Foster Care and Child Welfare Week in Review – October 2, 2023
Here are some news items from last week related to foster care, adoption, and child welfare that caught our eye:
Lucy, a caseworker for Texas’ child welfare agency, faces exhausting and emotionally challenging shifts monitoring foster children placed in hotels. Despite the rest of the state winding down, Lucy’s responsibility continues late into the evening, ensuring the safety and well-being of these vulnerable kids. These children, labeled “children without placement,” often older teens with complex needs, end up in unlicensed facilities like hotels or offices due to a lack of suitable placements. Caseworkers like Lucy endure low staffing, low pay, and burnout, jeopardizing the care they can provide. The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) faces a staff turnover crisis and potential legal consequences for these conditions. The situation highlights the broader issue of placement shortages and their impact on caseworkers and foster children in the state.
The long-standing Texas foster care lawsuit is heading for a confrontation, with children’s lawyers seeking to hold the state accountable for noncompliance with a federal judge’s orders. Lawyers for the children, working alongside court monitors, are attempting to build a case for holding Governor Greg Abbott and state agencies in contempt of court. The monitors have alleged official indifference and incompetence that endanger foster children with intellectual disabilities. Meanwhile, Abbott has hired private lawyers from Gibson Dunn & Crutcher, with the state potentially paying up to $7 million for their services. The lawsuit, ongoing since 2011, addresses issues within the state’s foster care system, with the judge’s monitors citing “egregious deficiencies” that place intellectually disabled children at risk.
Allegations have emerged that program directors for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) have been exploiting the situation of vulnerable youth in foster care to obtain free hotel rooms and vacations. A former DFPS employee claimed that officials responsible for booking hotel rooms for foster youth with nowhere else to stay have been benefiting personally from these bookings by collecting hotel rewards points. This practice, while not illegal, has raised ethical concerns as it involves some of the state’s most vulnerable children, and it may influence the choice of hotels for housing these youth, including those in high-sex trafficking areas. DFPS is facing criticism for allowing this situation to persist.
A former employee of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) has alleged that program directors within the department have been exploiting the situation of vulnerable youth to gain free hotel rooms and vacations. According to the court filing, officials responsible for booking hotel rooms for foster youth have been collecting hotel rewards points from these bookings. While the act of collecting rewards points itself is not illegal, it has raised ethical concerns, especially given that it may influence the choice of hotels for housing these youth, some of whom are highly vulnerable and at risk.
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