WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Wednesday made it a little harder for civil rights lawyers to be paid extra for exceptional results.
In most American lawsuits, each side pays for its own lawyers whether they win or lose. But Congress occasionally allows the winning side to claim its legal fees from its adversaries, notably in cases involving claims of civil rights violations.
The question in the case decided Wednesday, Perdue v. Kenny A., No. 08-970, was how judges should determine how much the losing side has to pay.
The case arose from a successful class-action suit on behalf of 3,000 children in Georgia that helped reform the foster-care system there.
The trial judge awarded the lawyers $6 million using a conventional way of calculating legal fees — hours worked times the local hourly market rate for lawyers of comparable experience and skill. The judge then added $4.5 million for what he said was work of exceptionally high quality.
Justice Samuel A. Alito, writing for five justices, said that some additional payments may be proper in rare cases but that the judge here had not given good enough reasons for increasing the basic payment by 75 percent...more
See, every time Children's Rights files a class action, it files on behalf of children in foster care to provide them more services and to expedite the process of adoption. Children's Rights does not advocate for the children who have been improperly and unnecessarily removed form the family, nor does it advocate for the child victims who have been legally kidnapped. Children's Rights does not advocate for damages to the children who have been harmed in foster care, not even to the children were able to get the class certification on the case. Children's Rights brings forth these class action law suits because they know they have a guaranteed money making cash cow.
See, there is no why, shape or form a state can meet the requirements of any of the settlement agreements.
Even though it is admirable that this organization has taken the initiative to protect children from the horrific conditions in the foster care system, Children's Rights fails to consider that these children are mostly being placed in foster care due to poverty and fraud.
I have loosely developed my own hypothesis for these class action events. When the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General comes out with extremely poor audits of a state child welfare systems, Children's Rights gears up to file because the money to be had does not come from the settlement agreement of the case, it comes from the settlement agreement of the attorney fees and the likelihood that the state will not meet the criteria for compliance, meaning the state will breach the settlement agreement and there shall be more attorney fees incurred.
Actually, this is quite brilliant, so I do not fault, as I am only here to inspire people to do more through education.
Of these attorney fee settlement agreements, not one single penny will go to the children of these cases. Not one penny will even remain in the state of where the agreement was entered. Not one penny will go to a family to prevent a placement in foster care for lack of resources such as housing or medical care.
In the end, the children still loose until someone stands up and takes action to stop the fraud in child welfare.
Before Children's Rights filed its lawsuit against Michigan DHS, I contacted them to see what areas they were going after to improve.
Naturally, it said it wanted children in the system to receive services and be safe in care, with permanent placement the end goal.
So, naturally, when I asked if they were going after Michigan Children's Institute Superintendent, Bill Johnson, who is the sole, legal parent to more than 7,000 kids, many of whom are subjected to horrific conditions with any form of due process, who are the protected class of these lawsuits,the response was.
"What is Michigan Children's Institute?"
I lost all respect for Children's Rights because they did secure one of the largest attorney fees in history. Not one penny went to the children of whom they were representing.
As Children's Rights matured over the years, it has become evident that, not only did they not know about the atrocities of the child welfare system, they are still functioning on a self-proclaimed learning curve, meaning, they still have yet to address the legalities of its operations.
I speak of the Medicaid fraud in Massachusetts' Child Welfare System.
To be fair, if Coakley has to resort to blaming Children's Rights as being grifters to make a ton in legal fees, then she very well knows how jacked up the child welfare system is in Massachusetts.
Martha Coakley is the State Attorney General who runs a Medicaid Fraud Control Unit that has not done jack shit to stop Medicaid Fraud in Child Welfare. The reason for her lack of effort to protect children and the public funds is because she is caught between a rock and a hard place.
A State Attorney General cannot prosecute those it defends.
The State Attorney General defends child welfare contracted agencies and prosecutes child welfare cases. Let's see if she is woman enough to bring this fact up in her campaign for Governor.
Yes, keep in mind that when she is elected, she will no longer be Attorney General and will not be involved in the litigation, well, at least not in the open. She will have a front row seat to the inner workings of the state's child welfare system.
Martha Coakley spoke to reporters at her campaign headquarters Thursday.
A national children’s advocacy group struck back at Democratic gubernatorial nominee Martha Coakley Friday, saying she has leveled “irresponsible” charges against the group with her statement that it is suing the state’s troubled child welfare agency in order to collect hefty publicly funded legal fees.
“Very frankly, any suggestion that the lawsuit is motivated by legal fees is irresponsible,’’ said Sara Bartosz, lead counsel for Children’s Rights which filed the 2010 federal lawsuit.
“The suit is not about fees, it is not about politics, it’s about the state’s most vulnerable kids being harmed by the very system that is meant to protect them,’’ Bartosz said in an interview Friday.
Her comments were prompted by Coakley’s strong denunciation this week of a television ad by a Republican-funded super PAC that accuses her of ignoring the mismanagement of the state’s Department of Children and Families and implied her inaction resulted in the abuse and neglect — and even death — of scores of foster children. The ad refers to the Children’s Right’s lawsuit.
