CHAPTER VIII: ROLE OF THE STATE

Research:

The 1992 Little Hoover Commission Report on Mending Our Broken Children: Restructuring Foster Care in California recommended that:

The Governor and the Legislature should enact legislation requiring a bono fide longitudinal study of California's foster care system and its clients to determine the long-range effectiveness of the system.⁽¹³⁸⁾

Research in the field of child welfare services has grown considerably in recent years, with close and important ties to policy and practice. The technologies of research have significantly improved, and the opportunity to conduct child welfare research that is central to the development of the profession is greater than ever.⁽¹³⁹⁾ Some of the following studies are funded by the State of California and others by private foundations and organizations.

California Children's Services Archive:

Through a five-year partnership between the Child Welfare Services Center at U.C. Berkeley and public agencies, including the California Health and Welfare Agency, the California Department of Social Services, the California Youth Authority, and county welfare departments, the California Children's Services Archive will provide a longitudinal description of children, their service careers, and the outcomes associated with these services. The Center will be merging vital statistics data to gain a better description of the birth and birth family; census data describing the communities of residence of the family of origin and substitute care providers; child abuse and neglect, child welfare, health, education, criminal justice, and public assistance data. The Archive creates an opportunity to understand the dynamics of service needs and service responses to California's children. The Center is using the Archive to provide routine information to children's services agencies on their performance and to conduct research to evaluate innovative programs.⁽¹⁴⁰⁾

California Community-Based Child Abuse Prevention Evaluation:

Recently California adopted a plan to allow communities to identify their own approach to preventing child abuse and neglect. Child Abuse through Community Empowerment allows 21 communities in California to shape a service delivery system that involves local community members and which is neighborhood-based in its design. The evaluation of this project uses a series of process and outcome measures.⁽¹⁴¹⁾ (See concern of CWDA in Appendix G: Recommendations of the County Welfare Directors Association Report)

Child Abuse Reporting: An Analysis of State Systems

This study analyzes the extent to which the performance of state child abuse reporting systems is influenced by characteristics of their design and operation. The functioning of state systems is examined and compared along five dimensions: 1. reporting rates; 2. substantiation rates; 3. investigation; 4. out-of-home placement; and 5. mortality rates.⁽¹⁴²⁾

The Emergency Response System: Screening, Assessment and Disposition of Child Abuse Reports:

This project is designed to describe the process of screening, assessment and disposition of child abuse and neglect cases. The project is structured to analyze the characteristic and nature of cases which are screened out at intake, assessed and closed, or are assessed and then proceed to dependency investigation. The study will determine the extent to which services are accurately directed towards the most serious and/or severe cases of abuse or neglect.⁽¹⁴³⁾

Performance Indicators for Child Welfare Services in California

In recent years increasing attention has been paid to the role of outcome indicators to increase accountability in child welfare services systems. This study draws upon data collected in the Foster Care Information System (FCIS) and reconfigured at the Child Welfare Research Center into a longitudinal, relational database. The data are used to show various annual outcomes in child welfare services for the state of California and for each county. The study is designed to help administrators monitor program services for children and families.⁽¹⁴⁴⁾

Child Welfare Services for Very Young Children:

This study will examine data from the child abuse and neglect data system in four counties to understand more about child abuse reporting dynamics for young children under 6 years of age. The data in the Archive (see above) will be used to review foster care caseload dynamics. The study additionally includes focus groups with intake workers, investigations workers, continuing services workers, and adoptions workers to understand more about the practice in serving these young children.⁽¹⁴⁵⁾ (See Chapter V: Children in the Dependency System with Various Needs, sub-chapter on Very Young Children)

Evaluating Family Preservation and Support Programs (FPSP)

This project is designed to:

1. analyze existing family preservation and support efforts in California and present methods and results in a meaningful way;

2. create baseline and post-FPSP indicators of family preservation using individual and community level county data in three study counties;

3. develop analytical strategies and results that could show the impact of family preservation services;

4. create curriculum materials that provide students with the opportunity to learn how to analyze administrative data in the service of family preservation evaluations.⁽¹⁴⁶⁾

