CYS looking for at least 58 additional foster families
When Washington County’s Children and Youth Services agency embarked on a training program last year, those in charge hoped the education would provide a sort of road map to improve how it deals with children, families and foster families.
One outgrowth of the training was coming up with an actual map that pinpoints exactly where the agency’s children live, where their relatives live and the nearest foster homes.
Kimberly Rogers, CYS director, received approval from the county commissioners last year for 16 caseworkers, supervisors, managers and fiscal and program specialists to participate in a year-long program called Leadership Fellows offered here by the Public Catalyst Group of Iselin, N.J.
CYS deals with runaways and cases of child abuse, child neglect, truancy, incorrigibility, or circumstances in which a child is at risk of being abused or neglected. Its clients include infants through age 21. The current 6,000 children come from 2,000 to 3,000 families.
“The majority of foster homes are not located here in Washington County,” said DeeDee Blosnich-Gooden, deputy director of Washington County CYS.
An analysis shows Washington County CYS needs 58 additional foster homes, and their goal is to find them from residents of the City of Washington and Charleroi Borough.
Because of the lack of foster homes in Washington County, children from here may be sent to foster homes in Allegheny, Beaver, Crawford, Greene, Fayette or even Huntingdon County in central Pennsylvania.
West Virginia’s northern panhandle and eastern Ohio are closer to Washington County than Huntingdon, but out-of-state placements require court approval under an interstate compact.
The availability of foster homes changes often. For example, foster homes can house a total of six children, including biological offspring. A number greater than that requires a waiver from the state Department of Human Services. Foster families often adopt a foster child, which may result in the foster parents dropping out of the program. CYS staffers view this last situation with mixed emotions, because a child achieves a permanent home, but it keeps the agency in a constant state of recruitment.
Without its “looking-outside-the-box” approach, CYS may never have worked with Washington County’s manager of geographic information systems Christopher Jursa, who deals with, among other things, data for the current property reassessment. But when CYS staff asked him to design a mapping system that would allow them to display CYS-related information and interpret it, he was also able to provide the department with mapping tools.
In fiscal year 2014-15, CYS dealt with 3,160 cases. It was able to determine at a glance that most of the children came from Washington and Charleroi.
In fiscal year 2015-16, which just ended June 30, the agency had 3,372 cases, Rogers said.
Parents’ opioid addiction is one cause of the burgeoning number of cases which CYS handles.
“We’ve seen an increase in the number of children entering placement who are 8 years old and younger,” said Blosnich-Gooden.
CYS deals with 13 to 17 agencies that provide foster homes. When possible, CYS tries to place children with relatives, known as “kinship care.”
For school-age children, the maps also help CYS identify foster homes within a particular school district.
The aim of the training with Public Catalyst Group was how to use data and technology to measure the most effective way to help children. The training program had a maximum cost of $204,400, with $40,880 coming from Washington County taxpayers. State and federal taxpayers picked up the rest of the tab.