Sonoma County Grand Jury
• 2010-2011
• Agency Response
Response to:
Children's Protective Services
Children's Protective Services Ma County*
⚠️ Translation Notice: This content has been automatically translated. The original English text is the official version. Translation may contain errors.
⚠️ Este contenido ha sido traducido automáticamente. El texto original en inglés es la versión oficial. La traducción puede contener errores.
Findings and Recommendations 1 findings
F5
Page 4
Conscientious employees in ER are at risk of having low morale and being exhausted, partially due to inadequate supervision and management, time pressure to close cases, inconsistencies in interpretation of regulation for case closures, as well as the many cases that require investigation. However, the FYC's implementation of new ER policies and procedures and the hiring of case social workers could reduce this risk. The well-being of our staff is a top priority. Child welfare work can be exhausting both physically and emotionally. Child welfare social workers deserve to have manageable caseloads and effective supervision. Recent budget constraints resulted in a supervisor position being kept vacant for an extended period of time leaving existing supervisors with more staff to supervise. Furthermore, and as the Grand Jury suggests, FYC had identified areas of inconsistency in its assessment system and in its policies and procedures prompting the transition to a new assessment system (SDM) and the revision of several policies and procedures. In addition to moving forward with the recommendation regarding F5 (see Recommendation 4 below), in August 2011, FYC also started the recruitment process for the vacant supervisor position.
Related Recommendations (1)
R5
Page 2
– The procedure for a random review of cases should be carried out by section managers rather than, or in addition to, supervisors as a way to make section managers more familiar with the actions of their supervisors and social workers. Cases that were judged to be high risk should be a priority for re-review. A process for evaluating the implementation of the procedure needs to be established. The Grand Jury met with the Family, Youth and Children's Division Director and is pleased with the amount of effort that has been put into the new Emergency Response Policies and Procedures. The FYC Division has developed and updated the policies as required in R2 and R3. The plan includes staff training as well as developing a methodology for continued quality assurance to ensure that the standards and practices as defined in the Policy are maintained and adhered to. They expect to have a first draft to the Grand Jury for review by March 2012 with full implementation by July 2012. Also included in the updates is a new Case Review Policy that addresses the issue in R5 for the random review of cases, both routine and formal. Section Managers are included in the policy to ensure their role in compliance and review of the cases with the social worker and supervisors. Human Services Department COUNTY OF SONOMA "Empower, Support, Protect" AUG 2 9 2011 Approved: Court Judge Jo Weber, Director August 29, 2011 tel (707) 565-5855 Date: fax (707) 565-5890 Jerry Dunn, Assistant Director tel (707) 565-5750 fax (707) 565-5890 Presiding Judge Gary Nadler Superior Court, State of California Susan Chestnut, Director AUG 2 9 2011 600 Administration Drive Administration Division tel (707) 565-5855 Santa Rosa, CA 95403 SUPERIOR COURT OF CALIFORNIA fax (707) 565-5890 COUNTY OF SENOMA Re: Response to 2010-2011 Grand Jury Final Report _ DEPUTY CLERK Diane Kaljian, Director Adult & Aging Division tel (707) 565-5950 Dear Judge Nadler, fax (707) 565-5957 Marion Deeds, Director Please accept this response to the 2010-2011 Grand Jury Final Report Economic Assistance Division regarding Child Protective Services (CPS) - Reducing the Risk of Abuse and tel (707) 565-2198 fax (707) 565-2929 Neglect. I appreciate the Grand Jury's thoughtful review of our CPS system and the strengths that you have identified. I also agree with all six of the Karen Fies, Director
* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.