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Extracted from Consolidated Report
This investigation was originally published as part of a larger consolidated report containing multiple investigations. View the consolidated PDF for the complete document.
⚠️ 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.
Recommendations 2
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R1Page 364Scalability: Going Statewide The procedures used in the pilot project for ordering credit reports and transmitting the sensitive data electronically among DCFS, the CRAs and the remediation agencies proved both efficient and secure. Based on the pilot project, the work of a foster care agency in creating and transmitting a report of foster children’s identifying information and then transmitting it to the three CRAs on a quarterly basis would amount to less than 100 hours a year plus one-time work at start-up of less than 50 hours. This workload would be the same regardless of the number of records in the report. For each of California’s 58 counties to do the same thing would mean 58 times the workload statewide. The CRAs have said that they could not use the pilot project data transmission procedures for all the counties individually. We also have serious concerns about the security risks of involving so many entities in transmitting such sensitive data. The “manual” alternative of the county agencies sending individual written requests to the credit reporting agencies, providing the necessary documentation for each child, would be far more labor- intensive than making a bulk request electronically. The counties would then have to send the paper credit reports received to the remediation agencies, which would add to the workload and the security risk. The last thing we want to do is to expose foster children Calif o rn ia O f fic e o f P riv ac y P rot e c t ion | 14 330 2011-2012 LOS ANGELES COUNTY CIVIL GRAND JURY FINAL REPORT
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R3Page 364To Catch the Thieves At the end of the pilot, the data received from the CRAs and copies of the clearance letters from creditors and collectors were provided to DCFS. We have suggested to DCFS that they add the clearance letters to the files of important documents that foster children receive upon emancipation, for use in the event that they experience problems with their credit records in the future. We have also encouraged DCFS to work with DCA in bringing the data to the attention of local law enforcement for investigation. See