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The state has downgraded Luzerne County Children and Youth’s license to provisional status following a review stemming from the death of a child, state records show.
“The results of the review revealed some serious concerns regarding agency practice as well as regulatory violations,” a state licensing inspection summary says.
A license downgrade forces the agency to undergo and pass more frequent inspections to restore its compliant status.
According to online state records:
The Department of Human Services’ Office of Children, Youth and Families initiated a mandatory “fatality review” of the county agency in January 2015.
The report does not name the victim. A county source said the child’s death was ruled accidental, and nobody was charged.
Examiners reviewed all case files involving the victim and interviewed the caseworker and supervisors involved in the case. They also interviewed the deceased child’s siblings, maternal grandmother, maternal step-grandfather, biological parents, pediatrician and four physicians who treated the child the day he died.
The inspection said the agency did not appropriately assess the safety and risk of the victim and a sibling.
From Sept. 14, 2014, until Nov. 3, 2014, both the victim and his sibling lived with a paternal family relative due to concerns about a lack of heat at the parents’ house.
No background clearances or review of internal agency records were completed on the paternal relative, who had a “long prior history” with Children and Youth, including placement of her children, child abuse and termination of her parental rights.
Protocol requires agencies to clear all adult household members when the agencies are intervening in the custody of children or providing ongoing services to a family. Adherence is “crucial in making informed safety and risk determinations on behalf of children,” according to the report.
Inspectors also questioned whether safety assessments were completed on Aug. 4 and Nov. 3, 2014. Documents about assessments on those dates use safety threat language “clearly copied” from a preliminary safety assessment performed by an intake caseworker on March 19, 2014, they said.
“The language did not apply to the current circumstances of the family and/or in determining the safety of the children on those dates,” the inspectors said.
The victim’s parents also were not given an opportunity to participate in development of a “family service plan” for the child when it was drafted in March 2014 and reviewed again in October 2014. County agencies are supposed to invite family members to participate in plan development and amendments if it won’t jeopardize the child’s safety.
A second case
The inspection reports also describe another case in May in which seven siblings were not placed in shelter care as decided by a team that evaluates critical cases.
According to the report:
This team, which includes county and state human services representatives, concluded the youngest seven children were unsafe. The mother had two adult daughters and eight children ranging in age from 2 to 16. The father was in prison.
Instead, the day after the team decision, three Children and Youth workers picked up the family and their pets from their home in Luzerne County, transported them to Delaware County and dropped them off at a hotel paid for by the county agency.
The decision was allegedly made because the mother said she had an apartment in Delaware County and could not move in until the following week. However, files show the mother had made a claim about moving to Delaware County several times over the prior year and provided no confirmation an apartment had been secured.
“In addition, although there were concerns regarding the condition of the family home, the safety threats present to the children were not regarding housing so uprooting the family to another location did not alleviate the safety threats to the children,” the report said.
The mother of the children died a few days after the family was relocated, and the children were displaced to relatives’ homes in that county and Delaware state.
The case file also contained no documented face-to-face contact by caseworkers with the parent or these children in December 2014 or January through April 2015. Monthly visitations are required as often as necessary for the protection of the children but at least once a month, and all visits must be documented.
The report also questions why the first family plan from October 2014 stated the children were at imminent risk of placement, while two subsequent reports said they were not, even though the family’s stability was “deteriorating.”
“It was clear that the children were at imminent risk of placement,” the report states.
County responds
County Chief Solicitor C. David Pedri said many problems cited in the inspection reports are related to a lack of documentation, and the report identifies staffing shortages as a primary cause.
The county has 27 vacant Children and Youth caseworker positions, leaving around 80 to 85 workers, according to Pedri and Human Services Division Head David Schwille.
Schwille said some caseworkers are hovering at or near the state-established maximum caseload of 30.
The positions are filled through state Civil Service, and the county sometimes exhausts the available list of prospective applicants through that system, Schwille said.
Some turn down job offers because they don’t believe the starting pay — around $32,000 — is sufficient for “the type of work they’re expected to do,” he said.
Often several leave for other positions outside the county as new ones are hired, putting the agency back to square one, Schwille said.
“This is a zero sum game. You hire five, and then five resign,” he said.
Pedri said the caseworker position also is a “very difficult job.”
“These are the front-line child protectors in the county, and recruiting for these positions is very difficult,” Pedri said, noting the administration and union are discussing solutions.
Caseworkers also have less time in the field to visit families and catch up on paperwork due to delays in court hearings, Pedri said.
“Once those two issues are taken care of — the staffing and court delays — the county believes this documentation process will move much quicker,” Pedri said.
He stressed there’s no contention Children and Youth caused any deaths.
“The county is taking this as a major issue and treating it as a serious one, but also as an opportunity to grow and get better,” Pedri said.
The state said the county’s hiring process “needs to be revamped in order to efficiently and quickly fill all vacant positions without hesitation or delay.” Cooperation and support from the county manager and human resources is “imperative” because staffing levels are “insufficient to meet the needs of the children/families of Luzerne County,” it said.
The number of complaints about the county’s Children and Youth agency to the state’s Office of Children, Youth and Families “continues to be excessive,” the report says. This includes complaints about caseworkers or supervisors not returning phone calls, a lack of case planning progress and overall delays, the report says.
Pedri said the provisional status still allows the agency to continue full operation. The provisional license will remain in effect at least through March 16, the state said.
To view the report, click here.