Lawsuit may help foster kids

Lew Hollman of the Center for Law in the Public Interest, who is one of the key attorneys behind the lawsuit, said he thinks the lawsuit might really work. "We’re trying to address problems everyone has acknowledged, so I’m kind of hopeful," he said.

Lawsuit aims for systemic change


He added that meaningful change can only come if all of the organizations that serve foster youth—including the Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS), the Department of Mental Health (DMH), the state Department of Social Services (DSS) and others—can work together in the child’s best interest.

According to Hollman, "In the DCFS, the coordination is never there. There’s a great deal of finger pointing, and very, very little cooperation. Different funding streams distort assessments. For example, if a child is developmentally disabled and has emotional problems, should Regional Centers pay for their care or should the DCFS?"

Legally, social workers are supposed to make an "assessment." That means deciding what kind of place the kid needs to live in, what kind of schooling he or she needs, and whether extra services are needed, such as counseling and medication. "In fact, very little happens. They get pulled out of the home and it becomes very difficult for the parent to maintain contact. If they get any assessment, it’s usually inadequate," said Hollman. He noted that often the reasons for a child being removed—such as drug use by a parent or an abusive boyfriend—are not addressed effectively.

The lawsuit seeks to change the rules that allow foster care providers to have any child removed from the home on seven days notice. This policy leads to kids being constantly rejected because they are angry and rebellious, Hollman said. It makes sense for foster youth to be angry and rebellious, he said. "Those behaviors are natural reactions to being pulled out of a familiar environment and put with strangers."

Hollman said the foster care system needs to change the way money is spent on youth. MacLaren Hall, for example, costs $757 dollars per day for each child, which adds up to more than $276,000 per year. But children who are in foster homes or placed with their relatives cost less than $10,000 a year, while children who are at risk but not removed from their homes cost less than $5,000 a year, Hollman said.

Officials hope to put kids in more stable placements

Attorney Virginia Weisz of the Los Angeles Public Counsel said she is also hopeful that the lawsuit will keep kids from being moved around so much. "If you were a gardener and you had a tomato plant, you are probably going to pot it and then plant it in your garden. Think what would happen if you transplant it every month. If you transplant it 28 times, or even 3 or 4 times, you wouldn’t have any tomatoes. What you would end up with is a vine that is all withered and dead, right? We don’t treat the kids as well as we would treat a tomato plant.

"Stability is extremely important. And the problem with the kids is if you ignore what their mental health needs are, then it’s much harder to place them in a home because they are going to be so messed up mentally. So you need to make sure that they get their services right when they come into care, instead of just putting them on the back burner until they develop really awful problems."