Illinois Children and Family Services Advisory Council met April 18.
Here are the minutes provided by the council:
Illinois Children and Family Services Advisory Council
Attendance
Members: Marge Berglind, Anita Weinberg, Nate Pietrini, Jennifer Hansen, Brittani Kindle, Gabriel Foley DCFS: Kara Hamilton, Lori Welcher-Evans, Angela Hassell, Christina Kelly, Jason House Public: Nicholas Martin (pending member), Joshua Travis (pending member), D’Laney Gielow (Legal Aid Chicago), Leah Gluck (Legal Aid Chicago), Birdell Fry (DSNWorldWide)
Agenda
I. Welcome and Introductions
Marge called meeting to order 3:04pm.
II. Approval of Minutes from January 13th meeting- MOTION: On a motion by Jennifer Hansen moved seconded by Gabriel Foley, minutes were unanimously approved.
III. Membership Update
• Term discussion
i. Update of who is rolling off, Kara double checking terms with Governor’s Office.
• Recruitment
i. Joshua and Nick materials are with Governor’s Office, appointments pending
ii. Marge reminded council to look for new members, focus on making sure the state is represented.
• Q. Delaney Gielow asked if plans have been made to recruit bio parents?
A. Marge responded that this is something the membership committee would have to look at, although there are bio parent specific groups.
IV. Presentation of Federal Funding, focus on Title IV-E: Birdell Fry
• Current Claiming and High Level Framework
i. Federal Programs; Title IV-E (Foster Care, Adoption Assistance, Guardianship Assistance), TANF-EA (emergency assistance), Title IV-B pt.1, IV-B pt.2, Social Security, Chafee Independent Living (youth 14-23), Educational training vouchers (18-27)
ii. IV-E Eligibility; initial, ongoing, older ward. Uncapped entitlement
iii. Upcoming changes; Family First legislation took effect 10/1/2021
1. Provides funding for evidence-based services
• Limits time a youth can spend in Quality Residential Treatment Program (QRTP)
• Q. what does the specified placement setting refer to, QRTP’s?
A. Per Birdell, Foster care is not one specified place. Specified settling is QRTP, independent living programs ILO/TLP, programs that address sex trafficking, programs that address pregnant/parenting youth.
• Q. When those took effect 2022 what does that mean?
A. Per Birdell, Before Family First took place, you had to have QRTP program in place and approved by feds. Postponed implementation because of fiscal impact of implementing sooner rather than later.
• Q. How much new money could come in due to shift of prevention piece?
A. Per Birdell, after the first year, once children use up residential treatment days, state receives less IV-E dollars, IL uses residential services considerably more than other states. Length of stay is always a topic of conversation.
V. DCFS QRTP Presentation: Angela Hassell
• Requirements
i. 30 day assessment: Family First provides timelines for assessment of QRTP placements- at 30 days, independent assessors, such as Northern University, whether QRTP is appropriate for a youth. If disapproved, youth should be moved within 30 days.
ii. 60 day Court Review: At 60 days- court reviews the independent assessment and approves/disapproves QRTP placement. If disapproved by court, transition expected within 30 days.
iii. licensed/accreditation: our agencies were already there
iv. Trauma-informed treatment: model description, staff training, trauma assessment, and treatment planning, trauma interventions and supporting management practices.
v. Nursing and other clinical staff: onsite in accordance with treatment model and availability
vi. Family Engagement: Connecting all department to engage families and get participation in treatment process. Asking providers to look at process of how they can support
vii. 6 month aftercare: Youth go into QRTP, be stabilized, then transition out. Ongoing assessment for youth and family.
• Q. When are independent assessments completed?
A. Per Angela, within 30 days of youth’s admission to QRTP. When a 906 filled out, triggers independent assessors in our system, they begin to reach out to WRTP and permanency worker to gather all necessary information.
• Q. IL uses residential services more than others, why?
A. Per Birdell, states that don’t use residential placements as heavily or uses Medicaid, they can implement Family First Prevention more quickly. Illinois not the only state that uses them heavily. A. Angela, we’re challenged with trying to change the mindset on how we use residential services and we have also experienced loss of resources and Illinois budget challenge.