Bartosz also said Coakley’s claim that the federal judge found the suit “meritless” badly mischaracterized his ruling, noting that he had some harsh conclusions about the way DCF is carrying out its mission of caring for foster children.
Here you have one side, Children's Rights taking a stance in the courts to change public policy. The gravamen of the case is to protect those children who have been remanded to the foster care system and to accelerate and expedite exits from the foster care system through adoption or reunification, mostly focused on the former.
Then, on the other side of the dramatic spectrum, you have the one man show of the National Coalition on Child Protection Reform who is taking a stance in the media to change public policy. The crux of his advocacy is to cease and desist the improper and unnecessary removal and placement of children in the foster care.
So why is it these two positions cannot merge into one significant force to reform child protection?
It's because neither of them understands the system or its secret...yet...
With Rhode Island’s child welfare system facing a lawsuit by one advocacy group, another advocate has taken aim at both the state and the plaintiff.
Richard Wexler, head of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, held a news conference in Rhode Island Thursday to issue a 64-page report calling the state “the child warehousing capital of America.” The report, State of Denial: Why Rhode Island’s Child Welfare System is so Dismal – and How to Make it Better, says the state removes children from their homes 80 percent more frequently than the national average, and places them in the poorest of group homes and institutional care.
Children’s Rights, a New York-based advocacy group, also believes Rhode Island’s child welfare system is a mess, and in 2007 joined a class action lawsuit by the state’s child advocate, Jametta Alston, against the state Department of Children, Youth and Families in an effort to force reforms. In June, the federal First Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the lawsuit, which had been thrown out by a lower court. The case is now awaiting reassignment to a judge.
Wexler charged that reforms pushed by Children’s Rights in other states rely too heavily on continuing to remove children from their homes, and that any settlement in Rhode Island would probably “exacerbate” that practice. He called for a settlement emphasizing “safe, proven alternatives to taking away so many children in the first place.”
Susan Lambiase, associate director of Children’s Rights, replied via e-mail that Wexler’s report “identifies issues we have been trying to get Rhode Island officials to address” through the lawsuit, including “the growing number of children placed in large, unsafe institutional settings.” She said lawsuits by Children’s Rights in other states led to changes that include reducing foster care populations.
The nonprofit National Coalition for Child Protection Reform advocates alternatives to removing children from their homes. The nonprofit Children’s Rights has brought class actions lawsuits against several states to reform their child welfare systems.
I would like to take this time to memorialize the work of the Lansing State Journal and the reporting of Justin Hinkley on illuminating the Michigan's Child Welfare System.
You can research the history of Michigan on this blog because it all started here.
On a side note, as I wish not to tarnish this report with in the spirit of fuchsia, but I will say this.
The Michigan Office of Children's Ombudsman has this category called "Valid Not Opened" when it came to requests for investigations.
The intake investigator, being quick on her feet, would make a determination as to the validity of a case, not on anything dealing with the well being of the child, or the original guardians, but on the financial merits of being able to afford the investigation, or if there were political interests, or if there was fraud...
This one particular year, I had decided to skew its reporting statistics.
I went around the state with a friend where we created, printed and distributed fliers at the court houses and child placing agencies with direct information on how to report to the Office of Children's Ombudsman.
I drastically skewed the annual report.
You know you love me, every one of you, including The Madame Maura Corrigan (said in a high British accent).
More Michigan kids are dying from abuse or neglect a decade after a
federal lawsuit forced the state to spend millions of dollars on
improvements.
LANSING — Shortly after Gov. Rick Snyder's child welfare agency argued to a federal judge it had improved enough to escape court oversight, one of the state’s foster children drowned in a lake near Flint.
Omarion Humphrey, 9, was autistic. On July 4, 2015, he wandered away from a foster mother who had no specialized training to care for him.
"We
had him for nine years and nothing even close to that happened to him,"
his sister, 21-year-old Cyrria Mims, said in a recent interview. "They
had him for four months and he ended up dead."
More
Michigan kids are dying from abuse or neglect than a decade ago, when
the state settled a federal lawsuit and vowed to improve its child
welfare system, a Lansing State Journal investigation found.
Deaths
increased despite the hundreds of millions Michigan spent on reforms,
including doubling its child welfare budget and nearly doubling the
child welfare staff.
In 2008, the year Michigan
settled the lawsuit, the state reported 59 deaths from abuse or neglect.
In 2016, the most recent year data is available, Michigan reported 85 such deaths and became one of the five worst states in the nation.
Also in 2016, the Michigan Office of the Children's Ombudsman opened a record number of investigations into the deaths of foster children or kids whose families had recently received child welfare services.
The ombudsman
says the Michigan Department of Health & Human Services did
everything right in 6% of the hundreds of cases it reviewed between
February 2016 and March 2018.
Those reviews included child deaths and
other cases involving Children's Protective Services investigations,
foster care and adoption.
