Private groups seek to take over foster care

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Religious and private social service groups are making a push to take over the main duties of the state's troubled foster care system, suggesting they could do a better job than overworked state employees.

Gov. Bob Holden also has outlined a reorganization of the way the state handles children's services in response partly to the recent death of a 2-year-old foster child in Springfield.

Contracting with more private case workers was not part of the proposal he announced last week. But Holden said in an interview Friday that he has not ruled out the possibility.

Missouri already contracts with 15 private social services agencies to work as case workers for some foster children in Jackson and St. Louis counties and St. Louis city.

But the roughly 1,500 children served by those private social workers make up barely 12 percent of the 12,219 children removed from their parents' homes and placed in either a foster home or some other sort of residential care facility.

Private social services groups would like to handle as much as 90 percent of the state's foster children, said Larry Weber, executive director of the Missouri Catholic Conference.

"We can do this a lot better than the state can," said Weber, referring not only to Catholic charities but dozens of other religious and private groups. "We are tied to our local communities ... and can utilize the strengths of the community in such a way that we're acting in the best interests of the children."

Warm reception from panel

Weber served as a spokesman for private social services groups while pitching their plan this past week to a panel of state senators investigating the state's child welfare system. The idea received a warm reception from the Republican-controlled panel, especially from Senate President Pro Tem Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau.

Holden said he is open to the idea, if it would improve children's services.

"Our interest is to protect the children in this -- that's got to be our primary consideration," Holden said. "We're looking for areas where we might privatize governmental services, as long as we don't undermine quality and as long as we don't abdicate our responsibility of oversight."

But so far, the state has no plans to expand its contracts with private foster care caseworkers, said Jerrie Jacobs-Kenner, deputy director of children's services in the Division of Family Services.

Missouri's current foster care contracts are intended to ease the burden on state caseworkers, who often serve between 20 and 25 families, Jacobs-Kenner said. Caseloads for private contractors are capped at 12 families per caseworker.

If Missouri stuck with those standards while expanding the work of private social service groups, the state's costs likely would rise -- as they have in other states with privatized foster care systems, she said.

Rather than adding more private caseworkers, Jacobs-Kenner said the state wants to improve oversight and the standards used to judge the success of current foster care contractors.

Private social service agencies are convinced they have a better process than the state, Weber said.

'Complete breakdown'

After the death of 2-year-old foster child Dominic James in August, Holden appointed two investigators who determined there was a "complete breakdown" in Missouri's child welfare system. The state Senate also formed a special committee after Dominic's death. The boy's foster father has pleaded innocent to a murder charge.

After the boy's death, private organizations also met in Jefferson City to come up with their own proposal for managing most of the state's foster care system.