BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    Ó



                                                                  AB 1751
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          ASSEMBLY THIRD READING
          AB 1751 (Pan)
          As Introduced  February 17, 2012
          Majority vote

           HUMAN SERVICES      5-0         JUDICIARY           10-0        
           
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          |Ayes:|Beall, Jones, Ammiano,    |Ayes:|Feuer, Wagner, Atkins,    |
          |     |Wagner, Portantino        |     |Dickinson, Gorell, Huber, |
          |     |                          |     |Jones, Monning,           |
          |     |                          |     |Wieckowski, Alejo         |
          |-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
          |     |                          |     |                          |
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           APPROPRIATIONS      17-0                                        
           
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          |Ayes:|Fuentes, Harkey,          |     |                          |
          |     |Blumenfield, Bradford,    |     |                          |
          |     |Charles Calderon, Campos, |     |                          |
          |     |Davis, Donnelly, Gatto,   |     |                          |
          |     |Hall, Hill, Lara,         |     |                          |
          |     |Mitchell, Nielsen, Norby, |     |                          |
          |     |Solorio, Wagner           |     |                          |
          |-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
          |     |                          |     |                          |
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           SUMMARY  :  Requires that county child welfare agencies and county 
          probation departments be given access to specified child support 
          information related to the noncustodial parents of children who 
          are subject to juvenile court proceedings.  Specifically,  this 
          bill  :  

          1)Requires the disclosure, by all state departments, boards, 
            agencies, bureaus, or other agencies of the state or local 
            government, of a parent's name, social security number, most 
            recent address, telephone number, place of employment, or 
            other contact information to a county child welfare agency or 
            county probation department to identify, locate, and notify 
            parents of children who are the subject of juvenile court 
            proceedings, to establish parent and child relationships, and 
            to assess the appropriateness of placements of a child with a 
            noncustodial parent.








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          2)Authorizes the release of a parent's name, social security 
            number, most recent address, telephone number, place of 
            employment or other contact information to county child 
            welfare agencies and probation departments established or 
            maintained by any public entity pursuant to the administration 
            and implementation of the child and spousal support 
            enforcement program.

          3)Requires the state Department of Social Services (DSS), no 
            later than January 30, 2013, to amend the foster care state 
            plan required by federal law to implement access to 
            information provided to the California Parent Locator Service 
            and Central Registry (CPLS) by the federal Parent Locator 
            Services (FPLS) to ensure compliance with and facilitation of 
            provisions related to the location of parents of children who 
            are the subject of juvenile court proceedings.

          4)Requires DSS, on or before July 1, 2013, to issue an 
            all-county letter or similar instruction explaining the 
            entitlement of county child welfare and probation agencies to 
            specified information in child and spousal support records.

          5)Authorizes DSS to adopt emergency regulations, and to develop 
            an interagency agreement with the Department of Child Support 
            Services, to implement the provisions of this bill.

           EXISTING LAW  : 

          1)Provides that when a child is removed from the physical 
            custody of his or her parents, preferential consideration 
            shall be given whenever possible to the placement of the child 
            with a relative.  (Welfare & Institutions (W&I) Code Section 
            16000)

          2)Requires, with specified exceptions, the confidentiality of 
            all information and records established or maintained by any 
            public entity pursuant to the administration and 
            implementation of the child and spousal support enforcement 
            program established pursuant to federal law.  (Family Code 
            Section 17212)

          3)Establishes within the California Department of Child Support 
            Services the CPLS, which collects and disseminates specified 








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            information about parents, putative parents, spouses, or 
            former spouses.  (Family Code Section 17506)

          4)Requires the assignment to the county of any rights to support 
            by any applicant for or recipient of aid under the California 
            Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids Act, subject to 
            confidentiality requirements pertaining to implementation of 
            the child and spousal support enforcement program.  (W&I Code 
            Sections 11477, 11478.1)

          5)Under the federal Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 
            (Public Law 105-89), establishes the FPLS, enabling authorized 
            state agencies to access information on, or to facilitate the 
            discovery and location of any individual who is under an 
            obligation to pay child support, against whom an obligation is 
            sought, or to whom an obligation is owed, including the 
            person's Social Security Number, address, employer's name and 
            address, and employment wages, benefits and other income.

           FISCAL EFFECT  :  According to the Assembly Appropriations 
          Committee:
          
          1)Costs associated with DSS updating the foster care state plan 
            and issuing an all-county letter should be minor and 
            absorbable within existing resources.  

          2)To the extent this allows county child welfare departments to 
            more easily locate noncustodial parents, it should provide 
            some administrative workload relief for the counties. 

           COMMENTS  :  The author points out that, in recognition of the 
          importance of family preservation and in alignment with federal 
          law, following a child's removal from their home a social worker 
          must, within 30 days, conduct an investigation to "identify and 
          locate all grandparents, adult siblings, and other adult 
          relatives of the child" in an attempt to find a suitable 
          relative for placement, consistent with the child's best 
          interests (W&I Code Sections 361.3, 309(e)).  "Unfortunately," 
          the author says, "current law does not explicitly allow county 
          child welfare agencies and probation officers to utilize an 
          important resource within the child welfare system-the child 
          support information database-and as a result, social workers do 
          not routinely access this source of information about 
          alternatives to foster care."








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          This bill would enable county officials responsible for locating 
          the relatives of an abused or neglected child to use the state's 
          child support database to access the basic contact information 
          of the child's noncustodial parent.  The author notes that the 
          measure would decrease the amount of time currently spent by 
          county officials in unnecessarily difficult attempts to locate 
          the parents of abused children pursuant to state and federal 
          mandates.  In addressing the need for this bill, the author 
          says:

               With approximately 60,000 children currently in the 
               state's foster-care system and an ongoing state budget 
               shortfall, county welfare agencies have fewer 
               resources than ever to do their jobs.  This 
               common-sense bill would allow local child welfare 
               agencies and probation officers to access the child 
               support information that already exists in the state 
               child support database and to obtain critical contact 
               information such as the parent's name, social security 
               number, most recent address, phone number, and place 
               of employment. 

               This, in turn, will allow the case worker to contact 
               the parent to see if they want to and can provide a 
               caring alternative to foster care for the abused or 
               neglected child.  This measure provides county child 
               welfare agencies, social workers, and probation 
               officers with the information they need to make 
               timely, appropriate decisions regarding the placement 
               of abused and neglected children who have been removed 
               from their homes.

          The author notes that placing children with relatives decreases 
          both the number of children in the foster care system and the 
          costs associated with prolonged stays in foster care:

               According to the Public Policy Institute of California 
               (Foster Care in California: Achievements and Challenges, 
               2010), the number of children in California's foster 
               care system has declined by 10 percent or more between 
               2000 and 2009.  The report notes an increased number of 
               placements with relatives among the reasons for this 
               decline and credits, in part, the creation of the 








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               Kinship Guardian Assistance Program Payment (Kin-GAP) 
               Program in 2000.  This program incentivizes kinship care 
               - a form of foster placement that is significantly less 
               costly to the state than some other options such a group 
               home placement.

          DSS has had the ability to access data available to the CPLS 
          through the FPLS since 1997 but has apparently not taken the 
          prerequisite steps to amend the state foster care plan.  This 
          bill requires DSS, by January 30, 2013, to amend the foster care 
          state plan required by federal law to implement access to 
          information provided to the CPLS by the FPLS.

           
          Analysis Prepared by  :    Eric Gelber / HUM. S. / (916) 319-2089 


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