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Statement of DePelchin Children's Center, Houston, TX 77007

DePelchin Children’s Center, founded in 1892, is Houston’s oldest charity.  It is accredited by the Council on Accreditation, and serves the Houston Gulf Coast region. Our mission centers on enhancing the mental health and physical well being of children, focusing on 2 major areas:  (1) prevention & mental health services, & (2) serving children in the Child Protective Services (CPS) system. 

 Currently, we have nearly 600 foster children in about 400 therapeutic, habilitative, and basic foster care homes and 60 CPS children in 2 residential treatment centers (RTCs).  In 2007, we provided foster care to a total of 1063 children, facilitated adoption of 100 CPS children, and supplied post adoption support services to families who have adopted children from the CPS system.   We provide a continuum of care focusing on the mental health and safety of children.  Our programs include:

  • Prevention & early intervention (PEI) services, most of them pursuant to contracts with the state and federal governments; they focus on preventing  teen pregnancy, truancy, juvenile crime, child abuse, and bullying, and several are home-visitation based;
  • Therapeutic, habilitative, and basic foster care & residential treatment  for CPS children;
  • Adoption services for CPS children and post-adoption support services;
  • Transitional living for homeless young mothers to help them become self supporting.
  • Children’s mental health treatment, including psychiatric & psychological care & school-based and office-based counseling,;
  • Child psychiatry residency training with the Baylor College of Medicine Menninger Department of Psychiatry, and Baylor psychology post-doctoral training;

 DePelchin also has a research and development department.  In recent years, we have been part of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN), a program of the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), which is developing trauma informed therapies for children who have suffered complex trauma, like those we serve.  Some of our prevention programs are partially funded by research and development grants from the Administration for Children and Families (ACF).

Comments on HR 5466: 

OVERVIEW

DePelchin Children’s Center supports HR 5466.  Two provisions relating to the financing provisions are key to DePelchin as a service provider in Texas and to improving outcomes for children and families who need child welfare services.  Those are:

  • changing the method of determining the federal match for foster care from the 1996 AFDC  “look-back:” provision to instead using a measure based upon the State’s Medicaid participation;
  • encouraging the use of federal child welfare funds for prevention, early intervention, and temporary and permanent kinship placements;
  • Allowing youth to stay in care until age 21.

DePelchin strongly supports the provisions of the bill targeting the following outcomes:

  • Safely reducing the number of children in care, especially through prevention and early intervention;
  • Safely reducing the lengths of stay in care;
  • Increasing the use of kinship care and kinship guardianship;
  • Authorizing states to retain children in care up to age 21;
  • Providing post-permanency supports; and
  • Improving the medical care and educational outcomes of foster youth.

As in many other states, over 80% of Texas’ children and youth in foster care are in the care of community-based and faith-based charities such as us.  Although DePelchin is a large foster care provider, we strongly support policies that reduce the need for foster care, other out-of-home placements, and institutional care.  Research supports the intuitive belief that children are best off with their families where those families can be safe and stable.  Children need safety, stability, and adult mentoring and encouragement if they are to become productive adults. 

DISCUSSION

Use of federal funds for prevention and family preservation:  DePelchin is currently adapting to cultural groups in Texas a successful family preservation program developed at the University of Maryland called Family Connections.  The development work is largely funded with a replication grant from the federal Administration for Children and Families (ACF). DePelchin has also developed trauma-informed mental health treatments which we utilize in caring for the children in our foster homes and residential treatment facilities.  Our development of this expertise came from our participation in the SAMHSA-funded NCTSN. By enacting the policies in HR 5466, Congress can encourage the use of federal child welfare funds in a way that utilizes and expands upon the knowledge developed in federally funded research such as these grant programs.

Expanded federal support for kinship placements:  Experience, especially in Illinois, demonstrates that kinship placements are generally more stable and successful than foster care with strangers, so long as the kin can meet certain minimum standards.  The reasons are apparent.  The child has continuity of relationships and receives a message of caring and connection from relatives that is often lacking in foster care.  Relatives also often can make sure that the parents are taking the necessary steps to achieve a successful reunification.  They are also more likely to keep the children in their care if reunification is not feasible, and to receive them back if reunification is unsuccessful. 

Research verifies this evidence.  Studies vary, but all show that relative care is at least as safe as foster care.  Studies also show that relative placements are more stable, have much higher rates of siblings staying together and children return to their parents more quickly. 

