BILL ANALYSIS �
AB 1015
Page 1
Date of Hearing: April 26, 2011
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON HUMAN SERVICES
Jim Beall Jr., Chair
AB 1015 (Charles Calderon) - As Amended: April 14, 2011
SUBJECT : Child welfare services: county task force
SUMMARY : Requires, by January 1, 2013, each county to convene a
task force to identify and implement operational improvements in
child welfare services administration. Specifically, this bill :
1)Requires the task force consist of the following members, at a
minimum:
a) A representative appointed by the bargaining unit
representing children's social workers,
b) A representative of the county welfare director,
c) A representative of the board of supervisors of the
county,
d) A representative appointed by the law firm that
represents foster children in the county,
e) A former foster youth residing in the county.
2)Requires the task force to submit a report to the board by
January 1, 2014 which, at a minimum, identifies and lists
proposed operational improvements which may be implemented at
a cost savings to the county or within existing resources and
dates for full implementation of the proposals.
3)Requires the county to conduct a public hearing on the report
within 30 days of receiving the report.
4)Clarifies that this subdivision does not limit the discretion
of the task force or the county to identify and implement any
reform or policy it deems appropriate or as otherwise
permitted by law.
5)Requires a representative of the county welfare director, the
board of supervisors, or the law firm to report annually to
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the board and the public about the status of implementation
efforts or lack of full implementation.
6)Prohibits the county or state from providing payment or
reimbursement for the task force member participation, and
creates an exception for county employees who may serve in
their capacity as county employees and be paid accordingly.
7)Provides that the requirements of this bill may be
accomplished through a report covering more than one county or
as part of the county's California Child and Family Service
Review (C-CFSR) obligations as long as the requirements of
this bill are met.
EXISTING LAW
1)Establishes a system of child welfare services for abused and
neglected children which is overseen by the California
Department of Social Services (DSS), the single state agency,
and administered by individual counties.
2)Requires DSS to review all county child welfare systems
through the C-CFSR, to establish and monitor outcome
indicators and best practices. Welfare and Institutions Code
(WIC) 10601.2.
3)Requires DSS to report annually to the Assembly and Senate
Budget Committees of the Legislature regarding the findings
and recommendations for improvements to the child welfare
system identified as part of the county self-assessments and
system improvement plans, including information on common
statutory, regulatory, or fiscal barriers identified as
inhibiting system improvements and any recommendations for
overcoming those barriers.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS :
Need for this bill: According to the author, the aim of this
bill is to establish a child welfare taskforce in each county to
bring stakeholders, including social workers, county management,
and children's attorneys together to work collaboratively to
identify and implement operational improvements that can lead to
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better practice in child welfare and ultimately result in better
outcomes for children.
The author states that despite statewide efforts such as the
federally mandated Child Welfare Services Outcome and
Accountability System, known as the C-CFSR, which seek to
measure statewide outcomes related to safety, permanence, and
child and family well-being, county administered child welfare
services practices are nonetheless still mired in administrative
and procedural inefficiencies and redundancies, with serious
consequences for the children and families they are meant to
serve.
The author points to recent child deaths involving children
known to the child welfare systems in Sacramento and Los Angeles
counties as evidence of needed improvements. In both counties,
according to the author, social workers argue that too much of
an emphasis has been placed on paperwork instead of client
interactions, policies and procedures were unclear or too
cumbersome to implement, and that basic training and equipment
fell short of preparing and enabling social workers to
adequately manage their caseloads. In the case of Sacramento,
county supervisors hired an outside consultant to conduct an
internal review and found that county guidelines for social
workers contained 167 policies spanning over 1,300 pages,
including outdated or conflicting guidance, which had not been
edited out as policies were updated over the years.
The author and sponsor of this bill hope to create a mandatory
process via county task forces in each of California's 58
counties whereby the concerns of line social workers can be
amplified and ideas for systemic improvements be brought before
the county Board of Supervisors of each county. This bill
requires a report to be issued by the task force to the board of
supervisors by January 1, 2014, identifying the proposed
improvements, and requires the board of supervisors to hold a
public hearing within 30 days on the report. After the initial
report and hearing, this bill requires a specified
representative of the task force to report to the board and the
public on an annual basis regarding the status of the
implementation.
