The Kansas Department of Children and Families is embedding local specialists in one of the state’s most populous counties in an attempt to head off the need for CPS involvement in some cases. Its partner on the venture will be local police departments.
“I believe that over time, this new initiative may lead to a reduction in the number of contacts a family has with law enforcement, reduced formal contact with DCF and prevention of child abuse and neglect,” said DCF Director Laura Howard, who recently agreed to a settlement in a class-action lawsuit filed over treatment of youth in state foster care.
The plan is for DCF to fund three community support specialists, two employed by the Wichita Police Department and one by the Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Department. The specialists are mandated reporters, and would have to report any suspected abuse or neglect, but the goal is to use them to get ahead of official system involvement. The specialists are empowered to make referrals to community-based services for parent skill building, home visiting, mental health services and substance use services, according to the announcement of the plan.
“It is an effort to identify issues before a family may need to have formal contact with law enforcement or DCF and to connect services to the family,” said DCF spokesperson Mike Deines, in an email to Youth Services Insider.
A community specialist has already been embedded since late 2019 with the Sedgwick County Sheriff.
“We already seeing positive results for the community due to the work the community support specialist is doing,” said Sheriff Jeffrey Easter, in the statement announcing the plan.
The hope on Kansas’ part is that a venture like this stems the need for official involvement that can lead to foster care removals. Like many states, Kansas saw its foster care population surge in the past decade: its total jumped from 5,852 in 2011 to a high of 7,753 in 2017, before declining slightly in the past two years.
A class action lawsuit was filed by the nonprofit Children’s Rights against DCF in 2018, focused on insufficient services for youth in care and the high number of placements that some children experienced while in the system. A federal audit released this year slammed DCF over unsafe conditions inside some foster homes.
Last month, the state reached settled the lawsuit with an agreement on ambitious reforms of the system.