BILL ANALYSIS Ó SB 942 Page 1 Date of Hearing: June 21, 2016 ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON JUDICIARY Mark Stone, Chair SB 942 (Liu) - As Amended June 15, 2016 PROPOSED CONSENT SENATE VOTE: 39-0 SUBJECT: DEPENDENT CHILDREN: TEMPORARY RELATIVE PLACEMENT KEY ISSUE: IN ORDER TO IMPROVE THE LIVES OF FOSTER CHILDREN AND ENHANCE REUNIFICATION EFFORTS, SHOULD THE CHILD WELFARE AGENCY AND THE COURT IMPROVE THE PROCESS FOR EARLY ASSESSMENT AND PLACEMENT OF FOSTER CHILDREN WITH RELATIVES? SYNOPSIS Research has repeatedly shown that placing vulnerable foster children with willing and able relatives is most often the best placement for these children and, as a result, state law provides a placement priority for relatives. However, far too often, states the author, "too many of California's foster children remain in shelters or foster homes for extended periods of time even after an appropriate relative has requested placement. Many times postponements of relative placements are SB 942 Page 2 the result of unwarranted delays in the assessment process or in securing required exemptions for criminal histories." This bill, sponsored jointly by the Alliance for Children's Rights, the Children's Law Center of California and the Juvenile Court Judges of California, seeks to improve procedures for the temporary placement of a child with an able and willing relative prior to the initial child welfare detention hearing by requiring a social worker to conduct an assessment, including requiring a criminal records check be conducted within a specified timeframe, and establishing procedures to hold a hearing for consideration of recommendations based on that assessment. If the county fails to meet those required timeframes, this bill authorizes a judge to make a finding that the county has abused its discretion. This bill also requires the county to actively assist a person in locating and obtaining any documents required for the criminal records exemption. This bill is supported by children's advocates and the Los Angeles Unified School District, and has no reported opposition. SUMMARY: Requires an early assessment of a relative home for placement of a dependent child, and provides for court oversight if that early assessment does not occur timely. Specifically, this bill: 1)States legislative findings that placement of a dependent child with able and willing relatives at the earliest point in time is in the child's best interest. Clarifies the legislative preference for relative placement by stating that research has shown that foster children tend to be more emotionally well off when placed with their relatives, and reunification with their parents is routinely enhanced by placement with those relatives. 2)Requires the court to order a social worker to immediately conduct an assessment of a willing relative who requests temporary placement of a child, if that child is not placed SB 942 Page 3 with a relative at the time of the initial detention hearing. 3)Requires a county, to the extent possible, to actively assist a person seeking placement of a dependent child and requesting an exemption relating to a criminal background check result to help the person to locate and obtain any documents required, including having a social worker contact any other government entity directly to obtain any required arrest reports or court dispositions. 4)Requires the county to complete the assessment process, including any exemptions and waivers, within 30 calendar days. Permits a court to set a hearing to determine why the assessment is not completed within 30 days. Permits the court, if the assessment process is not complete, or an exemption or waiver is denied, or any administrative process is not complete with 60 days of the court ordering the county to conduct the assessment, to conduct a hearing to determine if the county has abused its discretion. EXISTING LAW: 1)Provides that a minor may be removed from the physical custody of his or her parents and become a dependent of the juvenile court as the result of abuse or neglect, as specified. (Welfare & Institutions Section 300. Unless stated otherwise, all further statutory references are to that code.) 2)Requires the social worker to immediately release a child in temporary custody to the child's parent, guardian or responsible relative, unless specified conditions exist. Defines the steps and timelines the county must take after detaining a child, including creating a preference for the child to be placed temporarily with an able and willing relative or a nonrelated extended family member (NREFM), as SB 942 Page 4 defined. (Section 309.) 3)Requires the court, at the detention hearing, to take certain steps to evaluate the case, determine whether the child can be returned home safely, and, if not, to ensure the child is placed in an appropriate placement, with priority consideration for relatives and NREFM. Defines "relative" as an adult who is related to the child by blood, adoption, or affinity within the fifth degree of kinship, including step relatives, relatives whose status is preceded with "great," "great-great" or "grand" or the spouse of any of these persons. Provides that only grandparents, aunts, uncles or siblings are eligible for preferential consideration for placement. (Section 319.) 4)Establishes criteria for approving a relative or NREFM home for the placement of a child, including a home visit and the submission of fingerprints for a state and federal criminal background check, and requires the county to prohibit placement with anyone who has an arrest or conviction for a serious or violent felony, as specified. (Section 361.4.) 