“The Office of Children and Family Services (OCFS) needs to do more
to protect children placed with relatives or guardians outside of foster care
from harm or neglect,” DiNapoli said. “OCFS lacks adequate oversight and
uniform standards to ensure children in direct placement are not put into
another bad situation and are kept out of harm’s way. OCFS attempted to dismiss
the serious findings of our auditors rather than take proactive steps to
address these glaring issues. I urge the agency to act on our recommendations.”
OCFS oversees the state’s child welfare system and is
responsible for supervising and coordinating child welfare services, which are
administered by 58 local Departments of Social Services (local districts)
throughout the state. One alternative to foster care is direct placement, where
a child is placed in the direct custody of a relative or another suitable
person. In direct placement cases, courts usually order the local district to
supervise the placement. State regulations require local districts to document
that a family member or suitable person can safely provide for the needs of the
child.
DiNapoli’s auditors found OCFS does not maintain adequate
oversight of direct placements to ensure that local districts comply with
applicable laws and regulations and that children are placed in safe
environments. The agency does not have procedures for monitoring local
districts’ handling of direct placement cases, and does little to assess their
performance.
-A case where siblings were placed with an adult relative
who had a history of domestic violence and suspected drug use. Despite numerous
conditions that raised red flags, including a police report stating the
relative kept a loaded shotgun in one of the bedrooms of the placement home,
auditors could not find any indication that these conditions had been
communicated to the court.
-In another case, the placement home had garbage and dirty
dishes constantly present throughout the home, along with medications within
children’s reach.
Local districts must also follow certain regulatory
requirements, but OCFS has not developed the same kind of centralized
standards, policies or procedures for the districts to follow when supervising
direct placement cases, as it has for similar child welfare services such as
foster care, auditors found. This includes minimum standards for home
investigations.
DiNapoli’s auditors interviewed officials from 53 local
districts and found that their supervision of direct placement varied, with not
all cases receiving the same level of attention across, and possibly even
within, the local districts. For instance:
-Local districts varied in their documentation of home
investigations. While some included explicit details–for example, noting smoke
and carbon monoxide detectors, sleeping spaces, and weapons–others were vague
and nondescript.
-Local districts also varied in the frequency of their
follow-up visits. Of the sampled cases, auditors found that, in the majority,
local districts visited the placement home once a month, while others visited
twice a month, weekly or less than monthly.
Local districts must also provide the court with information
to make decisions regarding the safety and well-being of a child. Information
on children in direct placement is tracked in CONNECTIONS, the system of record
for child welfare in New York state.
OCFS uses the CONNECTIONS computer system to document
information about children who are in direct placement. However, auditors found
errors and discrepancies that render the data unreliable for reporting and
performance measuring purposes, not to mention for accurately tracking children
who have been placed. During the review of the 30 case files, auditors
identified four cases where children were misclassified as being in direct
placement. Additionally, while pulling the sample cases, OCFS identified and
corrected discrepancies for another eight cases.
DiNapoli recommended OCFS:
-Develop procedures for monitoring local districts’ handling
of direct placement cases;
-Develop procedures for county supervision of children in
direct placement to ensure greater consistency across the state;
-Establish minimum standards for the safety of children in
direct placement; and
-Correct the errors identified in the direct placement data
and implement ways to prevent and detect input errors to ensure that
information in CONNECTIONS is complete and accurate.
OCFS officials disagreed with the audit’s conclusions and
the audit scope. The agency’s response, as well as replies by the auditors, are
included in the audit.