Records show state
employees and contractors frequently violate the laws and policies meant
to protect kids from harm and often fail to intervene when they
should. The ombudsman has written more than 500 suggested improvements
to the child welfare system over the last decade, including 155 related
to child deaths.
While Michigan has
made reforms it should be proud of, "we remain deeply concerned about
the ability of the state to keep kids safe when they're in foster care,"
said Elizabeth Pitman Gretter, an attorney for Children's Rights. That's the New York advocacy group that sued Michigan after several high-profile child deaths, including the 2005 killing of Williamston’s Ricky Holland by his adoptive parents.
Omarion Humphrey’s death 10 years later illustrates
the ongoing flaws. DHHS had removed Humphrey and 10 of his siblings from
their parents over living conditions officials said were unsafe. But
the state placed Humphrey with a foster mother who had a history of
complaints and no training on how to handle autistic children.
"I
don't think anyone that had him there that day actually was sorry,"
Mims said. "My son will never have met his uncle, ever. My baby brothers
don't even know who he is.
And my younger brothers don't remember who
he is."
DHHS can't comment on specific cases, but spokesman Bob Wheaton pointed to state policies requiring the
department to place kids in the most appropriate home and minimize "the
trauma experienced by the child and family."
The
DHHS contractor that placed Humphrey lost its license; Humphrey's
siblings were returned to their parents in December 2016.
Herman McCall,
executive director of Michigan’s child welfare programs, refused to be
interviewed or answer written questions for this article, citing the
ongoing federal lawsuit. Instead, he issued a written statement pointing to numerous new programs launched over the last decade.
"Since
coming under federal court oversight in 2008," the statement says,
"MDHHS has taken numerous measures designed to increase safety and
well-being … and deliver effective services to achieve positive outcomes
for children and families."
Mistakes
like what happened to Humphrey will continue to happen, current and
former DHHS employees said, because of excessive turnover that leaves
kids' lives in the hands of inexperienced caseworkers.
State
civil service records suggest only about 18% of child welfare employees
have at least 10 years on the job. The average worker has about 7
years' experience.
That
can be a serious shortcoming. Child welfare workers need a deep
understanding of state and federal law, the court system, and community
resources available to families.
"You just don't get that without time in the trenches," said David Berns, who ran child welfare agencies in several states, including Michigan in the 1990s.
Turnover
is a common problem in the high-stress, high-stakes world of child
welfare, especially given that the pay is relatively low. DHHS' child
welfare workers make between $19.41 and $33.32 an hour.
But
current and former DHHS employees who spoke with the State Journal said
the problem is exacerbated in Michigan. Employees often quit out of
frustration with supervisors who they believe are more concerned about
escaping court oversight than giving kids what they really need.
Supervisors
often tolerate — or even subtly encourage — shortcuts while harassing
workers who take too long to close cases, workers said.
"The
State of Michigan doesn't care," said Adre Brown, a former CPS
investigator in Ingham County. "As long as you get your cases done in 30
days, you're a rock star."
The federal court, state lawmakers and the Michigan Auditor General are investigating allegations — first uncovered by the State Journal last year
— that supervisors frequently assign cases to employees who are on
leave for medical or other reasons. That makes the state appear to be in
compliance with court-ordered caseload limits but may delay crucial
interventions in kids' lives.
Researchers found turnover among
foster care workers was more than 16%, compared to less than 10%
across all state government jobs. DHHS spends $1.5 million a year hiring
and training new foster care caseworkers, researchers from the National
Council on Crime & Delinquency said in that report.
The
report concluded DHHS should hire enough foster care employees so none
were responsible for more than 13 cases, to give employees adequate time
for kids. Yet, DHHS has repeatedly missed the 15-cases-per-worker
requirement spelled out in the federal lawsuit, including in the most recent monitoring report.
The
department also exceeded caseload limits for supervisors and CPS
workers. The department was within caseload limits for licensing staff
and employees who run the statewide hotline where suspected abuse is
reported.
'There's no leadership'
McCall,
the state's child welfare chief, told lawmakers in March that DHHS has
used the results of employee surveys to make the department a more
attractive place to work.
In his written statement
to the State Journal, he said officials have focused on hiring
qualified staff, providing quality training, and helping employees deal
with the secondary trauma they might experience through the horrors they
witness in their work.
"Recognizing that a
healthy workforce is a significant asset to successful improvement and
sustainability of Michigan’s child welfare system, MDHHS continues to
develop and implement efforts focused on addressing workforce barriers,"
McCall said in the statement.
But it isn't clear that's really happening. Last year's surveys
revealed skepticism among employees at the Children's Services Agency,
the umbrella organization McCall runs that covers child welfare
programs, juvenile justice and more.
Just more
than a quarter of those employees said they'd seen meaningful change
come from engagement survey results. Most said DHHS leadership
is untrustworthy and that employees cannot share their opinions without
fear of retaliation.
So turnover remains a problem. And families feel the effects.
For
about two years, White Lake's Brendan and Erika Bedini have had legal
guardianship of their 5-year-old niece, Addisyn Lantto, because the
girl's mother struggled with alcoholism.
