BILL ANALYSIS Ó SENATE COMMITTEE ON HUMAN SERVICES Senator McGuire, Chair 2015 - 2016 Regular Bill No: AB 260 ----------------------------------------------------------------- |Author: |Lopez | ----------------------------------------------------------------- |----------+-----------------------+-----------+-----------------| |Version: |April 7, 2015 |Hearing |June 23, 2015 | | | |Date: | | |----------+-----------------------+-----------+-----------------| |Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes | ---------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------------------------- |Consultant|Sara Rogers | |: | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Foster care: parenting youth SUMMARY This bill establishes a declaration of the legislature that a child shall not be considered to be at risk of abuse or neglect solely on the basis of information concerning the parent's or parents' placement history, past behaviors, or health or mental health diagnoses occurring prior to the pregnancy, as specified, and prohibits that history from being used in deciding a child's placement, unless the court deems it materially relevant. ABSTRACT Existing law: 1)Provides that a child shall be within the jurisdiction of the juvenile court when the child has suffered, or is of substantial risk of suffering, serious physical harm or illness as a result of the following: (WIC 300 (b)) a) A failure or inability of the parent or guardian to adequately supervise or protect the minor; b) A failure or inability of the parent or guardian to adequately supervise or protect the minor from the conduct of a custodian with whom the child has been left; c) A willful or negligent failure of the parent or guardian to provide the minor with adequate food, clothing, shelter, or medical treatment; AB 260 (Lopez) PageB of? d) The inability of the parent or guardian to provide regular care for the minor due to the paren'ts or guardian's mental illness, developmental disability or substance abuse. 2)Provides that, at the initial petition hearing, the court shall make a determination based upon the social worker's report or other evidence, as to whether reasonable efforts were made to prevent the removal of the child and whether there are available services that would prevent the need for further detention. 3)Declares legislative intent that a child whose parent has been adjudged a dependent child of the court pursuant to this section shall not be considered to be at risk of abuse or neglect solely because of the age, dependent status, or foster care status of the parent. (WIC 300) 4)Establishes legislative intent to support the preservation of families headed by minor parents and nonminor dependent parents and provides that foster care placements for minor parents and nonminor dependent parents and their children shall demonstrate a willingness and ability to provide support and assistance to the minor parents and nonminor dependent parents and their children. (WIC 16002.5) 5)Provides that, in all cases in which a minor is adjudged a dependent child of the court as specified, the court may limit parental control over an adjudged dependent child and requires the court to clearly and specifically set forth those limitations. Provides that such limitations may not exceed those necessary to protect the child. Additionally provides that a child shall not be taken from the physical custody of the parent or guardian unless the court finds clear and convincing evidence of a substantial danger to the child, and there are no reasonable means to protect the child. (WIC 361) 6)Except as specified, requires the juvenile court to order the county to provide child welfare family reunification services AB 260 (Lopez) PageC of? to the minor and the minor's parents or guardians, and permits the court to order the parent or guardian to participate in counseling or other treatment services. (WIC 361.5) 7)Provides that family reunification services are not required to be provided if the court makes, upon clear and convincing evidence, one of 16 specified findings, including: a) That the court-ordered termination of reunification services for any siblings or half siblings who had been removed because the parent or guardian failed to reunify and that parent or guardian has not subsequently made a reasonable effort to treat the problems that led to removal of the sibling or half sibling. (WIC 361.5 (b) (10)) b) That parental rights of a parent over any sibling or half sibling had been permanently severed and that parent has not subsequently made a reasonable effort to treat the problems that led to removal of the sibling or half sibling. (WIC 361.5 (b) (11)) This bill: 1)Establishes a declaration of the legislature that a child shall not be considered to be at risk of abuse or neglect solely on the basis of a parent's placement history, past behaviors, or health or mental health diagnoses occurring prior to the pregnancy. Provides that such information may be taken into account when considering whether other factors exist that place the child at risk of abuse or neglect. 2)Provides that the findings by which a court may decline to order family reunification services to a minor parent shall not include WIC 361.5 (b) (10) and (11), described above, unless one or more of the other 14 findings also apply. 3)Requires a party seeking foster care placement of or termination of parental rights over, a child, whose parent was AB 260 (Lopez) PageD of? a minor when the child was born, to demonstrate that reasonable efforts, using specified available resources, were made to provide remedial services designed to prevent the removal of the child and that these efforts were unsuccessful. 