5)Prohibits placement of the child in a home where an adult in the home has a criminal history until an exemption is granted by the county. (Section 361.4 (d).) FISCAL EFFECT: As currently in print this bill is keyed fiscal. COMMENTS: When abused or neglected children are taken from the custody of their parents, social workers are required to release a child temporarily to a responsible parent, guardian, or relative, unless a specified condition exists. These placements, at least initially, are temporary while the social worker develops a case plan to present to the court according to SB 942 Page 5 the following priorities: 1) maintain the child within his or her home; 2) remove the child but with the goal of reuniting the parent and child; or 3) find a permanent placement for the child. There is a strong preference to place the child with relatives. Existing law requires, prior to placing a child in the home of a relative or any other prospective guardian, that the social worker visit the home to ascertain the appropriateness of the placement and run a criminal records check on all persons over 18 years of age living in the home, or any other person who may have significant contact with the child, including those with a familial or intimate relationship with any person living in the home. If a criminal record check shows that a person has been convicted of a crime for which there is an exemption, the child cannot be placed in the home until the county does in fact grant that exemption. An exemption cannot be provided if the individual has been convicted of a non-exemptible crime, such as rape, a sex offense, murder, or fiscal malfeasance. In cases where an applicant has been convicted of an exemptible crime, the Department of Social Services is required to process an exemption only if requested by the applicant. Both federal and state laws and regulations require the state to conduct a thorough investigation and evaluation of the applicant. This process can be cumbersome, requiring the review of original case documents, which can be difficult to obtain from distant jurisdictions or in decades-old cases. During this exemption process the child is potentially waiting in a shelter or foster home for clearance before he or she can be placed with the relative. Seeking to expedite this process and thereby place children in the homes of relatives more quickly, this bill requires that social workers immediately assess willing relatives. This bill also authorizes the court to conduct a hearing to determine if SB 942 Page 6 the county has abused its discretion if the assessment process is not completed within a specified timeframe, and would additionally require the county, to the extent possible, to actively assist a person in locating and obtaining any documents required for a criminal records exemption. In support of the bill, the author writes: The advantages of relative placements are well recognized in law and policy, as are the benefits of this placement occurring as quickly as possible after removal from a parent. Longer stays in care, frequent placement disruptions, and placements with nonrelative caregivers or in residential facilities have been found to have a negative effect on child functioning and child welfare permanency outcomes. Timely placement in a stable environment with relatives is also directly linked to educational success. Foster students in kinship and guardianship placements were among the most likely to graduate from high school. Students with one placement were most likely to graduate, while students with three or more placements were least likely to graduate. Yet, in spite of current law, too many of California's foster children remain in shelters or foster homes for extended periods of time even after an appropriate relative has requested placement. Many times postponements of relative placements are the result of unwarranted delays in the assessment process or in securing required exemptions for criminal histories. Those unwarranted delays may stem from things like records lost in hurricane Katrina or family members who have no familiarity with the complexities of the criminal background check process being asked to personally research and secure decade's old data from distant jurisdictions. An unfortunately common cause for delays SB 942 Page 7 listed by both dependency court judges and attorneys in our examination of this issue is the inability of older grandparents to provide usable fingerprints due wrinkled fingers which caused social workers to be unable to process the prints. This resulted in requiring these grandparents to return over and over again to be fingerprinted until a usable set of prints was achieved. In other cases, months can go by between when relatives have completed required home modifications and when the home condition is reassessed for approval. In situations like these the long delays associated with the inability to complete exemptions or waivers may result in the child being shuffled through multiple placements, lingering in foster homes, congregate care settings or shelters for extended periods of time, even after an appropriate relative has requested placement. When moved from their placement after long delays in placing children with relatives, the child is often re-traumatized as they are removed from their familiar surroundings and bonds that have developed with caregivers are severed. There is currently no remedy in the law to address these extended delays. (Citations omitted.) Preference for Placement with Relatives. Studies have demonstrated significant benefit to children in the child welfare system who are placed with relatives rather than with strangers in foster homes or in group care. Writing in the National Journal for the Court Appointed Special Advocates for Children (CASA), retired Santa Clara Juvenile Court Judge Len Edwards underscored the benefits of placing children with relatives: Children in relative care tend to be just as safe as, or safer than, children placed in foster care. SB 942 Page 8 Relative placements provide more stability than placement with foster families, and if the child has to move, it is likely he or she will move from the home of one relative to another. Siblings more often remain together in relative care, and are more likely to visit one another even if they reside in separate relative homes. Relative caregivers are more likely to continue the ties with the child's birth family. Children in relative care are more likely to remain connected to their community, including their school. Relative caretakers facilitate parent-child visitation more easily since the caregivers will likely favor reunification and will be less likely than foster parents to compete with the parents for permanent custody of the child. Relatives