AGE EFFECTS ON PLACEMENT Ocials within the Texas foster care system have pointed to age as an indicator of a child’s chances to be placed in CWOP as well as how long that child will remain in CWOP. The following data represents 2021 through September.
CWOP: Children without placement occurs when the state cannot nd a suitable, safe placement for a child, requiring the state to provide temporary emergency care until a placement can be secured.
0-2 years old: 1 3-5 years old: 1
0-2 years old: 1 3-5 years old: 4 6-12 years old: 77 13-17 years old: 379
0-2 years old: 22 3-5 years old: 42 6-12 years old: 252 13-17 years old: 1,103
8-14 nights in CWOP
15-21 nights in CWOP
1-7 nights in CWOP
6-12 years old: 28 13-17 years old: 193
0-2 years old: 0 3-5 years old: 1
0-2 years old: 0 3-5 years old: 2 6-12 years old: 16 13-17 years old: 72
0-2 years old: 0 3-5 years old: 1 6-12 years old: 12 13-17 years old: 139
22-28 nights in CWOP
29-35 nights in CWOP
36+ nights in CWOP
6-12 years old: 23 13-17 years old: 126
SOURCE: TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF FAMILY AND PROTECTIVE SERVICESCOMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
District Judge Janis Graham Jack ruled in 2015 that foster children in Texas “almost uniformly leave state cus- tody more damaged than when they entered.” Resulting system reforms included heightened monitoring, which is implemented when certain foster care system entities have had a high rate of violations. Entities placed under heightened monitoring are given a plan by court monitors to address deciencies and, failing that, face consequences, such as having their licenses revoked. Since January 2020, 21 facilities with 13 or more children have been shut down or had their licenses revoked statewide, leading to the loss of about 1,200 beds, according to a September court update. Rebecca Mercer, regional director of statewide adoption agency Lonestar Social Services, said heightened mon- itoring has also led to some foster par- ents removing themselves from the system altogether. She also said the pandemic has made nding place- ments more dicult. “We’ve had a lot of foster parents that will come to us and say, ‘Until COVID is over, we’re not interested in taking placements anymore because it’s just too much,’” she said. Arrow Child & Family Ministries, a Houston-area Christian nonprot organization, is a partner agency that provides child welfare services to chil- dren and families throughout Region 6—which includes the Bay Area.
Region 6. “It is the dierence between a real placement for these older chil- dren and continuing to live in a CPS oce or hotel.” In the September CWOP report, DFPS Commissioner Jaime Masters said many providers have cited height- ened monitoring as a reason for declin- ing a placement, although she noted that did not indicate the department’s disapproval of the mandate. “DFPS is not ‘blaming’ the [CWOP] crisis on the court’s heightened mon- itoring orders,” Masters said. “While the monitors have noted DFPS’ ‘collab- orative’ eorts of listening to concerns of its stakeholders, it is an undisputed fact that DFPS cannot do this alone.” She said caseworker turnover result- ing from overworked employees has contributed to the growing number of CWOP. Between February and July, the DFPS hired 319 caseworkers, but 309 caseworkers left their roles during that time. Exit surveys in 2021 said 86% cited work-related stress as a cause for ending their employment, up from 40% in 2020. In Harris County, the number of chil- dren receiving DFPS services increased from 2,876 to 3,017 from 2019 to 2020. The number of CPS workers decreased, moving from 784 to 770. In Galveston County, the number of children receiving services increased from 376 to 538 from 2019 to 2020, and the number of CPS workers moved from 67 to 80. Data for 2021 is not yet available.
Ocials at Arrow said the area has followed state trends; plus, CPS is no longer licensing adoptive families in Region 6, leaving the burden of licens- ing, hosting informational meetings and training prospective parents on local agencies such as Arrow. Searching for solutions The DFPS has identied a need for 669 additional beds throughout the state to meet growing demands on the welfare system. Additionally, the department said it is lacking an ade- quate number of CPS caseworkers with 236 vacancies statewide. With these issues, Texas passed several pieces of legislation during the pandemic to address the needs. State Senate Bill 1896, passed inMay, revised and added regulations for the DFPS, including forbidding it from housing a child in an oce overnight, expanding eligibility for therapeutic foster care and transitioning into elec- tronic case management. Additionally, the DFPS requested an additional $83.1 million as part of Sen- ate Bill 1 to hire 312 caseworkers, which the Legislature fully funded, according to the September CWOP report. House Bill 5, which passed in September, allotted an additional $90 million to the DFPS, which will be used to retain providers and increase capacity to serve foster youth. “The importance of this funding cannot be overstated,” said Melissa Lanford, the media specialist for DFPS
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most recent data available, that num- ber had risen to 395 children. Meanwhile, COVID-19 has caused a decrease in the number of foster families available to foster children, said Charity Eames, the chair of the Children’s Services Board of Galves- ton County and clinical director of DePelchin Children’s Center in Hous- ton. The board provides oversight of county funds for foster children, and the children’s center provides chil- dren’s mental health, intervention and welfare services. Foster families have not been immune to the nancial hardships and illness brought on by the pandemic. This has caused many foster families to give up fostering, Eames said. Eames said some of her fellow board members work with foster children and say that sometimes it is the chil- dren themselves who choose to be without placement. For instance, some CWOP are put into foster homes, and they repeatedly run away, Eames said. “Unfortunately, sometimes the kids don’t want to be placed, so they cause trouble in the placements that are
found for them,” she said. Extenuating circumstances
In an August CWOP report, DFPS ocials said the number of children designated as CWOP had risen, in part, because of heightened monitor- ing regulations mandated after U.S.
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