DHHR official says W.Va. Child Protective Services' caseload becoming unmanageable

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WCHS) — The foster crisis in West Virginia is nothing new, but advocates say an online database is leaving out vital information such as the nearest available foster families, how many kids they could care for or what county in which they are located.

While the state Department of Health and Human Resources said the website is supposed to be revamped late next year, foster care advocates question what is being done until that time.

It’s a very complex problem and one that goes back many years in West Virginia.

But what is being done to help the more than 6,000 kids in the state’s foster care system?

Some groups call for policy changes, but others just want the correct data online and easier access to it.

“West Virginia has the highest removal of children from their families in the nation and by a lot,” said Marissa Sanders, director of the West Virginia Foster, Adoptive and Kinship Parents Network.

She is sounding the alarm on the foster care system.

“Per capita, we remove far more children than any other state,” Sanders said.

Sanders said 14 out of 1,000 kids were removed from their families in West Virginia in 2019. The next highest state had eight out of 1,000 kids removed. The national average is three.

"There are several steps that lawmakers can take and all of us can take,” Sanders said. “One of those steps is to require more comprehensive and consistent data reporting from DHHR.”

Questions about DHHR’s system were being raised during a legislative interim committee meeting Tuesday at the Capitol.

"It’s a case management system. It wasn’t designed to perform as a data reporting system,” DHHR’s Commissioner of the Bureau for Social Services Jeffrey Pack said.

Pack, a former delegate and chairman of the West Virginia House Health and Human Resources Committee, was named in July as commissioner to the newly created bureau that manages Child Protective Services.

He was giving an update to the Oversight Commission on Health and Human Resources Accountability Committee.

The bureau’s current reporting system makes crucial information such as the number of foster families available, or capacity of open shelters, more difficult to access.

“Yes, we can find out that information, but it’s not always the easiest thing to find out," Pack said.

Del. Mike Pushkin, D-Kanawha, a member of the Oversight Commission, asked if there will be an update to the system.

"There’s a whole new system. The PATH project is supposed to be rolling out late next year -assuming that’s on time,” Pack said.

The commissioner also updated committee members about the growing vacancy rate within the Child Protective Services' workforce.

"We are at the highest vacancy rate among CPS workers that I can recall. It’s about 27% was the last number I saw at the end of October," Pack said.

He pointed out that the state's CPS shortage leads to higher caseloads and burnout.

"A caseload that’s becoming unmanageable,” Pack said.

The advocate for foster children said instead of focusing on a shortage, she suggests reducing the number of kids coming into care by offering more resources in foster care prevention.

"Support families before kids are removed, then we can keep the caseload down," Sanders said.

Sanders added that approach would help break the cycle.

"Yes, because then we would need fewer CPS workers,” Sanders said. “I think it’s challenging to run at a deficit, but we’ve always run at a deficit and at some point, we also have to learn how to make the system work better and one way you do that is lowering the number of kids in care who need that case management."