are more likely to invest time and care for a child who shares a blood tie. This includes a willingness to care for the child for as long as needed. Placement with relatives will generally be less traumatic than placement in an unfamiliar home because the children will be living with someone they know and trust, particularly if the non-relative differs racially or ethnically from the child. SB 942 Page 9 Placement with relatives supports the transmission of a child's family identity, culture, and ethnicity. Placement with relatives eliminates the unfortunate stigma that many foster children experience. Children fare better in relative care than in foster care along numerous axes. The child placed with relatives knows his or her own family, sees family resemblances, and understands how he or she fits into it. (Judge Len Edwards, Examining the Benefits and Challenges of Placing Children with Relatives (CASA Nov. 2011).) But, Judge Edwards noted, there are barriers to placing children with relatives: Relative preference may be the law today, but significant challenges remain. . . . We must also identify, locate and engage relatives. Relative preference statutes mean little without rigorous social work immediately following removal of the child from parental care. The social worker must learn from the parents who the child's relatives are, contact them, and encourage them to become involved in the child protection case. The sooner this is accomplished, the more likely that the relatives will become engaged. The law now gives relatives the right to appear before the court and speak on behalf of the child. Just as importantly, relatives have the ability to participate in group decision-making processes such as family group conferences, team decision making, family team meetings, and court-based mediation. All of these group decision-making processes have spread throughout the United States and have been recognized as best practices in the resolution of the difficult issues presented in child protection cases. SB 942 Page 10 Delay in relative engagement often means that they will not be selected as placement for the child. The child protection system is notoriously slow. Fact finding hearings may take months to complete. Placement issues may take over a year. Yet in the meantime the child will be living with a family and will naturally become strongly connected to that family. The late-arriving relative often finds that the foster family will be preferred because of the connection between the child and that family. Relative placement is good social and legal policy. However, effective implementation of relative preference requires early identification and engagement. It requires effective judicial oversight of social worker actions regarding locating and engaging fathers and relatives. It also requires opportunities for relatives to participate in decision making, preferably through group decision-making processes. Engaging relatives is a best practice, one that will serve the best interests of children separated from their parents. (Examining the Benefits and Challenges of Placing Children with Relatives, supra.) This bill expedites the court's ability to safely place foster youth in the homes of relatives. This bill is the result of stakeholder meetings and discussions the author has conducted with interested groups over the past several years. In these discussions, dependency judges expressed frustration about delays in placement for children whose family members need to obtain exemptions. The bill addresses these concerns by allowing courts to hold hearings to determine whether the county, after failing to timely complete an assessment or when an exemption or a waiver is denied, abused its discretion. This court oversight, combined with the requirement for immediate assessment of a relative willing to take temporary placement of a detained youth and the requirement to help assist relatives in getting the documents necessary for a criminal record exemption, SB 942 Page 11 should ensure that the process of approving relative homes will be expedited. The Children's Law Center of California, co-sponsor, writes, "too often we see our clients lingering in foster homes, congregate care settings or shelters for extended periods of time, even after an appropriate relative has requested placement." The Juvenile Court Judges of California, also a co-sponsor of the bill, state that this bill will ensure that children who have been removed from their parents' homes are placed expediently with appropriate relatives by creating a timeline by which an assessment must occur and specifying a procedure for the court to oversee as necessary the relative assessment and placement process. "These important safeguards will help to reduce the re-traumatization of abused and neglected children who enter the foster care system." Related Pending Legislation: This bill works in collaboration with two other bills being considered by this Committee today. SB 316 (Mitchell) clarifies and simplifies rules for criminal background checks for foster care placements and makes the rules consistent with federal law. SB 1336 (Jackson), consistent with case law, requires child welfare agencies to consider willing relatives even when a new foster care placement is not required and requires the court to consider whether social workers have exercised due diligence in conducting their investigation to identify, locate, and notify the foster children's relatives. Prior Legislation: AB 1761 (Hall), Chap. 765, Stats. 2014, clarified that the placement priority for relatives and NREFM applies both prior to the detention hearing and also after the detention hearing and prior to the dispositional hearing. SB 942 Page 12 REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION: Support Alliance for Children's Rights (co-sponsor) Juvenile Court Judges of California (co-sponsor) Children's Law Center of California (co-sponsor) Children Now John Burton Foundation for Children Without Homes Los Angeles Unified School District National Association of Social Workers Public Counsel Children's Rights Project Opposition None on file SB 942 Page 13 Analysis Prepared by:Leora Gershenzon / JUD. / (916) 319-2334