Texas has been pursuing expanded use of kinship care for several years.  From 2004 to 2007, Texas nearly doubled the number of children in relative care, from 4516 to 8775, while increasing the number of children in foster care by 1260 children.  However, financial and casework supports of kin caregivers is minimal, and with federal support as proposed in HR 5466, more kin with limited and fixed incomes could provide care for these children.  In 2007, the Texas legislature emphasized its support for kinship placements when it unanimously enacted SB 723, which requires the state Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) to monitor and annually report to the legislature on the number of kinship placements that could not be made solely because the family did not have the financial resources to take the children, and the amount of monetary assistance that would be needed to enable those placements.    HR 5466’s provisions that kin can receive financial assistance equal to foster care if they pass criminal background checks and meet basic safety standards should help Texas expand the number of children who can be cared for by relatives. 

Subsidized guardianship:  For the same reasons that we, and the State of Texas, support temporary kin placement, we support the policy of providing for subsidized guardianship.  The Texas legislature in its current budget adopted budget control language (DFPS Rider 31) directing DFPS to apply for a federal waiver allowing Texas to use Title IV-E or other federal funds to help fund subsidized guardianship. 

However, we concur with the National Council for Adoption that 2 changes should be made in HR 5466’s  subsidized guardianship provisions:  (a) clarify that the decision that reunification or adoption are not feasible should be made by the judge, not caseworkers; & (b) to avoid creating a financial incentive to choose subsidized guardianship over adoption, provide that the subsidy is to be equal to, rather than “at least equal to” the State’s foster care or adoption subsidy payments.

Family connection grants:  The grant program provided for in Section 445 to develop kinship navigator, family finding, and family group decision-making programs has the potential to produce new ways to safely and effectively expand kinship placements.  Implementation of Family Group Decision Making in Texas is a primary reason our state has recently been able to expand kinship placements.

Federal funding for post permanency supports:   DePelchin Children’s Center has been providing post-adoption support services for adopted CPS children and their adoptive families for decades.  We provide these services under contract with the State, funded largely by state funds.  The funding has not increased in nearly 2 decades, despite cost of living increases and significant increases in adoptions.  Post-adoption support services include support groups, therapy, residential treatment, and respite care, among others. They are provided to families to preserve the adoptions of special needs children, so the child and family do not become overwhelmed and relinquish the child.  These programs yield a major benefit for a very small investment.   We encourage the sponsor and subcommittee to clarify this bill to authorize use of Title IV-E funds for these services.  We suggest this funding also be available for services to children in subsidized guardianship, since these children are likely to have many of the same problems.

Services up to age 21:   Texas currently provides Medicaid eligibility for aging out foster youth up to age 21, and in limited cases up to age 23.  It also provides youth the opportunity to re-enter care for certain purposes related to pursuing education.  As Congressman Danny Davis pointed out in his testimony, a recent comprehensive study by the Chapin Hall Center for Children found that youth who remain in care up to age 21 are more likely to enter college, complete college, and delay pregnancy. *   We are encouraged that this bill would recognize that in today’s society, few persons are able to be independent prior to age 21.  If our own children are not, how can the children who do not have a permanent family be?

Improving health care and education:  In addition to increased kinship care, the State of Texas has been pursuing a number of other policies that HR 5466 would help the State to expand.  Effective April 1, 2008, the State is implementing a medical home, electronic medical passports and managed health care for foster children and youth.  It is also pursuing educational passports.  The provisions of the bill requiring educational stability and funding of education related transportation costs can be critical to children having educational stability, especially in a large state like Texas. 

Training funds:  HR 5466 provides that federal training funds may be used to train employees of both public and private agencies that care for children.  We commend this policy, especially since over 80% of the children in foster care in Texas are in the care of private charities.  Currently, our employees cannot attend trainings for CPS employees that are funded with federal monies, even though they are serving the  same children.  Allowing the use of these funds for all the public and private agencies caring for CPS children is efficient and likely to result in improved continuity and quality of care. 

CONCLUSION

HR 5466 makes major strides in improving federal financial participation in the child welfare system.  The bill reflects the growth in knowledge and best practices that have occurred in the last several decades.  We strongly encourage this subcommittee and the full Ways and Means Committee to approve this legislation, with minor changes suggested by us and the other witnesses.  The bill should help produce much better results for children and families with the same investment.  Thank you for considering our input.


 
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