The Bedinis say
they feared for their niece's safety because DHHS allowed Addisyn to
visit her mother even as the mother had relapse after relapse.
The Bedinis said they struggled to get Children's Protective Services to
respond to their concerns.
Wheaton, the DHHS spokesman, pointed to policies that
encourage parental visitation plans that are "in the best interest of
the child and … develop or enhance attachment with the child's family."
Brendan
Bedini said the state repeatedly made the wrong decision in Addisyn's
case. He blamed that, in part, on the fact that they dealt with a dozen
different caseworkers over less than three years.
"I
don't know what the problem is" at DHHS, he said, "except there's no
leadership. There's no direction. There's no one to go to."
Each
state's problems are unique, but "Michigan did seem to get off to a
slower start," said Pitman Gretter, the Children's Rights attorney. "We
are frustrated that we aren't further down the road."
Michigan has changed its system in the decade since then-Gov. Jennifer Granholm signed the first settlement with Children's Rights.
Granholm's administration in 2009 created a specialized unit to investigate allegations of abuse or neglect in foster care.
The timeline below shows the history of child welfare reforms in Michigan. Story continues below.
In
2012, Snyder's administration opened a centralized intake hotline where
all allegations of child abuse or neglect are reported and assigned for
investigation.
In 2015, the administration
launched a massive, $61 million computer system meant to improve data
collection and analysis — though that program has been glitch-ridden
since it went online.
Those and other efforts
have helped the state improve upon some key statistics. The state has
sharply reduced the number of kids in foster care. At a hearing in
the federal lawsuit last summer, U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds praised the state for more quickly finding kids permanent homes.
"It is a happy event, and everyone involved should feel proud of what's been accomplished," Edmunds said.
But much remains to be done.
In
their latest report, court-appointed consultants tracking Michigan's
progress in the federal lawsuit said DHHS had accomplished less than 25%
of the goals laid out for it.
Among the missed
targets: Several abuse investigations took longer than allowed by state
law. Nearly a third of the allegations of abuse in foster care that
should have been assigned for investigation never were. And the
department failed to run background checks on some of the relatives with
whom children were placed, meaning some kids were placed in homes with
unsecured firearms or where drugs were abused.
And
monitors still can't measure the state's progress on many metrics.
Partly because of the still-glitchy computer system launched in 2015,
monitors said in their last report they couldn't gauge the state's
progress on 28% of the requirements.
"How does
management know, day to day, what decisions to make?" Sara Bartosz,
another Children's Rights attorney, told Edmunds at the 2017 hearing.
"You're driving a bus in the blind."
Orlene Hawks
Meanwhile, Children's Ombudsman Orlene Hawks said DHHS continues to show "a very concerning pattern of not following those rules and policies" in investigations.
As
long as there is poverty, substance abuse, domestic violence and other
family strife that puts kids at risk, bad things will happen, Pitman
Gretter told the State Journal.
But she said kids shouldn't get hurt because the government agency meant to protect them messed up.
"You
look for a system in place that protects against those human errors,"
she said. "Child welfare is a messy world, but it is not a standard-less
world."
In
2016, the Michigan Department of Health & Human Services reported
263 child deaths — many during or shortly after state intervention — to
the Michigan Office of the Children's Ombudsman. Here's how those deaths
happened:
47.5%: Unknown/unspecified
16%: Unsafe sleep practices
12%: Natural causes/health issues
6.5%: Accident
18%: Miscellaneous, including drowning, suicide and fire.
Source: Michigan Office of the Children's Ombudsman
Michigan child welfare: By the numbers
13,439: Number of Michigan foster children as of Dec. 31, 2017, compared to more than 18,000 in 2008.
76: The number of Michigan children who were abused or neglected in foster care in 2016, compared to 203 in 2011.
85: The number of child deaths from abuse or neglect reported in 2016, compared to 59 in 2008.
144: The
number of child death investigations opened by the Michigan Office of
the Children's Ombudsman in 2016, compared to 74 in 2009.
$1.2 billion: Michigan
Children's Services Agency budget for the 2018 fiscal
year, including $25 million on legal fees and monitoring costs in the
federal lawsuit.
Sources: Michigan
Department of Health & Human Services, Michigan Office of the
Children's Ombudsman, U.S. Administration for Children & Families
Child welfare federal oversight: A timeline
Aug. 8, 2006: Children's
Rights, a New York advocacy group, sues Michigan following highly
publicized government errors in several child deaths, including the 2005
killing of Williamston's Ricky Holland by his adoptive parents.
Oct. 24, 2008: Michigan
settles with Children's Rights. The state agrees to several reforms,
promising to reduce caseloads, hire more qualified employees, and do
more to protect children in foster care.
July 18, 2011: Gov. Rick Snyder signs a new settlement with Children's Rights about seven months after taking office.
Dec. 2, 2014: 28
days after Snyder wins reelection, his administration files a motion to
dismiss the federal lawsuit, starting a third round of negotiations
with Children's Rights.