C-CFSR: The C-CFSR was established by AB 636 (Steinberg),
Chapter 678, Statutes of 2001 and implemented in January of
2004. The C-CFSR marked a shift from the previous oversight
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system which focused exclusively on regulatory compliance, to a
system aligned with the federal standards and a focus on
measuring outcomes in safety, permanence and child and family
well-being. The C-CFSR seeks to integrate continuous quality
improvement, interagency partnerships, community involvement and
public reporting of program outcomes into the oversight of child
welfare programs. This is done at the state-level through
Quarterly Outcome and Accountability Reports published by DSS
and a program of State Technical Assistance and Monitoring.
Counties are responsible for three areas of the C-CFSR: County
Self-Assessments, County Peer Quality Case Reviews (PQCR), and
County System Improvement Plans.
The County Self-Assessment process assesses current levels of
performance and identifies procedural, systemic, practice or
resource barriers to improved performance. Counties are
encouraged by the state to use existing planning processes and
community-based groups to facilitate public input into the
self-assessment process, and are required to provide a public
comment process. Counties are also required by the state to
work with a group of core representatives in the development of
self-assessments. These core representatives include, but are
not limited to representatives of the California Youth
Connection, an organization representing current and former
foster youth, the county health and mental health departments,
child welfare services administrators, managers, social workers,
parents, local Tribes, the Local Education Agency, probation,
and adoptions. The same core representatives, including child
welfare services social workers, are involved in creating the
County System Improvement Plan.
In addition, PQCRs require counties to analyze practice areas to
determine areas of strengths or concerns and to follow up with
other counties to exchange best practice ideas and receive input
and training from county peer reviewers. The third
county-specific component of the C-CFSR is the County System
Improvement Plan, which must be approved by the County Board of
Supervisors and DSS. The County System Improvement Plan
establishes program priorities, action steps for improvement,
and specific percentage-related goals with timelines for
improvements. It is the state's responsibility to track,
review, and provide ongoing technical assistance to counties as
part of the C-CFSR process. Each county updates its CFSR every
three years, although the System Improvement Plan is updated
annually.
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Support: The Children's Advocacy Institute, one of the bill's
sponsors writes in support:
With recent, sweeping budget cuts to child welfare and
foster care, it is more important than ever for county
social workers, boards of supervisors, counsel for
foster children, and child welfare directors to
identify and implement simple, day-in, day-out
operational improvements that will reduce paperwork,
enhance social worker productivity and job
satisfaction, and help ensure that abused and
neglected children are well looked after?In response
to public controversy about Sacramento CPS�Child
Protective Services] services after multiple child
deaths, Sacramento County hired an outside consultant
to review its operations. The consultant identified a
large number of extremely obvious operational
improvements and efficiencies, benefitting social
workers and children alike.
Likewise, in response to news stories in Los Angeles
County about child deaths, SEIU Local 721 authored an
exhaustive and detailed set of recommendations for
improving and streamlining daily operations and
enhancing social worker productivity.
Critically, most of the suggestions offered in both
reports can be implemented within existing resources.
Suggestions included how to eliminate duplicative
paperwork, improve coordination between departments
and employees, and shift staffing to ensure greater
productivity and job satisfaction, all to the enduring
benefit of abused and neglected children?
Too often a serious conversation between stakeholders
- especially including line social workers - about how
they think CPS operations and their daily work lives
can be improved occurs only after a tragic headline.
QUESTIONS:
Are the county task forces duplicative of the existing C-CFSR
process? The state has a clear interest in maintaining adequate
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oversight of county child welfare services, however, the process
proposed in this bill seems duplicative of the existing C-CFSR
County Self-Assessment and System Improvement Plan processes.
Are the goals of the county task forces clearly articulated?
