DHS reforms show progress, but some challenges remain
The Oklahoma Department of Human Services has made progress in reforming its child welfare system, but areas of concern remain and future progress is threatened by state budget issues.
Those are conclusions contained in a report released last week by three out-of-state monitors.
“The advancements made to date are fragile, and not yet fully rooted, particularly with respect to manageable caseloads and an adequate array of placements for children,” the three child welfare experts said. “Budget pressures loom large presently, and threaten the pace and progress of the overall reform effort at a critical time.”
The experts were retained to oversee reform efforts as part of a negotiated settlement to a Tulsa class-action lawsuit over the maltreatment of children in state custody. The settlement was reached in 2012. This is the ninth progress report submitted by the monitors, who file a report every six months.
The reports monitor the state’s progress in meeting 31 specific goals related to reducing maltreatment in care, increasing the availability of
quality foster homes, providing enough caseworker visits, providing foster children with stable placements, reducing the use of shelters, speeding up adoptions and reducing caseloads.
The latest report was largely positive, crediting Oklahoma’s child welfare agency with making “good faith efforts to achieve substantial and sustained progress” toward meeting 24 of 31 specific performance goals.
The overseers reserved judgment in seven other categories that related to having sufficient therapeutic foster homes, providing stable placements and reducing the use of shelters.
Perhaps most significantly, the monitors reported that for three consecutive reporting periods the agency has been able to achieve a gradual decrease in the percentage of children abused while in state care.
The rate of maltreatment of children in state care stood at 1.27 percent when the state began monitoring its reform efforts during the April 2013 through March 2014 time period.
To the consternation of state child welfare workers, the rate of maltreatment actually increased during the initial years of reform efforts, reaching a high of 1.58 percent during the October 2014 through September 2015 time span.
Since that time, however, reform efforts have helped to gradually lower the maltreatment rate to 1.16 percent for the most recent April 2016 through March 2017 reporting period.
“This measure indicates that children in DHS’ custody were beginning to be safer during the report period than they were at the outset of the reform effort, an important outcome of DHS’ enhanced oversight, investments, focus and practice improvement,” overseers said.
The state still has a ways to go to meet its goal of having no more than 0.32 percent of children abused in state care.
DHS reported that 182 of the 15,753 children in state care were maltreated during the most recent reporting period.
To achieve its target, the agency would have needed to keep at least 132 more children safe from abuse and neglect by a resource caregiver.
The 222-page report was a mixture of good news and bad news.
For example, the overseers reported that DHS and its private agency partners approved 884 new traditional foster homes during state fiscal year 2017.
The 470 new foster homes approved during the first half of the fiscal year were “the highest number of new homes DHS has approved during the first half of any fiscal year during this reform effort,” the monitors noted.
Now for the bad news: DHS closed more traditional foster homes than it opened this past fiscal year, leading to a net loss of 207 open foster homes at a time when it had a goal of achieving a net gain of 325.
Perhaps even more concerning, every year since reforms were initiated the state has experienced a net loss in the number of therapeutic foster homes used to care for children with intensive behavioral health needs.
DHS reported 615 open therapeutic foster homes as of June 30, 2012, but five years later reported having just 278 — a reduction of more than 50 percent.
Part of the decrease was due to a decision by DHS to remove homes that hadn’t accepted child placements for more than 90 days from the list of available therapeutic foster homes, the overseers said.
The agency also intensified its focus on home quality and closed certain therapeutic foster homes after reviewing data that showed the maltreatment of children in therapeutic foster homes had been disproportionately high during the October 2015 through September 2016 reporting period, the monitors noted.
While those efforts decreased the number of available therapeutic foster homes, they succeeded in lowering the rate of abuse of children in therapeutic foster homes from 9.51 percent to 5.34 percent.
Several state officials said they were pleased by the progress noted in the report.
“My thanks go out to DHS employees for their hard work, as well as Oklahoma legislators for making the necessary financial commitment to support these important reforms,” said Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin.
“The success of the reforms to the child welfare system is critical to ensuring the state can provide adequate protection and care to vulnerable Oklahoma children.”
Tom Bates, special adviser to Gov. Fallin and interim advocate general for the Office of Client Advocacy, said he was “particularly pleased with the progress to reduce abuse and neglect of children in our care.”
“Many of the youth in DHS custody today have unique intellectual and behavioral needs, which makes caring for them extremely challenging,” he said.
“DHS’ traumainformed approach is working but we will need additional resources to ensure these youth are safe and accepted in communities around the state.”
DHS Director Ed Lake credited support from the governor and Legislature for progress that has been made to date.
“That support is definitely still needed if we are to ultimately succeed in meeting the terms of our settlement agreement and maintaining a quality child welfare system,” he said.