Reform of Services to Children and Families

Putting Families First: An Experiment in Family Preservation

In a review of a large-scale evaluation of family preservation services in Illinois, researchers came to the following conclusions. Reform must seek a reasonable balance between safety of the child and maintenance of family ties, recognizing that maintenance of these ties is usually in the best interests of the child if harm can be prevented. But reform must recognize that there can be no guarantees -- total avoidance of maltreatment cannot be achieved and risks must be taken as part of any balance. The most important requirement in reform is to be clear on the responsibilities of the government. (Society expects) both too little and too much of the state. Too little because government could facilitate resolution of the social problems that contribute to child maltreatment. Too much because the state cannot prevent or even respond to all harms to children.⁽¹⁴⁷⁾

The state cannot accept responsibility for the optimal development of all children. On the other hand, the state can be seen as having a responsibility for encouraging the development of opportunities for advancing child development and for reducing as much as possible outright harms to children. The authors suggest that the responsibility of the state in determining abuse and neglect be limited to those involving physical abuse to the child, including injuries caused by either abuse or neglect. Instead the state should encourage the development of services to help parents better relate to their children. These services should be voluntary, outside the abuse and neglect response system. The scope of state investigation must be limited. To include situations of risk invites intrusion of the state into many more families. The researchers recommend that only when there is "high' risk of "serious" harm, should the state intervene.⁽¹⁴⁸⁾

The authors believe that the sharp division between the realms of in-home and out-of-home services is not helpful to families and children. The bright line that is drawn when a child is placed in substitute care should be blurred. Placement of a child is unavoidably disturbing to the child and family but it is made more traumatic by the way the system handles it. The researchers suggest that efforts be made to lessen the sense of trauma that accompanies placement. Where it is appropriate, it should be made clear to all involved that efforts will begin immediately to return the child home. Under this conception, in-home and out-of-home would constitute a continuum and movement between placement and home would be easier. Placement should be viewed as a step in the process of helping that need not always indicate failure. Such changes can often be thought of as respite from caretaking responsibilities and more use should be made of voluntary placements.⁽¹⁴⁹⁾

The reviewers found that family preservation efforts have not produced the major results that were expected. This means, they argue, that the system must continue to experiment with service approaches. They recommend a substantial increase in the volume of services available to families. There should be many more alternatives for families and for the workers who are trying to help them. In low-income communities, help with housing problems, day care, caretaking respite services, and other supports for parenting is more readily available to families who abuse their children than to those who do not. Often help of this kind is provided too late, after family relationships have deteriorated to the point of child maltreatment. This help should be much more universally available through community-based organizations that are responsive to the needs of their neighborhoods.⁽¹⁵⁰⁾

Development of The Child Welfare Services Case Management System (CWS/CMS)

With the help of federal funds, the state of California is implementing a comprehensive state-wide computer data system intended to support case workers and provide them access to enhanced, accurate, and timely information. So far, the implementation of the system has met with mixed success. Case workers find the input of information time-consuming. The system has become more complex as counties add their own components. The system was implemented while there were still problems because of federal time constraints.⁽¹⁵¹⁾

Development of Tools for Caseworkers for Risk Assessment, Decision Making and Case Management: Structured Decision Making (SDM)

The California Department of Social Services (CDSS) is implementing a 36 month Structured Decision Making (SDM) pilot project to improve the assessment tools available to caseworkers when making case assessments and decisions and generally managing their cases. The tools will be based on actual research of outcomes of the various factors which caseworkers consider when determining the level of risk to a child's safety. Several other states have implemented research-based assessment systems. A 12-month comparison of SDM and non-SDM counties in Michigan found that those using SDM had many fewer new referrals, fewer new substantiations, fewer children removed from their homes, and fewer injuries that required medical assistance than non-SDM counties. Seven counties have volunteered to be part of the pilot project. They are Los Angeles, Orange, Sacramento, San Bernadino, Santa Clara, Alameda and Humbolt. Collectively, these counties represent more than half of the state's child population.

The project will be conducted in two stages. During the first 18 months, efforts will be focused on the design and development of the major system components and decision-making tools. The second 18 months will be dedicated to fine tuning the process tools, making appropriate revisions, and conducting validation, workload, and impact evaluations studies.⁽¹⁵²⁾ (See Chapter III: Child Welfare Services, Introduction, speech by Marjorie Kelly)

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