juvenile Justice. Or the crime reports.

The youth in today’s OJJ prisons were toddlers when their families were scattered by hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005.

The governor is commissioning a major study of DCFS to figure out how to deal with the new reality there. But there’s no denying that the problem is more than how a state agency is organized, or disorganized.

The next governor faces a new world. No denying.