While this bill requires each county to submit a report
identifying and listing proposed operational improvements by
January 1, 2014, it is unclear what the larger goal of these
task forces should be or how their work should proceed after the
initial deadline. There is no uniform end date for reports
regarding progress on implementation of the recommendations, and
no requirement for any communication regarding recommendations
or outcomes to the state.
Proposed author's amendments: Rather than attempt to create an
entirely new process to examine necessary administrative and
operational improvements at the local level, the author has
proposed amendments which would integrate the task force concept
into the existing C-CFSR process. In fact, the types of reviews
and assessments sought under this bill would likely benefit the
county-level C-CFSR work. By modifying the C-CFSR, the
improvements suggested under this bill will also be ensured a
review by each county board of supervisors, as well as DSS, in
line with the author's original intent.
Author's amendments are as follows:
1)Strike page 2, lines 1-32 inclusive and page 3, lines 1-13
inclusive.
2)Amend subdivision (c) of WIC 10601.2 as follows:
(c) (1) (A) By October 1, 2002, the California Health and Human
Services Agency shall convene a workgroup comprised of
representatives of the Judicial Council, the State Department of
Social Services, the State Department of Health Services, the
State Department of Mental Health, the State Department of
Education, the Department of Child Support Services, the State
Department of Justice, any other state departments or agencies
the California Health and Human Services Agency deems necessary,
the County Welfare Directors Association, the California State
Association of Counties, the Chief Probation Officers of
California, the California Youth
Connection, and representatives of California tribes, interested
child advocacy organizations, researchers, and foster parent
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organizations. The workgroup shall establish a workplan by
which child and family service reviews shall be conducted
pursuant to this section, including a process for qualitative
peer reviews of case information.
(B) In developing the county self-assessments and county
improvement plans required pursuant to this section, or similar
reports required by any subsequent changes to the California
Child and Family Services Review system, each county shall
consult with stakeholders, including but not limited to, county
child welfare agency and Probation agency staff at all levels,
current and former foster children, children's attorneys, and
foster care providers. At least one member of the group
consulted pursuant to this subdivision shall be a county child
welfare worker named by the bargaining unit representing
children's social workers.
(2) At a minimum, in establishing the workplan, the workgroup
shall consider any existing federal program improvement plans
entered into by the state pursuant to federal regulations, the
outcome indicators to be measured, compliance thresholds for
each indicator, timelines for implementation, county review
cycles, uniform processes, procedures and review instruments to
be used, a corrective action process, and any funding or
staffing increases needed to implement the requirements of this
section. The agency shall broadly consider collaboration with
all entities to allow the adequate exchange of information and
coordination of efforts to improve outcomes for foster youth and
families.
3)Amend subdivision (d) of WIC 10601.2 as follows:
(d) (1) The California Child and Family Service Review System
outcome indicators shall be consistent with the federal child
and family service review measures and standards for child and
family outcomes and system factors authorized by Subtitle B
(commencing with Section 421) and Subtitle E (commencing with
Section 470) of Title IV of the federal Social Security Act and
the regulations adopted pursuant to those provisions (Parts 1355
to 1357, inclusive, of Title 45 of the Code of Federal
Regulations).
(2) During the first review cycle pursuant to this section,
each county shall be reviewed according to the outcome
indicators established for the California Child and Family
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Service Review System.
(3) For subsequent reviews, the workgroup shall consider whether
to establish additional outcome indicators that support the
federal outcomes and any program improvement plan, and promote
good health, mental health, behavioral, educational, and other
relevant outcomes for children and families in California's
child welfare services system.
(4) The county improvement plans developed pursuant to this
section and which are approved by the county board of
supervisors shall include a separately titled subsection which
lists and provides the rationale for proposed operational
improvements that may be implemented at a cost savings to the
county or within existing county resources, identified as a part
of the stakeholder process described in subparagraph (B) of
paragraph (1).
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
Children's Advocacy Institute
Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
Opposition
None on file.
Analysis Prepared by : Michelle Doty Cabrera / HUM. S. / (916)
319-2089