BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) - Foster care
-----------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| |
| |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
|--------------------------------+--------------------------------|
| | |
|Version: June 30, 2016 |Policy Vote: HUMAN S. 5 - 0 |
| | |
|--------------------------------+--------------------------------|
| | |
|Urgency: No |Mandate: Yes |
| | |
|--------------------------------+--------------------------------|
| | |
|Hearing Date: August 8, 2016 |Consultant: Debra Cooper |
| | |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: AB 1997 makes several changes to the Education,
Family, Government, Health and Safety, Penal, Probate, and
Welfare and Institutions codes to revise the provisions AB 403
(Stone, Chapter 773, Statutes of 2015) which implemented the
Continuum of Care Reform (CCR) efforts.
Fiscal
Impact:
The 2016 Budget Act includes a total of $170.6 million ($129.3
million GF) in local assistance and state operations for
implementation of CCR efforts. This bill makes modifications
to AB 403 necessary to facilitate implementation. The various
changes made in this bill are addressed in the budget. (See
Staff Comments)
The numerous changes to CCR implementation made in this bill
would result in unquantifiable costs. To the extent that the
changes result in costs that are not included in the 2016
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 1 of
?
Budget Act, this bill would require additional General Fund
costs.
Background:
Continuum of Care Reform effort : In response to the legislative
mandate pursuant to SB 1013 (Committee on Budget and Fiscal
Review, Chapter 35, Statutes of 2012), which required the
Department of Social Services (DSS) to establish a stakeholder
workgroup to develop recommended revisions to the current
rate-setting system, services, and programs serving children and
families in the continuum of eligible foster care placement
settings including, at a minimum, all programs provided by
foster family agencies and group homes, DSS led a multi-year
effort and produced a report. The January 2015 report,
"California's Child Welfare Continuum of Care Reform Report,"
outlined a collaborative approach to improve the experience and
outcomes of children and youth in foster care by improving
assessments of children and families, emphasizing home-based
family care placements of children, and changing the goals for
congregate (group home) care placements.
Through this model, children who cannot initially safely be
placed in home-based family care may still go into congregate
care, but with a care plan that aims to transition these
children into home-based family care with their services
following them. The report emphasized that reform efforts cannot
be accomplished with isolated standalone components, but rather
an interconnected system. Several of the recommendations in the
report required short-term upfront investments to phase in
changes to the placement system.
AB 403 : AB 403 (Stone, Chapter 773, Statutes of 2015)
established the framework for commencing the development of the
reforms to the existing foster care placement system and payment
structures through codifying a number of recommendations
included in DSS's January 2015 CCR report. Specifically, AB 403:
Eliminated the group home category of licensure and created a
new licensure category of "short-term residential treatment
centers" (STRTCs) defined to mean a residential facility
licensed by DSS and operated by a public agency or private
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 2 of
?
organization that provides short-term, specialized, and
intensive treatment, including core services and 24-hour care
and supervision to children. While the group home category was
eliminated, this bill permitted a two-year conditional
extension to individual group homes to the STRTC model and an
interim rate structure for group homes that were unable to
transition in the given time frame.
Established new requirements for foster family agencies
(FFAs), including requiring accreditation of all FFAs,
mandating new rates to be established, permitting probation
departments to place youth into a certified home of an FFA,
permitting mental health certification for programs that
provide intensive services, and requiring maintenance of a
written plan of operation.
Required statewide implementation of the resource family
approval (RFA) process by January 1, 2017, approving RFA's in
lieu of certifying foster homes.
Required DSS to create a new payment structure for STRTCs and
FFAs effective January 1, 2017. These rates were released with
the Governor's 2016-17 Revised Budget.
Proposed Law:
This bill makes a number of changes to CCR implementation in
the following ways:
Changes to STRTC and FFA structures, licensure, and
certification :
Changes the licensure category from "short-term residential
treatment centers" to "short-term residential therapeutic
programs" (STRTP) and clarifies that it is a residential
facility operated by a public agency or private organization
that provides an integrated program of specialized and
intensive care and supervision, services and supports,
treatment, and short-term, 24-hour care and supervision to
children.
Requires that private STRTPs be organized and operated on a
nonprofit basis.
Requires an FFA or STRTP to include with an application, a
letter of recommendation from county placing agencies to
identify a need for the program prior to licensure.
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 3 of
?
Requires FFA social workers to meet core competencies to
participate in the assessment and evaluation of an applicant.
Deletes the ability of an FFA or STRTP to receive a
provisional license in order to obtain accreditation, provides
each FFA with a 24-month window to receive accreditation, and
permits DSS to revoke licensure if accreditation is not
obtained in that time.
Prohibits an FFA from considering an applicant who has had a
denial within the preceding year or a previous rescission,
revocation, or exemption denial, but permits an FFA to
continue to review an application if it has determined that
the reasons for the previous denial, rescission, or revocation
were due to circumstances that either have been corrected or
are no longer in existence.
Role of the probation department in regards to STRTP :
Requires the chief probation officer to review and approve
placement of a child in an STRTP through the probation
department if the youth is older than 13 years old and the
placement exceeds 12 months, and requires the chief probation
officer to review no less frequently than every 12 months
thereafter.
Authorizes a court to affirm or reject the placement
determination of a probation department and specifies the
courts actions if the court rejects the placement
determination.