• Marge noted it’s not the use of residential, length of stay. Also, we don’t have enough mental health resources and a good enough system, needs to be worked on by many state agencies, not just DCFS.
• Q. More about identification process, evaluation after if necessitates placement?
A. per Angela, youth are not just referred to residential treatment programs, clinical staffing process does assessment but then Family First asks for the independent assessment.
• Q. When/is there data available for QRTP placements and IV-E?
A. Per Birdell and Jason, information regarding placements, tracked in SACWIS. As far as accessible to public? Unsure. Very curious of other data going forward, we don’t currently have.
VI. Budget Presentation: Jason House
• DCFS FY23 Budget Proposal
i. Budget proposed raises from $1.5 to $1.8 billion, highlights-$29 million for 360 new positions, $16million for CWIS (Child Welfare Information System), $182 million for investments in workforce and high end youth services.
• Training and recruitment; partnering with universities to provide stipends for students pursuing social work.
• Q. What is the cost of losing staff and is the department investing in current staff to reduce turnover and staff leaving?
A. per Jason, we don’t have a dollar amount for staff turnover. Folks have a lot of career paths to progress through, most practically new hires are backfilling positions old staff moved within department. For our private community-based providers, they often do have a cost related to hiring/training, problem is getting and retaining staff.
Marge pointed out workforce crisis attachment sent out with meeting invite.
• Q. What schools are you partnering with and how is that outreach going?
A. we have only been partnering with state public universities yet.
ii. Critical Investments in Workforce and Youth Services
• $87.1 million- Joint Rate workgroup with Community Based Providers: funding for salary increases for private caseworkers and supervisors, child care workers (from $16.62/hr up to $19.62/hr) , & hiring additional support staff.
• $25 million- Level of Care Support Services
• $13.2 million- FY22 Workforce Crisis Response
• Q. What has been General Assembly response to proposed budget?
A. Per Jason, a lot of engagement on other ideas of how to improve and a lot of support.
• Q. Besides pay, have you gotten other feedback from workers to prevent from leaving?
A. We have heard the same thing too, there are more pressing factors behind retaining staff and those discussions will have to continue.
VII. Discussion: Intact- Lori Welcher-Evans
Q. What are intact services and how do they relate to Family First?
A. Pretty much same services, we have expanded for early prevention and tacking into DHS. Focusing on assessment piece, making sure workers completing CANS, engagement of fathers, and with low risk intakes
Q. Are intact services moving to provide evidence-based services?
A. Yes
Marge asked regarding licensing standards, Kara responded to the question posed before this meeting regarding licensing standards.
Q. To what extent is IL having difficulty getting foster families, how are we using Family First funding to do so?
Kara will determine the best staff to attend next meeting.
Q. to what extent do we have evidence-based services in place?
Are we going to be able to meet the demand.
VIII. Open discussion
Q. Gabe asked about Tanya Gassenheimer and Shriver center bill?
A. Anita disclosed Tanya left Shriver, unsure who is leading this, and appointments not filled yet. Kara mentioned the department was coordinating appointments.
Q. Anita asked what are still the challenges of Family First implementation? Can someone speak to that?
Q. Marge asked if there is someone overseeing Family First as a whole, Kara will check into this. Marge noted legislation list sent to the council to review, pointed out workers’ safety bills, asked Anita to recap. Anita- one bill is enhanced penalties if someone harms DCFS workers to make consistent if you harm any other providers of care. Concern because ‘battery’ can be just touching someone, and in a volatile situation can result in an inappropriate action by parent but not constitute aggravated battery with those penalties. Another bill allows for workers to carry pepper spray and be trained by State Police, concerns about legislation not discussing use. Another bill allowing workers to carry weapons, does not look like this moved. Other organizations opposing this and offering other solutions.
Marge noted budget should be approved by next meeting.
Meeting Adjourned
There was not a motion, but meeting ended 5:07 PM
Adjourn
https://www2.illinois.gov/dcfs/aboutus/policy/Documents/ICFSAC/ICFSAC_Minutes_031022.pdf
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