DCS aims to augment lingering case backlog

Agency wants to put focus on closing out reports

A backlog of thousands of cases has hung like a dark cloud over the Department of Child Safety.

Currently at 13,366, it consists of case files of child abuse and neglect that have not been touched for 60 days and for which no social services have been ordered.

The Legislature wants to get rid of the backlog and use a private contractor to do much of the work. Meanwhile, DCS has come up with another way to measure its progress in shedding that dark cloud — one that makes the problem appear to be declining.

The agency argues 60 days of no activity is “an unreliable metric” to assess child safety because many of those case files need only notes entered to close them.

Instead, DCS is focused on closing the reports, which are created when a call comes into the state’s child-abuse hotline. Because a given case can involve numerous reports, when reports are resolved they will eventually lead to cases being closed, the agency argues.

In nine of the past 12 months, the agency has closed more reports than came in, a trend DCS has been quick to highlight.

But statistics show that hasn’t yet led to the end goal: fewer kids in state care. As of late January, the agency was overseeing the care of 21,455 kids, counting those children who are living at home but under DCS supervision.

DCS, working with an efficiency expert from the Government Transformation Office, is confident those numbers will come down. Meanwhile, it still has to deal with those 21,455 cases.

The increasing number of kids in care is due more to children staying longer under state supervision than kids being removed, the agency says.

Senate President Andy Biggs, R-Gilbert, is skeptical of the agency’s new approach to defining the backlog.

“I don’t think definitional changes make a difference,” he said. Like many other lawmakers, Biggs is frustrated about the lack of progress.

DCS says it’s not trying to redefine the backlog, but wants to “augment” how it’s viewed by pointing to the importance of closing reports.

When the Legislature created DCS in May 2014, the new agency inherited a 13,024-case backlog. The Legislature gave the agency $29 million to deal with it, and DCS administrators set a goal of cutting the backlog to zero by July 2015.

Instead, the backlog grew. And the money couldn’t be properly accounted for.

Greg McKay, who became DCS director a year ago, told state lawmakers last fall that the money was not well spent by a prior administration, but didn’t have details. His office now says about 15 percent of the $29 million was used for overtime pay to work on the backlog and the rest went to services needed for the children and families listed in some of those backlogged reports.

Joint Legislative Budget Committee staff says it’s impossible to trace the dollars, short of a forensic audit.

Lawmakers have responded with a proposal requiring the agency to hire a private contractor.

“We don’t even know if these kids are safe or not,” said Sen. Debbie Lesko, RPeoria, who introduced the legislation. The extra help would address fears that kids are languishing in unsafe conditions, she said.

“My goal is to alleviate this problem for DCS so they can take on the new cases,” Lesko said when she introduced Senate Bill 1142 last month.

Since then, the bill, as well as a similar version in the House, has won committee approval. The plan has been modified to give DCS oversight of the process and a July 2017 deadline has been cut out, to give the process more flexibility.