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Republican lawmakers came to Charleston this week ready to kick off the legislative session with 16 bills they said could help fix the state’s troubled foster care system.
Mountain State Spotlight asked five child welfare researchers to review their bills.
The researchers said that lawmakers’ plans don’t address the roots of the crisis, and won’t prevent kids from being removed from their families or meaningfully address staffing shortages. And they aren’t likely to result in system-wide change, the researchers said.
“I think these are somewhat incremental,” said Bethany R. Lee, professor of children’s services at the University of Maryland’s School of Social Work and one of the researchers.
Last year, Mountain State Spotlight investigated the beleaguered system and found that overburdened case workers can mean kids getting few services offered to them once they are in the system, whether that’s support for foster and kinship families or mental health help for children in communities.
We also found that the state sent back millions of federal dollars that could have been used to help older kids with things like tuition and rent assistance as they transitioned to adulthood.
The lawmakers, focused on foster care, recommended, among other proposals, requiring CPS workers to wear body cameras; getting CPS workers in two counties mobile devices they can use to send real-time data to supervisors on their cases; securing pay raises and assistants for guardians ad litem, who represent kids in court; and enlisting State Police to train workers.
Limited emphasis on prevention
But child welfare policy should also include building up strong safety nets, said Lee, who is also director of PhD and postdoctoral programs at the University of Maryland’s School of Social Work.
She said child welfare bills should be paired with bills to make housing and health care affordable and expand addiction treatment.
“That would be a reform effort that would change things dramatically,” she said. “Oftentimes, the child welfare system is more of a reflection of where the gaps are in the larger society.”
Families in poverty are more likely to have their children removed, as poverty is often misperceived as neglect, according to Kelley Fong, assistant professor of sociology at the University of California, Irvine.
“I think anti-poverty policy is child protection policy,” she said.
The workgroup presented one draft bill requiring the Department of Human Services to establish a prevention plan over the next year focused on implementing services for a wide range of populations, from kids who aren’t involved with the system but are considered at risk, to those who are aging out.
But Fong, who studies families and the state systems and policies that affect them, noted that lawmakers could be implementing prevention policies now.
“What are the investments that can be made in the near term, so that families can get the help they need without having their children removed into foster care?” she said.
During a legislative meeting last month, Del. Adam Burkhammer, R-Lewis, who co-leads the workgroup, acknowledged the need to reduce the number of kids in foster care, but he added that he wanted to be deliberative and safety-focused.
“I’m a data guy,” he said. “So I feel like all of our decisions shouldn’t be off of a hunch or a complaint, but really, truly looking at it.”
He said that in 2024, half of the cases in West Virginia ended in reunification.
“So that tells me that with the proper oversight, resources and services, that families were able to stay together,” he said. “So the ought is, ‘how can we shift that to the front end?’”
Sen. Vince Deeds, R-Greenbrier, and the other co-lead of the group, said he supports state efforts to connect churches and civic organizations with schools and DoHS as part of prevention efforts.
For instance, schools might contact volunteers to help a family with a parent who has lost work or a student who has been truant.
“There’s a very strong desire with our faith-based communities and our civic organizations now to get engaged early on with our young people,” he said. “Let’s do what West Virginians do best.”
The overburdened CPS workforce and lack of supports
Lawmakers did not include hiring more workers in any of their proposals.
The Child Welfare League of America, an advocacy group composed of experts like researchers and workers, argues for measuring cases by child and not exceeding 15 children per caseworker.
Many case workers in the state have said their average caseload was in the 30s, and some have reported having as many as 50 cases at a time.
But some proposals are aimed at assisting CPS workers, and families and children already involved with the system.
Deeds said a proposal to get CPS workers mobile devices to take out in the field is aimed at helping to take some load off workers by providing supervisors with real-time updates and reducing time spent on paperwork.
One recommendation would allow kinship families to receive financial assistance more rapidly, a policy supported by multiple child welfare advocacy groups.
Out-of-state placements
Overreliance on putting kids in institutions and sending them out of state has been a constant problem with the state’s system.
And the number of in-state beds has declined — there are only a few beds for kids who need short-term, high-level psychiatric treatment and no long-term treatment beds at in-state residential care facilities, according to Cindy Largent-Hill, director at the Division of Children’s Services at the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals.
One bill establishes a fund, assuming lawmakers put money in it, for in-state residential care, to bring kids home from out-of-state institutions and train the workforce to treat kids with psychiatric problems that require inpatient care. Gov. Patrick Morrisey has also championed this proposal.
Lonnie Berger, associate vice chancellor for research in the social sciences in the School of Social Work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said that when kids are placed in residential facilities it is less significant whether those facilities are in state or out of state and more significant whether they are close to supportive adults and family members.
“Do they get to visit them?” he said. “That distance could be just as big within the state.”
Lee said states can prevent kids from ending up in residential care for psychiatric problems in the first place with more mental health help in communities and schools.
“It’s not like a kid wakes up one day and suddenly needs this level of care,” she said.
Long-term solutions
During a December meeting, Burkhammer said one proposal, monthly meetings and trainings for community representatives like health officials, schools, law enforcement and nonprofits serving children and families, could help with problems like kids being placed out of state because communities could work together on their own solutions.
Fong said “mandated supporting” can help reduce reliance on CPS caseworkers.
This change would empower teachers to be “mandated supporters” and call parents and work with them on finding help for poverty-related problems like finding housing, food or clothing.
Jessica Pac, assistant professor of social work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said that trained workers who can make decisions that keep kids safe are of utmost importance, and that higher pay would improve retention.
But like the other researchers, she emphasized focus on prevention.
“We should be thinking about what happens in 20 years,” Pac said. “And I think that it’s not very interesting to policy makers, because it means you don’t see the benefit of those dollars spent for 20 or 30 years. But ultimately, that’s what in my mind, a well-spent, well-funded and very intentional child welfare system would look like.”
Reach reporter Erin Beck at erin@mountainstatespotlight.org