Feb. 2, 2016: The
Snyder administration signs a new agreement with Children's Rights.
Under the new Exit & Sustainability Plan, requirements end when the
administration proves it can accomplish them.
What's next
The
Michigan Department of Health & Human Services and Children's
Rights will appear in U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds' courtroom at 10
a.m. Thursday. Officials from Public Catalyst, the New Jersey firm
appointed by Edmunds to monitor DHHS' progress in the federal lawsuit,
are expected to present their latest report.
Here is the Conclusion of the judge who dismissed Children's Rights' class action lawsuit against Massachusetts:
"This is a dispiriting opinion to write. In alleging
violations of substantive due process, the Plaintiffs set
themselves to climb a virtually unscalable peak. They have
failed in the ascent. Nothing is really resolved. The state
defendants today avoid the litigation bullet but the stage is
set for further costly litigation as all attempts at settlement
have failed.
In the process, the Court may have done a disservice to the
hundreds of overworked, underpaid, and underappreciated case
workers and foster home providers whose dedication has never
been questioned here. There is, of course, a certain aridity in
marshalling the statistics necessary to sustain or refute the
class-wide institutional claims made in this case.
Yet this is not a case about statistics but about children
-- our children -- and this much is clear, the flaws noted
herein are more about budgetary shortfalls than management
myopia. We are all complicit in this financial failure.
When next you bemoan your tax burden, remember that, at
that moment, somewhere in Massachusetts there is a youngster who
Case 1:10-cv-30073-WGY Document 373 Filed 11/22/13 Page 83 of 84 84
has just been taken from her parents’ home.43 She is confused,
inexpressibly lonely, homesick, and desperately afraid. Because
of Massachusetts’ penury, her future is murkier than in most
places in America.
Do you care?"
/s/ William G. Young
WILLIAM G. YOUNG
DISTRICT JUDGE
Judge Young is raising the bar for reform as the current adversarial models of litigation do nothing but pump more money into a dysfunctional system. There needs to be a new approach to child welfare. A good place to start would be an economic departure from the out-dated-sunken-costs legal arguments.
"Why keep pumping money into something which has generationally proven not work? Why not ameliorate the issues which created the need for the system in the first place?"
Poverty is not a crime and foster care should not be the gateway to mental health services.
Does a state's failure to protect an individual against private violence constitute a violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment?
"No. The Due Process Clause does not impose a special duty on the State to provide services to the public for protection against private actors if the State did not create those harms. "The Clause is phrased as a limitation on the State's power to act, not as a guarantee of certain minimal levels of safety and security; while it forbids the State itself to deprive individuals of life, liberty, and property without due process of law, its language cannot fairly be read to impose an affirmative obligation on the State to ensure that those interests do not come to harm through other means."
The Rehnquist Court demonstrated a severe lack of awareness in the parens patriae doctrine in DeShaney v. Winnebago County , because, that defendant did in fact violate the Due Process clause to protect the child, as child protection had been placed under Trade and Commerce Law back in 1976, federally funded by CAPTA in 1974, solidifying the basis of the initial argument that it was the inherent right of the state to protect its heir in perpetuity. Therefore, the state violated federal anti-commerce law and the due process contained within of 15 U.S.C. 15 (c), obfuscated within child welfare policies.
The federal judge who handed the state’s embattled child welfare system a victory in a closely watched lawsuit last year set the bar too high for the plaintiffs to meet and either “ignored or misinterpreted” the law, a New York advocacy group charged in a sharply worded appeal of the decision.
Children’s Rights, which unsuccessfully sued state officials in a class action suit first brought in 2010, blasted U.S. District Court Judge William G. Young’s ruling, writing in a massive, 263-page appeal that it should be reversed.
Young’s so-called “two-pronged” approach — in that the group needed to prove the Department of Children and Families’ failures not only veered substantially from accepted practice but “shocks the conscience” — was unnecessarily high, Children’s Rights said.
It also argued that the deference he showed to state lawmakers to better fund the agency, and thus correct its ongoing problems, could set a dangerous precedent.
“Constitutional and statutory violations are rampant in DCF foster care,” Children’s Rights attorneys wrote in the appeal, filed late yesterday. “If this Court were to accept the district court’s view that federal judges must yield to executive and legislative prerogatives when such priorities are inconsistent with the state’s constitutional obligations to the state’s most helpless citizens, the consequences would be far-reaching.”
Furthermore, the group wrote, by putting the responsibility on lawmakers to fund DCF appropriately, “it likewise excused the abject failure by DCF.”
“Vulnerable children who are wholly dependent on the state for their safety and well-being, were erroneously held to a standard of proof no less burdensome than the standard to be met by an incarcerated felon,” the appeal states.
Children’s Rights had accused Bay State officials of failing to protect children under their care from abuse, allowing kids to flounder in the foster care system and doling out too many psychotropic drugs. It has successfully sued more than a dozen other states, and had gone to trial only once before in this type of case, winning against Washington, D.C., officials more than two decades ago.
