Texas leaders are taking new approaches to tackle the state’s “broken” foster care system, by calling on faith organizations across the state to step up.
“Faith-based communities have a long history of involvement with these children and we need this partnership to grow dramatically,” Lt. Governor Dan Patrick said in a press release on Thursday. “Last session we increased funding for Child Protective Services by $230 million, and resources for prevention and early intervention programs, but we need to do more.”
In December, U.S. District Judge Janis Graham of Corpus Christi deemed the Texas system “flawed” and “broken”. Lawmakers have since been scrambling to fix the problems, which include high caseloads and caseworker turnover.
“It’s huge. These are the state’s children,” Houston state Rep. Garnet Coleman said. “Once somebody is taken out of a home, that child becomes the responsibility of the state of Texas. We are the responsible parent.”
According to the Texas Department of Family Protective Services, there are more than 16,000 children in foster care. However, according to Rep. Coleman, D-Houston, the state isn’t doing enough.
In 2015, more than 1500 children in Texas were pushed out of the foster care system. Many of them turned 18 years old, making them ineligible for adoption.
“Statistics tell us that what happens to these kids is horrible,” Pastor Kile Bateman of Wichita Falls said. “Many of them will end up incarcerated, addicted to drugs, taking on a life of crime.”
Bateman created the organization “Phased In”, to give those children a second chance to find a forever home.
“These kids are out of chances. They’re out of opportunities. They’re out of any hope of finding a forever family,” Bateman said. “So we wanted to turn the ‘out’ into ‘in.’”
It’s organizations like Bateman’s that Lt. Governor Dan Patrick hopes will fix the damaged system.
“We’ve had deaths. We’ve had injuries. We’ve had situations that weren’t followed up on appropriately,” Coleman said of the state’s agency. “We want to look at the system from the start to the finish, and make sure the welfare of the child is kept in mind all the way through.”
In march of 2015, Governor Greg Abbott gave Child Protective Services an extra $38 million to fix it’s problems. However instead, new progress reports show the system has gotten worse. The number of child deaths has increased, more reports have been filed on abused and neglected kids, and investigations continue to drag on.
On Monday, Coleman announced that the House Committee on County Affairs will be hitting the road in June to address the issue head on. The 10 member committee plans to hold hearings across the state in each of the 11 CPS regions.
“We need to do a better job at identifying what needs to happen,” Coleman said, “and if there are particular things for each region.”
Lawmakers say they are hoping to get a sense of how different areas manage CPS caseloads within their communities, and improve aspects of the system that have received a lot of criticism.
Coleman said the tour will kick off in Lubbock the first week of June.
