BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE HUMAN
SERVICES COMMITTEE
Senator Carol Liu, Chair
BILL NO: AB 1905
A
AUTHOR: Cook
B
VERSION: March 17, 2010
HEARING DATE: June 10, 2010
1
FISCAL: Appropriations
9
0
CONSULTANT:
5
Park
SUBJECT
Foster care: funding: placement approvals
SUMMARY
Requires the approval of an approved relative or
nonrelative extended family member foster care provider to
remain in force during the reapproval process.
ABSTRACT
Existing federal law:
1.Authorizes federal funding for state foster care programs
pursuant to Title IV-E of the Social Security Act, under
an approved state plan.
2.Requires states to apply the same licensing standards to
all foster family homes receiving Title IV-E funding,
including relative and nonrelative caregiver homes.
Existing state law:
1.Provides for the establishment and support of a statewide
Continued---
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child welfare system through the Department of Social
Services (DSS) and county welfare departments.
2.Sets forth standards for the licensure of foster family
homes and approval of relative and nonrelative extended
family member homes. Exempts the homes of relative and
nonrelative extended family members, as defined, from
licensure. Requires the licensing standards for foster
family homes to be used in the evaluation and approval
process for relative and nonrelative caregiver homes.
3.Provides for the Aid to Families with Dependent
Children-Foster Care (AFDC-FC) program, which provides
for the funding of foster care placements through a
combination of federal, state, and county funds.
Provides for AFDC-FC payment to eligible children placed
in licensed or approved homes, as specified, including
the approved home of a relative or nonrelative extended
family member.
4.Requires county departments of welfare, with oversight
from DSS, to evaluate and approve or deny the home a
relative or a nonrelative extended family member, for
purposes of AFDC-FC eligibility, immediately following
the placement of a child in the home.
This bill:
1.Requires an approval to remain in full force and effect
when an annual reassessment visit is pending for the home
of a relative or nonrelative extended family member.
2.Requires that payments to the relative or nonrelative
extended family member not be delayed or terminated
solely due to late completion in the annual reapproval
process, such as a late home visit or corrective action
plan.
3.Specifies that no appropriation shall be made pursuant to
specified law to implement these provisions.
FISCAL IMPACT
According to the Assembly Appropriations Committee, no
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significant costs are associated with this legislation.
The committee analysis notes that eliminating the need for
county social workers to temporarily shift relative
caregivers from the federal foster care program to a
state-only program could result in some administrative
savings for the counties.
BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSION
Author's statement
The author states that, for the purposes of receiving
federal payments for foster care and adoption assistance
(under Title IV-E of the Social Security Act), California
currently exceeds federal requirements for annual
reassessments of relative caregivers. The author points
out that state law does not require annual renewals of
foster family homes, but does require annual reassessments
of relative homes, while the federal IV-E requirement
mandates the same standards for these homes. The author
also points out that the state additionally requires
federal and state funding to be terminated when an annual
reassessment is not completed on time, while nothing in
federal law prohibits continued payment to a foster
provider once the provider is initially licensed and
approved to provide care. The author states that, due to
high workloads at the local level, counties struggle to
complete these annual reassessments on time, and both the
state and counties lose federal funding.
Additionally, the author notes that when this funding is
lost, payments for foster children are made from CalWORKs,
which creates additional workloads for the county, a
significant reduction in payment amount to the caregivers,
and the risk of placement disruption. The author points to
the recently concluded federal IV-E eligibility audit of
2009, which cited cases in error when the state failed to
stop AFDC-FC payments for a late relative reassessment.
The author argues that these errors, fiscal repayments, and
the subsequent performance improvement plan could have been
avoided if the state did not itself require that IV-E
payments cease when reassessments are late.
Higgins v. Saenz (CPF-02-501937 (Cal. Supr. Crt., Los
Angeles County, Oct. 24, 2002))
In 2002, the Youth Law Center filed a lawsuit, alleging the
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Department of Social Services had not provided adequate
oversight of the approval process for relative homes. The
suit charged that some children were living in substandard
and dangerous conditions because of the state's failure to
require counties to investigate fully relative homes and to
provide assistance to relatives in meeting licensing
requirements. According to the National Center for Youth
Law, the settlement, which was filed October 31, 2002,
required uniform, statewide standards for foster parents
who are related to the children in their custody. It also
called for audits and required counties to help unqualified
relatives meet the standards, rather than simply
discounting such relatives or removing the children from
them.
As part of the Higgins v. Saenz settlement, DSS issued
several all county letters, implementing the relative
approval monitoring process. As part of its instruction,
DSS required counties to perform an initial assessment of
relative caregiver homes, followed by annual reassessments
for all relative caregivers (which were stated in the
Higgins settlement). DSS has also required that AFDC-FC
payments to relative caregivers be terminated if the annual
reassessment is not completed within one year of the
initial approval.
Arguments in support
The sponsor of this bill, the County of San Bernardino,
writes that it currently has approximately 1,500 children
placed with relatives, and, due to the reduction in its
child welfare service allocation, processing the annual
reassessment in a timely fashion has become an extremely
daunting task. San Bernardino County states that, under
state regulations, the federal funding for these placements
stop, resulting often in an "overpayment" to that home for
the month the home was not deemed in compliance; for any
overpayment to a relative caregiver, the state must re-pay
the federal government its share and cannot recoup these
costs from either foster parents or counties based on
current law.
The California State Association of Counties (CSAC) writes
that the loss of these benefits ultimately harms the foster
children in these homes and may cause a disruption in
placement. CSAC believes the bill will provide an
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economical way to streamline the continuation of critical
funding for foster children residing with relative
caregivers, and will help to conserve scarce state and
county dollars and staff time. The County Welfare
Directors Association states that the bill will eliminate
the state penalizing itself for a requirement that does not
exist in federal law.
Supporters argue that DSS effectively applies a higher
standard to the approval process for relative caregiver
homes, as only a portion of licensed nonrelative foster
family homes are reassessed on an annual basis; and
moreover, federal law does not prohibit continued payment
to a foster care provider once the provider is initially
licensed and approved to provide care, and such payments to
licensed homes are not terminated under the same
conditions.
Related/prior legislation
AB 1695 (Assembly Committee on Human Services) Chapter 653,
Statutes of 2001, conformed state law with the federal
Adoptions and Safe Families regulations requiring the same
standards for licensing and approving foster family homes,
and established the nonrelative extended family member
designation.
AB 2773 (Aroner) Chapter 1056, Statutes of 1998, conformed
state law to the federal Adoptions and Safe Families Act
(PL 105-89). The federal act required several changes
intended to prevent delays in the decision by county child
welfare agencies to begin to seek a permanent home for
dependents other than with the child's natural parents.
AB 1544 (Assembly Committee on Human Services) Chapter 793,
Statutes of 1997, established the priority of placing
foster children with relative caregivers and set forth
requirements for relative placements.
PRIOR VOTES
Assembly Floor: 74 - 0
Assembly Appropriations:15 - 0
Assembly Human Services: 6 - 0
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POSITIONS
Support: County of San Bernardino (sponsor)
California State Association of Counties
Chief Probation Officers of California
County Welfare Directors Association of
California
National Association of Social Workers
Oppose:None received
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