BY GAIL RIECKEN CCO StateHouse Editor
This past week Governor Holcomb introduced the findings of the Child Welfare Policy and Practice Group that he hired to study the Department of Child Services.Â
The article in the Statehouse File (June 20) briefly outlines the high points of the study. But from one who listened to so many complaints from the community, employees, and groups working with DCS, the one main criticism was that the operation was paralyzed by the centralization of decision making.Â
I can remember walking through the call center in Indianapolis watching employees do their job. It had gotten so tedious. Here these folks, essentially removed from what was happening on the ground, were to make a judgment about proceeding with the claim brought to them by locals who had already analyzed it for themselves.
And that was just the beginning of the centralized process.Â
It was another layer of bureaucracy built, in my opinion, because the state didn’t want to give locals the opportunity to succeed or to learn from their mistakes. It was all about control. (The call center change occurred before Director Bonaventura.)
Taxpayers spent thousands of dollars on the new call center and staffing, training and computer programs, money that could have gone to the children.Â
So all encouragement and positive thoughts to those involved who will look at decentralization as a priority. Here is the statement from the report.
16. DCS should identify opportunities to work toward decentralizing decisions that directly affect work with children and families. This would involve: (1) forming a workgroup of local FCMs, supervisors, county office directors and selected state office staff to review local decision-making authority and its limits related both to policy and spending; (2) attending in particular to policy revisions that better facilitate immediate access to funds to meet concrete needs of families as a means of addressing child safety.
The best to all of you who will work to put our children first.