Changes to the RFA Process :
Establishes the RFA as the only method to approving homes
within a foster family agency, sunsets provisions that allow
for certification of homes under the prior statute, and
requires an FFA to document various aspects of the RFA
process.
Requires an FFA to make an annual announced inspection visit
and authorizes inspection of resource family homes as often as
necessary to ensure the resource family is conforming to all
applicable laws and the written directives or regulations.
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 4 of
?
Requires a licensed or certified foster home or existing
approved resource family home to forfeit its current
licensure, certification, or approval concurrent with its
approval as a resource family by an FFA or county.
Requires DSS to develop a basic rate that ensures that a child
placed in a licensed foster family home and a child placed in
a certified family home or with a resource family approved by
a county or foster family agency is eligible for the same
basic rate and specifies that the rates shall not be lower
than the rates proposed as part of the Governor's 2016 May
Revision.
Clarifies that there is no fundamental right to approval as a
resource family.
Changes to mental health components of CCR :
Prohibits an STRTP from providing specialty mental health
services without a current mental health program approval from
the county mental health plan or state Department of Health
Care Services (DHCS).
Requires that county mental health plans ensure that Medi-Cal
specialty mental health services, including, but not limited
to, services under the Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis
and Treatment benefit, are provided to all Medi-Cal
beneficiaries served by short-term residential therapeutic
programs who meet medical necessity criteria.
Authorizes DHCS and county mental health plans to suspend or
revoke a mental health program approval, impose monetary
penalties, place a mental health program on probation or
require a program to prepare and comply with a corrective
action plan.
Provides DHCS and county mental health plans with authority to
issue a provisional approval for up to one year and requires
DHCS and DSS to issue regulations defining due process for
centers that are seeking to appeal any part of the licensure
and program approval process.
Clarifies the role of the interagency placement committee in
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 5 of
?
assessing children for placement in to STRTPs.
Establishes that out-of-state group homes must have a mental
health program approval equivalent to California's to accept
placement of California youth.
Requires DSS to track the number of licensed STRTPs that were
unable to obtain a mental health program approval and provide
that information to the Legislature annually as part of the
State Budget process.
Technical and clarifying changes :
Specifies that DSS, the county adoption agency, or licensed
adoption agency may obtain arrest or conviction records or
reports from any law enforcement agency as necessary to
perform its duties, as appropriate.
Requires DSS and DHCS to develop a dispute resolution process
or utilize an existing process to jointly review a disputed
interagency placement committee assessment or determination
and to report the number of disputes reported and resolved to
the Legislature annually as part of the State Budget process.
Related
Legislation:
AB 403 (Stone, Chapter 773, Statutes of 2015) implemented CCR to
better serve children and youth in California's child welfare
services system and also required statewide implementation of
the Resource Family Approval Process.
SB 1013 (Senate Budget and Fiscal Review, Chapter 35, Statutes
of 2012) realigned CWS to counties and established a moratorium
on the licensing of new group homes. This bill also required DSS
to convene a stakeholder workgroup to examine the use of group
homes and discuss and recommend changes to the continuum of care
within CWS and how to reform the use of congregate care.
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 6 of
?
Staff
Comments:
The Governor's 2016-17 May Revised Budget included $165.5
million ($127.3 million GF) for CCR implementation. The revised
budget makes allocations for the changes to CCR implementation
that are in this bill including, among other things:
$35.7 million ($33 million GF) for Home-Based Family
Care Rates
$3.8 million (GF) for Foster Family Agency Social Worker
rate increase
$2.8 million ($1.4 million GF) for accreditation
$12 million ($8 million GF) for Resource Family Approval
$0.4 million ($0.2 million GF) for STRTC certification
$0.3 million ($0.1 million GF) for mental health
assessments
The 2016 Budget Act includes $170.6 million ($129.3 million in
General Fund) for CCR implementation efforts contained in AB
403, including $164.8 million ($126.2 million General Fund) for
local assistance costs. The Department of Finance (DOF) states
that this bill "is not anticipated to result in additional
General Fund costs beyond the amount already included in the
2016 Budget Act." Additionally, DOF estimates that local
assistance for CCR will decrease to $83.9 million in fiscal year
2017-18, and will decrease to less than $300,000 annually
beginning in fiscal year 2018-19.
Proposition 30 (November 2012) eliminated any potential mandate
funding liability for any new program or higher level of service
mandated on local agencies related to realigned programs,
including child welfare services and foster care. Legislation
enacted after September 30, 2012, that has an overall effect of
increasing the costs already borne by a local agency for
programs or levels of service mandated by realignment only apply
to local agencies to the extent that the state provides annual
funding for the cost increase. Local agencies are not obligated
to provide programs or levels of service required by legislation
above the level for which funding has been provided.
The potential local and state fiscal impacts of this bill will
AB 1997 (Mark Stone) Page 7 of
?
be dependent on numerous factors including but not limited to
the outcomes of processes and structures required pursuant to
the bill's provisions. While the 2016 Budget Act includes $129.3
million General Fund in one-time funding to continue CCR
implementation in 2016-17, significant additional investments
will likely be required in order to continue to build on these
efforts.
Proposed Author
Amendments: The author has indicated numerous technical
amendments are forthcoming.
-- END --