4)Requires the clerk of the superior court to maintain court files and records concerning a dependent parent of a child who is the subject of a dependency petition separately from the files and records regarding that child. 5)Permits a dependent parent's dependency court records to be disclosed to the county in the child's dependency proceedings, but disallows these records from being admitted as evidence unless required by a court order stating that these files and records contain information materially relevant to the case, as specified. 6)Requires foster care placements for minor parents and nonminor dependent parents and their children to support the preservation of the family unit and provide services, as specified, to prevent, whenever possible, the filing of a petition to declare the child a dependent of the juvenile court. FISCAL IMPACT According to an Assembly Appropriations Committee analysis, there are potentially significant costs in excess of $150,000 to the courts for increased administrative workload and additional hearings. BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSION Purpose of the bill: According to the author, "It is vital that we initiate a culture shift around the way we think about parenting foster youth. Instead of making it more difficult for these youth or overlooking their unique needs as parents living within the AB 260 (Lopez) PageE of? dependency system, we should be supporting them in their goals to create a healthy family in the same way we support their goals for higher education, career/professional, or any other permanency outcomes our system seeks to achieve for them. By working to break the cycle of foster care, we can ensure our foster youth can succeed while also preserving the lives of children in their family unit rather than settling for additional, unnecessary entrances into the system for those children." California Child Welfare System The California Department of Social Services (CDSS) oversees a 58 county-administered Child Welfare Services (CWS) system which responded to nearly 500,000 allegations reports of abuse, neglect or exploitation in 2014, resulting in nearly 80,000 substantiations and 31,600 entries into foster care. Overall, as of January 2015, there were nearly 63,000 children in foster care placement, with nearly one in three residing in Los Angeles County. It is currently unknown how many current and former foster youth are pregnant or parenting. When youth transition out of care, counties report specified exit outcomes data to CDSS, including the number of youth who are custodial parents. This data does not include the number of youth who may not have custody of their children. However, a recent research performed by the University of Southern California, in collaboration with the California Child Welfare Indicators Project at the University of California at Berkeley and CDSS linked state child welfare services data with birth records. The research found that: Although only about 4 percent of teens in foster care give birth in any given year, more than 25 percent of girls who were in foster care at age 17 had given birth at least once before age 20. Among girls in foster care who first gave birth before age 18, more than one in three had a second teen birth. By age 5, children born to teen mothers who were victims of maltreatment were abused and neglected at AB 260 (Lopez) PageF of? twice the rate of other children.<1> Juvenile Dependency Process The juvenile dependency process is designed to provide maximum safety and protection for children who currently are, or are at risk of being physically, sexually, or emotionally abused, being neglected, or being exploited, while at the same time maintaining a focus on the preservation of the family. (WIC 300.2) The court has broad authority to direct orders to the parent, parents, or guardian of a minor who is subject to a dependency proceeding as the court deems necessary and proper for the best interests of the minor. These orders may concern the care, supervision, custody, conduct, maintenance, and support of the minor, including education and medical treatment." Existing law permits a social worker to take a minor into "temporary custody" if it is suspected that a child is being, or is at risk of being abused or neglected. In such cases the abuse has not yet been validated, the child has not yet been adjudged to be a dependent of the court, and parental rights have not been formally limited. The authority for the juvenile dependency system to limit parental authority over children is subject to a series of rigorous and lengthy hearings and extensive court oversight designed to ensure that parental rights are only limited to the extent necessary to protect the child. In addition, the court may order a child to be a dependent of the court but order the county welfare department to supervise while the child remains at home. (WIC 300 et seq.) Under current law, there is no prohibition against submitting as --------------------------- <1> California's Most Vulnerable Parents: When Maltreated Children Have Children. November 2013. http://www.chhs.ca.gov/CWCDOC/7California's%20Most%20Vulnerable_P arents_Full_Report_11-11-13.pdf AB 260 (Lopez) PageG of? evidence, information contained in a parent's own dependency case file, including information about the parent which may have occurred prior to pregnancy and birth of the child. Family Reunification and Maintenance Services At the initial detention hearing and at subsequent hearings, the court is required to consider whether reasonable efforts have been made to prevent or eliminate the need for removal of the child. Except in specified circumstances, whenever a child is removed from a parent's or guardian's custody, the juvenile court is required to order the social worker to provide child welfare family reunification or family maintenance services. (WIC 