Young had ripped DCF in his 84-page ruling released in November, concluding it failed to “not only to comport with national standards of care and state and federal requirements but also to comply with its own internal policies.”
But he said the plaintiffs, represented by Children’s Rights, had embarked on a “virtually unscalable peak” to win their suit.
“This is not a case about statistics but about children — our children — and this much is clear: The flaws noted herein are more about budgetary shortfalls than management myopia. We are all complicit in this financial failure,” Young wrote in November. He noted he wasn’t going to substitute his judgment “for that of duly elected Massachusetts lawmakers, who properly are endowed with the power to direct the reserves of the commonwealth’s coffers to whatever issue of public import they see fit.”
State officials have said that DCF’s budget had been cut by roughly $100 million between fiscal year 2009 and fiscal year 2012.
But Children’s Rights argues in its appeal it was wrong for Young to treat “fiscal constraints as a defense” and that he did so without “any valid legal basis.”
Attorney General Martha Coakley’s office, which is defending the state in the suit, will have 30 days to respond.
The situation has thrown the Democrat into an awkward position of balancing the actions of her office and her own calls for reforms at DCF as a leading gubernatorial candidate. Coakley has repeatedly said she feels there is no conflict.
The ruling likely saved the state from a costly court-mandated reform plan and the possibility of shelling out millions more in attorney fees. Last year, a judge ordered Oklahoma officials to launch a $100 million-a-year initiative to fix their system — on top of $6 million in legal costs for Children’s Rights — after the group successfully sued that state.
This was the response for the State Child Welfare Licensing Division:
Good Afternoon A youth, a mandated reporter, an interested citizen, frankly anyone can file a complaint against a licensed foster home. You say home provider so I assume you are talking about a foster home. If there is a suspicion of abuse or neglect the complaint should be made to Children Protective Services Central Intake. If you have a complaint against a child placing agency or a child caring institution, it is handled through the Division of Child Welfare Licensing under the Department of Health and Human Services. DCWL investigates child placing agencies and child caring institutions around compliance with specific rules. You can make a complaint using the website if it is against a child placing agency or a child caring institution, or you can give me the information. I hope this helps. I am not aware of who investigates Protective Services. I would suggest contact with a supervisor or the District Manager of the local office involved.
As you can read in the response, Michigan Child Welfare Administrators do not have a clue to what is going on in the system, or even how the system actually works, or even a personal passion to actually respond to the questions regarding the reporting of fraud or if foster kids have civil rights.
You can tell she has yet to read the Auditor General's Report on CPS.
Governor Rick Snyder is now calling for changes after the Michigan Office of the Auditor General released a scathing report last week detailing several faults in the state’s Child Protective Services program.
The audit found a number of glaring issues in the state’s CPS program, including failing to launch and complete investigations within the required timeframe and not referring investigations to prosecutors.
The governor has tapped Orlene Hawks to lead a review and improvement process of CPS.
Hawks is currently the director of the Office of the Children’s Ombudsman, though she will leave that post during the review.
Snyder hopes Hawks will be able to find ways to rapidly improve Michigan’s CPS program, having called the audit’s findings “unacceptable.”
In the spirit of fuchsia... Snyder's hopes shall soon be dashed because Orlene Hawks has been put on notice, from the first day she took her Oath of Office, that the entire system sucks and has sucked since it was first conceived. (NOTE TO SELF: Check to see if her Oaths of Office are filed in the Great Repository of the Seal) Orlene Hawks has not done a damn thing to improve the system, as the Office of the Children's Ombudsman functions as a strawman of oversight, on a shoestring budget, with no cooperation from the Attorney General or the Department of Health and Human Services. Did you know DHHS has the power to refuse to cooperate with an OCO investigation? I can prove it, you know. Did you know the OCO does not possess powers of subpoena? By the time OCO can review and present finding to the Legislature for the rulemaking process to commence, there is a term limit and another election cycle. No one communicates with anyone up in Lansing. The last time Snyder called for a special commission review, they lied to him, like they always do. The Attorney General will not partner in investigations with OCO. OCO does not have to refer any criminal activities to the Attorney General. The Attorney General will not even appoint a Special Prosecutor. The Attorney General refuses to investigate DHHS. The Attorney General will not even investigation the Legislators on all their special interests child welfare legislation foreign dark money campaign contributions or those lucrative, privatized contracts these elected officials end up getting through their corporations.
As a matter of fact, the entire Michigan Child Welfare System has been under the federal monitor for over 10 years, yet Children's Rights continues to generate billing, without even advocating for the civil rights of these foster kids...because they cannot....because they are a private corporation and have not had the grant authority transferred, or rather parental rights...because these foster kids are under the jurisdiction of the state's legal guardian, Michigan Children's Institute. To believe Children's Rights is advocating for anyone other than themselves makes a strong case to go to a drug rehab, because there is no other logical explanation to think otherwise.
