The Oklahoma Department of Human Services has not made a “good faith effort” at attracting new foster homes, bringing down worker caseloads, reducing shelter use for children older than 6, staffing the hotline and finding permanent homes for foster children, according to a report issued Wednesday by an independent oversight panel.
The report is the third commentary on the improvement plan, referred to as the Pinnacle Plan. It is the agreement made to settle a federal class-action lawsuit in 2012 filed four years earlier by the nonprofit group Children’s Rights.
The three-person monitoring panel releases opinions on how the agency is progressing in improving the 15 areas of the plan. That includes the target dates for benchmarks toward the overall goal. It is a five-year plan.
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The monitors pointed to the gains DHS has made during the first two years.
“At the time the Pinnacle Plan was finalized, DHS leadership faced the steep challenge of reforming an under-staffed, under-resourced agency with a rising population of vulnerable children in its custody, and a pattern of housing very young children, including infants, in overcrowded shelters,” the report states.
By reorganizing the department and receiving more than $93 million from the state, DHS has eliminated shelter use for children through age 6, increased caseworker visitation and strengthened its investigations of abuse allegations of children in institutional care.
“Yet, despite this progress, there are reforms required by the (settlement) and contained in the Pinnacle Plan, which are vital to children’s interests, but have not taken hold,” the monitors stated.
The monitors used strong language, saying DHS “must confront immediately” the areas not meeting the goals.
High turnover is blamed on the finding that less than 30 percent of workers met the goal for manageable caseloads.
“High caseloads drove, in part, 40 percent of new workers statewide to leave DHS (last year),” the report states.
“In some local offices, turnover rates are 40 percent or higher overall (including all workers), creating a caseload crisis for both the workers who remain and the children and families on their caseloads.”
DHS has been struggling to staff the child abuse and neglect hotline, with 46 percent of positions vacant in June, the monitors found.
“The dearth of staff support has, at times, caused unacceptably long delays – on some days in excess of two hours – for callers trying to report allegations of child abuse and neglect,” the report states.
The monitors were reserving judgment in the areas of maltreatment of children while in care, number of new therapeutic foster homes and number of placements while in care.
Some specific targets in shelter use, permanency and caseload data are under review.
The results are a serious concern, said Marcia Robinson Lowry, lead attorney for the plaintiffs and director of the national children’s advocacy organization A Better Childhood.
“Now, two years into the implementation of the Pinnacle Plan, and with additional resources from the Legislature, this agency continues to fail children, with inexcusable examples of mismanagement and resulting harm to children,” Lowry stated in a press release.
“Children are actually in danger in the Oklahoma child welfare system as it is currently being operated. That was why the lawsuit was necessary in the first place.”
The monitors — Kevin Ryan, Kathleen Noonan and Eileen Crummy — were appointed by agreement of both sides and are considered experts in the field living out-of-state.
They have the power to return the case to federal court for sanctions at any time. Plantiffs can bring the case back at the conclusion of the five-year time limit if the court-mandated goals have not been met.
Tulsa attorney Fred Dorwart, who served as a co-counsel for the plaintiffs, said the monitors have the authority to take action if DHS fails to achieve “positive trending or begins to trend negatively.”
“The facts provided in this report cry out for the (monitors) to exercise that authority and for the federal court to enforce their orders if the department continues to fail,” Dorwart stated in a press release.
DHS Director Ed Lake released a statement reasserting the agency’s commitment to the Pinnacle Plan and provided supporting documents to show efforts underway. Some documents show its data on improvements in areas such as child welfare visits and foster care placements.
“While we still have a long way to go before we can be completely satisfied with our services, we are making progress to make this system better for kids and families,” Lake said.
He said those efforts include increasing in-home services to families instead of foster care placements and stressing kinship placements. He said young children are being kept out of shelters, caseworkers are making required visits and children are moving to few placements.
A sharp increase in foster care placements began when the settlement was put into place, which was about the time Lake was hired to replace the retiring former director, Howard Hendrick.
About 8,500 children were in foster care when the Pinnacle Plan was written. Last week, about 11,580 children were in care.
“Abuse and neglect calls to the agency have increased, as well as the numbers of children involved in those calls,” Lake said.
“This demand has stretched DHS’ available resources and slowed the implementation of our plans for improvement. Despite these challenges, we are confident we can continue to move forward and make the kind of improvements Oklahoma needs.”