361.5, 11254 and 16507)) These encompass a broad range of services, varying widely between counties, including case management, parenting classes, counseling, mental health and substance abuse treatment, transportation, home visiting and in-home caretaking, emergency shelter care, and others. (WIC 16500 et seq.) These services are time limited and may be terminated or extended if the court makes specified findings. Related legislation: SB 528 (Yee, Chapter 338, Statutes of 2013) authorized child welfare agencies to provide dependent parents with access to social workers and resource specialists, encouraged these agencies to update case plans within 60 days of learning of a pregnancy, authorized agencies to hold a specialized conference to assist the pregnant/parenting minor or nonminor dependent, required access to education be given to nonminor dependent parents, authorized reasonable efforts be made to allow access to school programs that provide child care for minor parents and nonminor dependent parents, required that foster care placements for nonminor dependent parents and their children be willing and able to provide support to those parents and their children, and declared the intent of the Legislature to ensure that data on parenting minor and nonminor dependents is collected. SB 500 (Kuehl, Chapter 630, Statutes of 2005) created an option AB 260 (Lopez) PageH of? for teen foster parents to live with their children in foster homes. SB 1178 (Kuehl, Chapter 841, Statutes of 2004) expressed the intent of the Legislature to preserve and strengthen family relationships between minor dependent parents and their dependent children and required the foster care system to treat these families as a unit rather than as individuals. COMMENTS Existing law and case law provide that courts may consider past events when determining whether a child is in present need of the juvenile court's protection. This bill would prohibit the determination that a child is at risk of abuse or neglect, solely based on the parent's placement history in the child welfare system, including past behaviors and mental health diagnosis. Recent hearings of the Senate Human Services committee regarding overuse of psychotropic medication included widespread testimony that dependent children are often mistakenly diagnosed with mental illness, over-prescribed dangerous psychotropic medications that worsen symptoms, and that the child's trauma associated with his or her involvement in the child welfare system may instigate or worsen a child's symptoms of mental illness. Further, the hearing highlighted concerns that the child welfare system frequently misresponds to developmentally-appropriate behaviors or responses to trauma given the challenging circumstances of the child. In such circumstances, using potentially outdated or incorrect information related to a parent's involvement in the child welfare system as the sole basis for determining whether to deny a parent from receiving family reunification service may create unnecessary barriers to the maintenance or reunification efforts. Additionally, this bill permits the dependent or formerly dependent parent's placement history to be disclosed to the county in a child's dependency proceedings and permits this AB 260 (Lopez) PageI of? information to be a consideration in making its determination. However, it prohibits the information from being admitted as evidence in the child's dependency proceedings unless ordered by the court. Given that the evidence considered by the court includes a report from a child's social worker, it is unclear if the entire social worker's report would be rendered inadmissible without a further court order if it included information related to the parent's dependency proceedings. Staff recommends the author consider this issue further in the Senate Judiciary Committee, should the bill pass to this committee. Additionally, staff recommends the following technical amendments: Page 7, Lines 19-38 amend as follows: (b) In the case of a child for whom one or bothminorparents have been adjudged to be dependent children of the juvenile court pursuant to Section 300, all of the following shall apply: (1) Paragraphs (10) and (11) of subdivision (b) of Section 361.5 shall not apply, unless one or more of the circumstances described in paragraphs (1) to (9), inclusive, and paragraphs (12) to (16), inclusive, of subdivision (b) of Section 361.5 apply. (2) A party seeking an involuntary foster care placement of, or termination of parental rights over, a child born to a parent or parents who were minors or nonminor dependents at the time of the child's birth shall demonstrate to the court that reasonable efforts were made provide remedial services designed to prevent the removal of the child from theminorparent or parents, and that these efforts have proved unsuccessful. (3) The efforts made pursuant to paragraph (2) shall utilize the available resources of the child and his or herminorparent's or parents' extended family, social services agencies, caregivers, and other available service providers. (c) For purposes of this section, "child"and "minor parent", "minor parent" and "nonminor dependent parent" shall have the same definitions as in Section 16002.5. PRIOR VOTES ----------------------------------------------------------------- AB 260 (Lopez) PageJ of? |Assembly Floor: |78 - | | |0 | |-----------------------------------------------------------+-----| |Assembly Appropriations Committee: |17 - | | |0 | |-----------------------------------------------------------+-----| |Assembly Human Services Committee: |5 - | | |0 | ----------------------------------------------------------------- POSITIONS Support: California Alliance of Child and Family Services Children Now Oppose: None received. -- END --