Children's Rights received the largest attorney fees payment in the history of the state and not one penny went to the children. The Court was going to put Michigan Child Welfare under Federal Receivership, but the "Legal Geniuses" (trademark pending) talked Edmunds into letting them privatize the oversight where Kevin Ryan at his "neutral" Public Catalyst is doing nothing but expanding the operations to maximize his revenue.
There is no need to call for the OCO to review because all she has to do is read my work.
I have all the Auditor General reports, congressional hearings and reports, and international reports, lawsuits, original sources, and everything else you ever wanted to know about child welfare, right here.
Here we have it. Another National group, Children's Rights, celebrates National Child Abuse Propaganda Month in the filing of a class action lawsuit to end child abuse in foster care.
Help support National Child Welfare Fraud Prevention Month by encouraging a law firm in your state to file a class action today!
A national advocacy group filed a lawsuit yesterday in federal court in Springfield, arguing that the state’s foster care system is in dire need of reform because it violates children’s rights by “routinely placing them in dangerous and unstable situations.’’
New York City-based Children’s Rights, which has filed similar lawsuits in more than a dozen states, argues that Massachusetts has one of the highest rates of abuse of children in foster care and that its system is rife with other problems.
The lawsuit, which names six children allegedly harmed by inadequate supervision by the state Department of Children and Families, says children in the foster care system suffer abuse at nearly four times the national standard.
It argues the agency “further traumatizes children’’ by moving them frequently, alleging that one-third of children in state foster care are sent to five or more homes during their time in custody. The suit also says the state has failed to prepare parents for reunions with their children.
“There is absolutely no justification for what Massachusetts is doing to its most vulnerable children,’’ Marcia Robinson Lowry, executive director of Children’s Rights, said in a statement. “It is robbing them of their right to be protected from abuse and neglect and to grow up in safe and stable homes with loving, permanent families.’’
State officials, while acknowledging the agency’s challenges, disputed the allegations and argued that the DCF has made significant progress in recent years by increasing the number of children cared for safely in their own homes, exceeding national standards for adoption and reunifying families, and improving programs for children who leave foster care as they get older.
They noted the Patrick administration has made changes in the agency, which employees 2,400 caseworkers for about 8,000 children in foster care, though its budget has decreased as state revenues have plummeted.
The governor has sought $760 million for the agency next fiscal year, nearly 10 percent less than two years ago.
“We strongly share this group’s goal that all children are raised in safe and nurturing environments,’’ said Alison R. Goodwin, a DCF spokeswoman. “We regret that their lawsuit will force us to expend already limited resources during this fiscal crisis to defend this suit, instead of investing those resources in efforts to serve children and families.’’
Goodwin said it was unfair for Children’s Rights to compare abuse rates between Massachusetts and other states, because Massachusetts has a lower threshold for reviewing allegations of abuse and neglect.
“It looks like we have a high rate of maltreatment, but it’s how we categorize our reports,’’ she said. She noted Massachusetts is one of eight states that investigates allegations based on a “reasonable cause’’ standard, rather than the higher standards of “credible evidence’’ or “beyond a reasonable doubt’’ used in other states. “We have a low tolerance for risk.’’
At a news conference yesterday at a Boston law firm, Lowry argued the state’s foster care system trails others because DCF caseloads are higher than in other states. She said the average caseworker oversees 28 families, while the national standard is 13 to 18 children per caseworker.
Lowry also argued the state has failed to pay foster parents sufficiently and has repeatedly lost the opportunity to be reimbursed by the federal government because it has not filed applications in a timely way.
“It’s not a well-managed system,’’ Lowry said. “There’s a failure of management.’’
Goodwin said the department has cut the number of children in foster care by about 2,000 over the past two years and the average caseload has dropped below 18 children for every caseworker.
The suit, which names Governor Deval Patrick, Secretary JudyAnn Bigby of the Executive Office of Health and Human Services, and DCF Commissioner Angelo McClain, was filed on behalf of six children from 9 to 15 years old.
The lawsuit said one child was sexually abused after being sent to seven foster homes over three years, another endured physical and psychological abuse while going through eight foster homes, and another was returned to an abusive mother after 11 placements.
Zevorah Ortega-Bagni, president of the union that represents DCF caseworkers, said she hopes the lawsuit will lead to changes.
“I am very disappointed that matters have come to this stage,’’ she said. “The system has some serious, serious problems. . . . I hope the Department of Children and Families will rectify all the problems that may have contributed to all the harm that children have received while in the foster care system.’’
The suit, for which class-action status is sought, asks the court to bar the state from further violating children’s rights “and order relief via widespread reforms.’’
Notice how there has never been any reform in the areas of the criminalization of poverty or defalcation:
false claims;
generation of fraudulent documentation;
improper removals;
unnecessary removals;
lack of legal representation for parents;
violations of due process;
violations of equal protection under the law;
racketeering;
overmedication;
unnecessary medication;
Medicaid fraud;
rape in foster care;
psychological torture in foster care; and
physical torture in foster care.
I'm tired of typing.
The following are eligibility criteria from the U.S. HHS OIG Review describing how a child may enter foster care while qualifying for fast track adoption. Notice how it has nothing to do with "child abuse".
