Addressing the oversight committee Wednesday, DHHS Commissioner Jeanne Lambrew said Jaden and every other child who died under the care of the state lost their chance at a future. “We mourn their loss,” she said. “I mourn their loss. And I ask myself and lose sleep over the question, ‘Could each child have survived if something different had been done in the child welfare system?’” (Getty Images)
Frontline workers for Maine’s child welfare system are again expressing concerns over agency leadership and its ability to listen to employees and keep children safe.
One hundred and forty five caseworkers, community care workers and case aides in the Office of Child and Family Services signed a letter of no confidence in the agency’s director, Bobbi Johnson, who has served in the role since January. The letter outlines safety concerns for children in state custody and a pattern of management ignoring staff concerns, according to a news release from the Maine Service Employees Association, SEIU Local 1989, which represents the workers.
The letter asks Gov. Janet Mills and Maine Department of Health and Human Services Commissioner Sara Gagné-Holmes to replace Johnson immediately. The Office of Child and Family Services is housed within DHHS.
More than 2,500 children were in state custody as of September, according to the most recent data on the state’s Child Welfare Data Dashboard. That is slightly lower but similar to when Johnson took over as director. However, the number of children in state custody has grown over the past few years from about 1,700 in July 2018.
In a statement responding to the letter, Gagné-Holmes said Johnson has her full support as she remains “confident in her compassionate, responsive and effective leadership.” As an example, Gagné-Holmes said Johnson has visited every OCFS district office three times since she assumed her role to listen to frontline staff.
“We recognize no single measure can solve every challenge in a system this complex, but the director’s commitment to listening, adapting, and supporting staff is unwavering,” she said.
A key issue raised in the letter is the agency’s practice of having children stay in hotels or emergency rooms while they are in state custody. The workers said that continued use of this practice — which has become more of a problem as the number of children in state custody has increased — means Johnson is “unable to ensure the well-being and safety of children and OCFS staff.”
“The Director’s inaction in finding an alternate to the warehousing of children in hotels or emergency rooms lends to the perception by many frontline workers that those in Central Office are reinforcing the misconception that hotels and emergency rooms are the only options for housing children,” the letter reads. “The focus on scheduling and costs associated with warehousing children in hotel and emergency rooms belies the actual needs of the children.”
The letter asks Mills and Gagné-Holmes to work with the Legislature to develop alternatives to having children stay in hotels and emergency rooms.
Mills’ office said her administration has been focused on trying to effectively curb the use of hotels because it believes children in state custody deserve a safe, loving and permanent home.
But it added that “the allegations and personal attacks against Director Johnson are meritless and this extreme approach by the union is not productive, nor does it serve the long-term shared goal of trying to reduce the use of hotels.”
Foster care is not an option for many of these children due to their mental health or behavior histories, the release said. In addition to their regularly assigned job duties, caseworkers and other frontline staff serve as caregivers for these children by making sure their needs are met as far as meals, medication, clothing, hygiene, transportation to and from school and recreational opportunities.
The union also filed a complaint with the Maine Department of Labor Thursday morning about OCFS workers being required to stay overnight in hotels with children in state custody. The release said this has resulted in multiple employees being assaulted by minors over the past several years.
Workers listed out seven specific safety issues in the letter, saying they have raised each of them repeatedly in meetings with Johnson without resolution. They include staff having to restrain children and not being certified to administer medication. Workers are also concerned that working multiple shifts in a 24-36 hour window can result in them failing to document vital case information, miss deadlines and even drive under unsafe conditions.
This isn’t the first time child protective workers are coming forward with concerns. Earlier this year, they testified before legislative committees about understaffing and high caseloads throughout the agency. In July, workers also wrote to Johnson and Gagné-Holmes with concerns over scheduling changes OCFS leadership wanted to implement.
“The (unilateral) changes will further exhaust an already exhausted state workforce,” the workers wrote in the July letter. “The results are obvious: a rippling effect throughout our entire system, decreasing the efficiency and effectiveness of our child protective system statewide.”
During the last legislative session, there were multiple attempts to improve the state’s embattled child welfare system. However, lawmakers’ work came to a close with little to show as far as concrete action. The Legislature’s Government Oversight Committee did put forth a list of more than two dozen suggested reforms, which were informed by the months they spent learning about the system’s failures from caseworkers and others involved with the agency.
Additionally, a recently released federal audit showed that a vast majority of child abuse cases in the state failed to comply with best practices. After those results came out Johnson said the agency policy and technology updates that have been implemented under her leadership would produce better results if a similar audit was completed again.
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