Through the Eyes of the Child Initiative

The Early Development Network: Babies Can’t Wait shared the 2011 Helping Babies From the Bench program, which focuses on children in the court system, today in Grand Island. “We have invited a group of stakeholders in the child welfare system, child welfare workers, CASA workers, educators, attorneys and foster parents,” Amy Bunnell, Nebraska’s Department of Health and Human Services (NDHHS) state coordinator for early development, said. “What we are doing is presenting information on the impact of trauma and appropriate court practices that will produce appropriate court outcomes for children from birth to five.” [...]
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The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services brings commitment to child welfare and juvenile services reform, Nebraska DHHS CEO Kerry Winterer said during a visit to Scottsbluff Wednesday. Winterer spoke about the current Families Matter initiative to reform Nebraska’s child welfare and juvenile services system. Families Matter is a multi-year initiative, which is also driven by improving services by federal requirements for safety, permanency and well-being of the children in the state. Previous practices by Nebraska DHHS can’t be sustained, Winterer said. Efforts to begin transforming the delivery of services started in 2006. For years, “Nebraska has been at the bottom of the list in terms of the number of kids we take out of homes.” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reports have highlighted that Nebraska exceeds the national average of state wards and ranks at or near the top in the number of children removed from homes. [...]
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ebraska's attempt to privatize the child welfare system resulted in a shift to a lead agency that was ill-prepared to manage the system or train its workers, confused communication by adding another layer of bureaucracy and shorted payments to foster parents to the point that many have quit, speakers at a legislative hearing said Wednesday. Seven testifiers before the Legislature's Health and Human Services Committee outlined problems with the state's hiring of Boys and Girls Home to oversee the foster care and child welfare system in two areas of the state, including Central Nebraska's Central Service Area. The state ended the contract in October 2010, but it is still negotiating a settlement payment to Boys and Girls Home while trying to figure out the next level of reform. "When everybody's in charge, nobody's in charge," Hall County Attorney Mark Young said. "There needs to be clear lines of communication and clear lines of responsibility." [...]
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State officials hope to reach agreement soon on getting long-overdue payments to some foster parents, therapists and other child welfare providers. Kerry Winterer, CEO of the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, said letters outlining a potential agreement went out Thursday. They were sent to providers who had subcontracted with Boys and Girls Home when that Sioux City-based organization held a contract to oversee child welfare services in the central, northern and western areas of Nebraska. The state ended Boys and Girls Home's contract in October because of financial and management concerns, among which were delays in paying subcontractors. [...]
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Children who are removed from their parents for abuse or neglect allegations experience better outcomes when judges follow a set of decision-making guidelines during the initial removal hearing, according to a study released today by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ). Development of a benchcard containing the guidelines grew out of a national NCJFCJ initiative, Courts Catalyzing Change: Achieving Equity and Fairness in Foster Care (CCC). In partnership with Casey Family Programs and the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, NCJFCJ member judges throughout the country are working to reduce the overrepresentation of children of color in the foster care system along with the disparate outcomes they and their families experience. Researchers tracked more than 500 children through the court system in three cities and found that 45% more children were able to return home to their parents or live with extended family members when judges used the benchcard during their hearings. [...]
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Before turning over major responsibility for Nebraska's child welfare system to private contractors, state officials said the change would help abused and neglected children. Fewer children would be torn from their homes. Fewer would become wards of the state. Children would not be bounced from foster home to foster home. Families would be reunified or children adopted sooner. What's more, those benefits could be gained with existing state dollars. Yet 20 months into the reform, the costs to the state have escalated, instability within the system has grown and benefits have been mixed, at best. [...]
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A national expert warned Nebraska lawmakers Thursday that privatizing child welfare can take a decade or two to yield results. Even then, the experiences of other states show the benefits are not clear-cut, said Jack Tweedie, director of the National Conference of State Legislatures’ Children and Families Program. “There are positive results here, but it took a while and they are not unmixed results,” he said. “There are not quick payoffs and certainly not cost savings.” Tweedie briefed members of the Health and Human Services Committee and other interested lawmakers about child welfare initiatives in other states. He focused on Kansas and Florida, the two states that have turned over key responsibilities for ensuring the safety and well-being of abused and neglected children statewide. The legislative panel met as part of an investigation into Nebraska’s venture into child welfare privatization, which began in November 2009. The effort has encountered several difficulties since then. Three of the five original contractors have lost or dropped their contracts, largely because of financial concerns. The largest contractor, KVC, laid off 15 percent of its workforce last week, along with getting a $5.5 million infusion of money from the state in an effort to stay afloat. [...]
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Many challenges exist for states that privatize child welfare, two officials from the National Conference of State Legislatures told Nebraska state senators Thursday. Privatization doesn't solve all the problems states hope it will. What's more, it doesn't save money, but actually costs more for many years. With or without privatization, said Nina Williams-Mbengue, a Conference of State Legislatures program director, there has been a decline nationwide in the number of children in foster care -- a 15 percent decrease between 2005 and 2009. Nebraska mirrors that, but at a lower rate, she said. Still, private agencies potentially can help improve foster care if the design and implementation is well thought out, said Jack Tweedie, director of NCSL's Children and Families Program. Read more: http://journalstar.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/article_bdcc56a9-a5c4-53b9-81d2-f660dc7cfa98.html#ixzz1RvNLym1A [...]
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Former foster child Haley Graupner doesn't want to admit the numbers are accurate, because they tell such a sad story. But kids like her, who age out of the foster care system, have less education, higher arrest and incarceration rates, higher poverty and more homelessness as young adults than peers who were not in foster care. Those statistics were outlined Wednesday at the Summit for Youth Permanency, which brought about 250 professionals, policy makers, judges, foster parents and caseworkers to the Cornhusker Marriott to discuss how to support young people who are transitioning from foster care. Graupner, 19, said she was doing all right when she first got out of foster care, but then problems knocked her down. Her guardianship fell through and she was forced to get an apartment. When her roommate left suddenly, she was homeless. She had entered foster care at age 9 and maneuvered her way through 27 placements, she said. Read more: http://journalstar.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/article_3513a871-fdc6-5241-89c2-cfbe705b9478.html#ixzz1RvNijtTy [...]
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A longtime provider of child welfare services in the Lincoln area is putting out a plea for foster parents. Cedars President Jim Blue said there is a critical need for willing foster parents. His agency alone has had to seek alternative care, such as group homes, or turn down the requests for placement for at least 30 children per week who would be served best in a foster home, he said. Group homes are not always appropriate placements, especially for younger children. Hundreds of children are placed in foster care each year in southeast Nebraska. But in the past six months, he said, there's been a steady increase in the number of kids needing out-of-home placements in Lincoln and the surrounding area. That has put an increased demand on an already limited supply of quality foster homes. Read more: http://journalstar.com/news/local/article_50cd53dd-f3cb-5c16-a519-5d52504c5cd3.html#ixzz1RvQKhPx3 [...]
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