A child may be eligible for Title IV-E adoption assistance if:he or she is determined by the State to meet the statutory definition of a child with special needsand:
•meets Aid to Families With Dependent Children (AFDC) requirements (as in effect on July 16, 1996) at the time of removal from the home,
•meets the requirements for Supplemental Security Income,
•is the child of a minor parent in foster care, or
•was previously eligible for Title IV-E adoption assistance.
For an adoption assistance payment to be eligible for Federal reimbursement, a State must document the child’s eligibility under one of these four categories. The State must also maintain other pertinent records, such as court records, adoption assistance agreements, evidence of criminal record checks, and birth certificates.
The U.S.ranks 28 out of 29advanced nations in child poverty. Yet the issue of children’s well-being receives little attention in the United States. And perhaps not accidentally, the U.S. could soon become the only country to not ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), underscoring how child welfare is not one of our public policy priorities.
Adopted by the U.N. General Assembly in 1989, the CRC outlines the rights and protections that every child should be entitled to regardless of national boundaries, including the right to survival, to develop to one’s fullest potential, to protection from abuse, neglect and exploitation and to participate in family, cultural and social life. It calls on states to develop and implement policies and programs that ensure that all children will grow up in supportive family and community environments.
At the beginning of 2015 there were only three countries that did not ratify the CRC — Somalia, South Sudan and the United States. South Sudanratified the treaty in May. Somaliastarted the ratification process in January and is expected to formalize it once the paperwork is deposited with the U.N.
Partisan fear mongering and widespread misconceptions about the CRC’s intent and potential effect continue to create obstacles to expeditiously moving the treaty forward in the United States. Opponents of the CRC, which includes a coalition of religious conservative groups, have pitted children’s rights against parents’ rights suggesting that the treaty would allow the government to tell parents how they should raise their children and grant children autonomous rights such as accessing birth control and abortion without parental consent. Supporters of the CRC insist that it includes language that emphasizes the primacy and importance of the role and authority of parents.
The U.S. does not have a good record on the rights of children. Child labor was abolished only in 1938 following decades of lobbying efforts. The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was established in 1866, nearly a decade before the formation of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. And it took another 100 years before a fully funded, formalized child welfare system was in place when Congress passed the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act of 1974 and federal dollars were allocated to assisting states in the investigation and prosecution of child abuse. It’s only in 2005 that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the sentencing of juveniles to death was a cruel and unusual punishment. Poor and minority children in the U.S. still attend substandard schools that are as racially segregated as they were in the 1950s.
Ratifying the CRC would signal to the rest of the world that the United States is interested in joining the community of nations that are working for the betterment of their children and youth.
A powerful minority of social and religious conservatives have repeatedly obstructed any progress on the CRC, citing unfounded fears that ensuring children’s rights leads to the infringement of parental rights, forcing the U.S. to stand alone on the issue within the global human rights community. In the early 1990s, Congress made several attempts to ratify the CRC amid opposition from President George H. W. Bush. His successor, President Bill Clinton, was widely expected to sign the CRC and send it to the Senate for advice and consent to ratification. However, the administration faced stiff resistance from the right.
Former Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., then the chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, vowed to prevent a hearing on the CRC. He then introduced a separate resolution, backed by 26 co-sponsors, opposing the treaty, arguing that it is “incompatible with the God given right and responsibility of parents to raise their children” and that “the United States Constitution is the ultimate guarantor or rights and privileges to every American, including children.” The George W. Bush administration also opposed the CRC, arguing that it conflicted with U.S. laws on privacy and family rights.
Despite lobbying by child welfare advocates and organizations, President Barack Obama has made no serious efforts to push for the CRC’s ratification. It is a shame because the U.S. does not fare well on a number of social and health indicators that measure child welfare when compared to other industrialized countries. In fact, a 2013 UNICEF report ranks the U.S.in the bottom on five important indicators of child well being compared to other 29 economically advanced nations:
Overall ranking: 24.8. The bottom four places in the ranking are occupied by three of the poorest countries in the survey, Latvia, Lithuania and Romania, and by one of the richest, the United States.
Material well-being ranking: 26.
Health & Safety ranking: 25. The only countries with infant mortality rates higher than 6 per 1,000 births are Latvia, Romania, Slovakia and the U.S.
Education ranking: 27. The U.S. also ranks near the bottom on provision of early childhood education and in rates of young adults participating in higher education.
Behaviors & risk ranking:23. The U.S. ranks last in childhood obesity and teenage births.
Housing & environment ranking:23. The U.S. ranks 27th in children’s exposure to violence as measured by the nation’s homicide rate.
It is perplexing that the richest nation in the world has such appalling rates of child poverty and educational attainment. The U.S. also stands out for not guaranteeing healthcare coverage for children and for prosecuting children as adults and sending them to adult prisons. Ratifying the CRC would signal to the rest of the world that we are indeed interested in joining the community of nations that are working for the betterment of their children and youth.
