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Brewer announces CPS dissolution in State of State
Arizona has no choice but to overhaul CPS
December 15, 2013 12:00 am • By Sarah Garrecht GassenLoading…
Info box
The CARE Team that is examining the 6,554 unexamined child abuse and neglect reports will make recommendations on how to improve Child Protective Services. They're taking suggestions and comments from the public via toll-free phone line 1-855-394-3253 and online at azcareteam.az.gov
Arizona’s child-protection and -welfare system does not work — and, as we have noted, it is not built to work. In fact, to state that the Child Protective Services system has been “built” suggests a process of intentional development that no one with common sense could find in its jumble of bureaucracy, paperwork and contradictory missions.
The latest scandal, the discovery of 6,554 reports of child abuse and neglect going back to 2009 that were set aside and never investigated, a practice that put unknown numbers of children in danger, must be the last in a depressingly long list of CPS failures.
But without an exhaustive examination of how Arizona responds to families in crisis and the commitment to making large-scale improvements, including those we know will cost money and lots of it, no amount of bemoaning a broken system will make a whit of difference.
Over several decades Arizona has swung between emphasizing family reunification, child safety and reducing the number of kids placed in foster care. The changes in direction have been prompted by murders or serious injury of children who were known to CPS, sometimes combined with agency leadership changes spurred by tragedy or politics.
It’s a national trend, according to Theresa Costello, the executive director of ACTION for Child Protection and director of the National Resources Center for Child Protective Services. The organization has worked with Arizona within the last decade on procedures for determining if a child is safe, but is not now involved.
“I think our child protective services, at large, are very reactive to those kind of tragedies,” she said. “We have seen many, many circumstances where policies are changed based on one bad case and it doesn’t end up to be good changes.”
The instability that creates prevents improvements from taking hold, Costello said.
Arizona was an early adopter of what is now being recognized as an effective way to keep children safe and allocating resources.
It’s often called “differential response” or “family assessment response” and is based on the effective triaging of initial reports of child abuse or neglect. Minnesota has had good results, Costello said, and other communities are beginning to use it.
Reports coming in are assessed at the beginning; those that include sexual abuse or severe physical abuse, for example, are sent to child-welfare caseworkers for full investigation.
Low-risk families are referred directly to community agencies that help with child care, parenting classes, drug treatment and similar support services, and the family participates voluntarily.
“By differentiating between these two and saying not all families are the same, that has allowed communities to put resources into investigating,” Costello said.
Arizona did this until 2003, when the Legislature required that every report be investigated — it was a reaction to the deaths of children who had been known to CPS.
The change is understandable, to demand that every case be investigated. But what sounds like a good idea can have unintended consequences. A flood of reports can overwhelm a system beset by high employee turnover and crushing caseloads.
An independent team headed by Charles Flanagan, director of the Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections, is examining those 6,554 cases and will create a set of reform recommendations, which is planned by Jan. 31, said Jennifer Bowser, spokeswoman for the Child Advocate Response Evaluation, or CARE, Team.
The evidence is clear that the existing CPS system is not capable of keeping up with the needs of Arizona children and families. Every option, including returning to a differential-response approach, must be carefully considered.
We have no choice but to change.
http://azstarnet.com/news/opinion/arizona-has-no-choice-but-to-overhaul-cps/article_c53e4f8d-e6ee-536e-b564-e01024be529c.html
AZ Governor Uses ‘State Of State’ Address To Get Rid Of Child Protective Services
With the scandal of over 6000 uninvestigated child abuse cases hanging over her head, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer dissolved Child Protective Services (CPS) by executive order. She made the unexpected announcement on Monday during her State of the State address to the legislature. Child advocacy groups and politically progressive groups have been calling on her to take action over the scandal. They especially wanted her to dismiss the Department of Economic Security director, Clarence Carter. Carter, who was appointed to his position by Brewer, was responsible for the oversight of CPS. He still has not been fired but, if Brewer has her way, CPS itself will disappear right out from under him.
The 6,000 abuse cases were ‘mis-classified.’
