RELEASE: March 4 , 2004

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DYFS on Track to Safely Close 6,000 Cases but New Cases Add to High Caseload

Ahead of its pace to safely close 6,000 cases, the Division of Youth and Family Services safely closed 1,459 cases last week for a total of 5,647 cases over the past six weeks but thousands of new cases continue to burden staff, Acting Human Services Commissioner James Davy announced today.

During his weekly press briefing Davy continued to express concerns about the high caseload of 66,000 children. Though the Division has closed a significant number of cases involving children who appeared safe and no longer in need of supervision, more than 5,900 new cases have been opened in the past several weeks.

“So far, we have managed to stabilize our caseload,” Davy said. “We’ve made some progress but the new cases continue to put quite a burden on our caseworkers across the state. We may not see true relief until DYFS establishes centralized screening to control intake and adds new workers to help shoulder the caseload.”

Davy has directed his staff to begin planning additional hires in the current year to ease the rising caseloads carried by individual workers. Caseworkers in DYFS district offices supervise an average of 42 children, but many veteran workers carry higher caseloads because workers with less than a year experience have limited numbers of cases.

Closing the 6,000 backlogged cases was one of seven immediate actions ordered by Davy on January 14. Acting Commissioner Davy gave the following progress report on those actions:

• Expedite the Licensing Process and Add 100 New Foster Family and Treatment Homes

Status: The Department has licensed 183 new homes this year. In addition, about 240 potential foster homes are involved in a “parallel track” licensing system, undergoing home studies while the prospective foster parents are still in training.

• Increase transportation and child care services to ensure that foster children do not spend their days in DYFS district offices.

Status: Last week, seven children spent significant amounts of time in DYFS district offices. This represented a slight increase from the week before, when DYFS recorded an average of one child per day. In January, the division typically saw two to four children each day spending significant time in district offices.

• End the practice of allowing newborns to remain in hospitals after they are medically cleared to leave.

Status: Of 21 “boarder babies” in New Jersey hospitals on Jan. 14, one remains in a hospital. The child has severe medical problems and is awaiting placement in a pediatric group home. All told, there are 15 boarder babies statewide as of today. Two veteran DYFS workers continue working in the Newark area – which has about 75 percent of the state’s boarder baby cases – to target this problem. Last week, three family team conferences were held in Newark to discuss active boarder baby cases. In two cases, relatives were identified to provide a home for the child. Background checks and home studies are underway. A total of seven boarder babies were discharged from hospitals last week, and four were placed with relatives.

• Redo safety assessments of 6,000 children in out-of-home placement.

Status: To date, 1,589 DYFS workers and 697 community agency staff members were trained in the new assessment protocol. One additional training session has been scheduled. DYFS workers and their community agency counterparts have held 189 pre-assessment conferences and completed 45 assessments through the end of last week. No safety concerns were noted.

Davy also announced an additional 500 safety assessments will be re-done. The Child Advocate raised issue with these assessments as part of his Collingswood report several weeks ago. These assessments were originally done when the worker was completing the required monthly placement visit as part of the adoption process. The assessments should have been done as a separate visit said Davy.

• Bolster foster parent recruitment and retention.

Status: The Hispanic Information Center – which has a contract to develop 10 foster-care beds for Hispanic children – has identified five potential foster homes in Hudson County and one in Passaic County. In addition, DHS officials continue working with the child welfare panel to develop a $1.5 million initiative to recruit resource homes in targeted communities. Davy said he expects the final plan will be finished in the next few weeks.

• Expedite medical examinations of children going to foster homes and other placements.

Status: DYFS continues interviewing applicants to fill 12 positions for nurses who will handle medical screenings for children moving from one foster placement to another. In addition, pediatricians are available in all 21 counties to examine children going into foster care and other out-of-home placements. To date, 19 DYFS offices – out of 38 field offices in the state – have allocated private space to conduct medical exams. The remaining offices are still working to identify appropriate space.

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