For Immediate Release
June 13, 2003

Richmond - The Virginia Department of Social Services has completed the first phase of a three-phase federal review of Virginia's child welfare system.

The "self assessment" phase of the Child and Family Services Review has been submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and was posted today on the Virginia Department of Social Services' Web site at http://www.dss.virginia.gov/geninfo/reports/children/cfsr.cgi.

"This review provides an opportunity to examine the child welfare system in Virginia and develop strategies to enhance the safety, permanency and well-being of our children," said Social Services Commissioner Maurice A. Jones.

"I'm pleased with the results of the first phase," Jones added. "Our self assessment shows that our system has strengths and opportunities to better serve the children and families in the Commonwealth."

The self assessment was developed using data from all 121 local departments of social services across the Commonwealth to evaluate current programs. Input from focus groups, surveys and a statewide stakeholders group that has met monthly for the past year also was used.

"The review assesses child protective services, foster care, adoption and family preservation programs. While the review looks at 14 categories, the safety, permanency and well-being outcomes for children are of particular interest to us," Jones said.

Strengths in the self assessment of those three outcomes include:

• Once child abuse or neglect is found, a recurrence is rare. Virginia's rate of recurrence 3.77 percent, which is significantly below the national standard of 6.1 percent.
• Virginia does a good job of keeping children out of foster care. Four children out of 1,000 are in foster care in Virginia, compared to eight per 1,000 children nationwide.
• Virginia provides a collaborative system of funding and services that allow local communities to address educational, mental and physical health, and other service needs of children.

Areas cited for improvement in the self assessment include:

• More children in foster care should be adopted within 24 months of entering foster care. The national standard is 32 percent, while Virginia's rate is 18 percent.
• The incidence of child deaths from abuse and neglect should be reduced. While the rate has dropped from 2.2 to 1.8 deaths in 100,0000 in recent years, the department believes even one child fatality from abuse or neglect is one too many.

Strategies in the self assessment to enhance outcomes include:

• A new decision-making model that incorporates safety and risk assessments will provide more consistency in judging children's safety.
• The timeliness of returning children to their families and of finalizing adoptions of children who cannot return home will be improved so that children have a permanent and safe family as soon as possible.
• Increasing medical providers willing to serve Medicaid-eligible children will improve medical and dental health availability, better enabling children to receive appropriate preventive and treatment services.

"This self assessment is just the first phase of the review," Jones said. "During the second phase, federal officials will visit three localities in Virginia and pull 50 cases as a sampling to examine during on-site reviews. They will visit Bedford, Fairfax and Norfolk during the week of July 7. Bedford, Fairfax and Norfolk have been preparing for the on-site review and we are grateful for their participation in this process."

"The third phase is to develop a program improvement plan for any categories that aren't in substantial conformity to the high benchmarks set by the federal government," Jones said.

"This is not a pass-fail review," Jones pointed out. "This is a process that provides for review and improvement. Virginia will be the 39^th state to undergo the review, and all those that have gone before us have had areas of strengths and challenges that require program improvement plans."

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is reviewing child welfare systems in all states to determine how well they are complying with the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997. This is the first time the federal government has established national benchmarks for child welfare.

Jones concluded, "Virginia is focused on enhancing child welfare programs to improve the lives of children and families. Social Services and its many partners across the Commonwealth are committed to this effort. This review will help Virginia meet that commitment."

Marcella Williamson
Public Affairs
(804) 692-1031
mkw900@email1.dss.state.va.us

Charles Ingram
Public Affairs
(804) 692-1619
cij900@dss.state.va.us
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