The cases came to light last November. A local police department was investigating allegations that had already been reported to CPS. A CPS worker found that, while the report came through the state’s child-abuse hotline, it was ‘mis-classified’ as ‘not investigated’. That classification meant that someone decided that it, along with 6,000 other reports, should not be investigated. At the time, CPS’s caseloads were climbing. They are currently at 177 percent of the national standard. Brewer’s solution to the problem is to create a cabinet-level, free-standing agency. The head of it will report directly to her. The man she chose in her executive order is Charles Flanagan, her appointed director of the Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections. Flanagan has already been dealing with the abuse cases since December, as head of a special team. Brewer charged them with finding out why the cases were ignored in the first place.
Legislators of both parties question Brewer’s methods regarding CPS.
While some see the governor’s announcement as progress, others are skeptical. House minority leader, Rep. Chad Campbell, D-Phoenix, disputed the idea that Brewer could dissolve CPS. Plus, he was wary of her choices. In response to her announcement, he said:
Quite frankly, her appointee that was heading up CPS is what got us in this mess in the first place. And now she just did another appointee for what seems like a new entity without any input from us [the legislature] again.
Other lawmakers expressed similar discomfort with the governor’s heavy-handedness, particularly in not consulting them. Sen. Chester Crandall, R-Heber, pointed out that changing the name of the responsible agency means nothing without laws to govern it and money to run it. Those missing ingredients can only come from the legislature. This isn’t the first time Brewer has tried to strong-arm the body into doing her bidding.
Apparently, she has a campaign underway to burnish her tarnished image before she leaves office at the end of the year. Last spring, she bullied her own party into accepting Medicaid expansion in the state, which meant a windfall of additional federal dollars for the state. Both that and reforming the handling of child abuse cases are commendable goals, whatever the governor’s motivation. But putting the change at risk of failure due to the tactics she uses could prove to be very unfortunate.
There are children who are suffering, and they have already suffered enough.
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/01/14/jan-brewer-dissolves-cps/
2 Arizona child welfare investigators fired
Originally published: Mar 22, 2014 - 2:40 pm
PHOENIX -- State officials on Friday said none of the cases handled by two fired child-welfare investigators have been compromised.
Two investigators with the state Office of Child Welfare Investigations were recently dismissed after it was revealed their resumes had false or incomplete information.
Child welfare investigations office spokeswoman Jennifer Bowser told the Arizona Capitol Times that none of their cases are at risk of being invalidated.
Bowser declined to comment on the circumstances surrounding the dismissals.
Some attorneys, however, said false backgrounds of investigators who may have served as witnesses can raise credibility issues in criminal and juvenile court proceedings.
Bill Owsley, at attorney with the Maricopa County Office of the Legal Advocate who represents children in Child Protective Services cases, said questions about investigators' integrity can jeopardize information they gathered that nobody else can corroborate.
The allegations made against the fired officers include lying about prior employment and omitting the reason for a past departure. According to a summary of an Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board investigation, investigator David Neuss admitted to sending an explicit cellphone photo of himself to a girlfriend while he on duty at the Pima County Sheriff's Office. The report also shows that Neuss quit after the admission but was also officially fired.
Neuss told the Times that he didn't offer the information because Greg McKay, the agency's chief of child welfare investigations, never asked.
"If he didn't look into it, it's his problem," Neuss said.
Neuss also still believes his firing was because of a political spat between McKay and the Pima County Sheriff's Office.
Records show investigator Joshua Ekrem was dismissed after it was discovered he lied about being a former deputy with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
"Based on conversations with this employee, OCWI Chief Greg McKay began to question the veracity of some of the information this employee shared with him," Bowser said.
Ekrem was not immediately available for comment.
The agency was established by the Legislature in 2012 after a task force recommended the idea in the wake of several high-profile child deaths.
A group appointed by Gov. Jan Brewer currently working on legislation to make Child Protective Services a stand-alone agency has not yet figured out what role the Office of Child Welfare Investigations will play.
The group last week removed language from a draft giving police authority to investigators. ___
Information from: Arizona Capitol Times, http://www.arizonacapitoltimes.com
Associated Press
http://ktar.com/22/1716113/2-Arizona-child-welfare-investigators-fired
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