THE FUTURE OF DCF

THE FUTURE OF DCF

by Atty. Michael H. Agranoff

The Past is Prologue
As I have stated many times, most DCF workers are good to excellent. But
the fact remains: DCF is a bureaucracy; and in a bureaucracy, you get ahead
by telling your boss what he or she wants to hear. If you also help the
client or customer, and do the right thing, fine; but that is secondary.
The most important thing is to protect yourself. In this economy, raises,
promotions, health care benefits, pensions, and continued employment are
important. The wise person is unlikely to jeopardize them.
When I first started as a State-paid Juvenile Court lawyer, I had a much
higher opinion of DCF than I do now. It changed with the Mexico baby.
I had an assignment to represent a child. His parents had taken him to the
small upstate town of Mexico, New York, and sold him to a very nice
middle-class couple who could not have children. The parents, of course,
maintained that it was a temporary arrangement, and they were just providing
expense money to the couple.
I demanded that DCF investigate. They said that the Mexico couple were
very good people, and did nothing. I then threatened to go to the newspapers.
Suddenly, a team of DCF social workers and Connecticut State Troopers,
aided by New York State Troopers, descended upon Mexico and seized the baby,
bringing her back to Connecticut and putting her in a foster home.
The distraught Mexico couple, who believed that they had acted in good
faith all along, called me; apparently getting nowhere with DCF. They pleaded
how responsible and appropriate they were, etc. I advised them, at least a
dozen times, to get a Connecticut lawyer and fight for custody. For
whatever reason, they declined, and the baby was eventually adopted by a
Connecticut couple.
I thought it strange that DCF needed prodding from me to rescue a bartered
child, however respectable the buyers were.

The Idea of NOREIN
DCF has changed since those days. Now it goes full-steam into child
protection, even if that protection sometimes harms the child more than it helps.

As to the future of DCF, I have an opinion.
DCF operates on the referral system. Someone has to call DCF to say that a
child is possibly being abused or neglected. Then DCF investigates.
But why wait for a call? What if DCF could investigate all children at
will, and determine for itself if the child were abused or neglected?
That is what I call NOREIN – NO REferral INtervention. And I am convinced
that it is the future of DCF.
Several highly-placed DCF managers have told me that there is no such
program. Maybe not by that name, but I am morally certain that DCF is planning
something like it. NOREIN would ensure that DCF never goes out of business,
and is in a position to demand ever-more money from the State Legislature.

This is hardly fantasy. This is the same DCF that once asked the State
Attorney General if it had the authority to violate the Fourth Amendment,
invading people’s homes without their consent, just by claiming that they were
investigating child neglect.
DCF has bright people, and they see what the Patriot Act allows law
enforcement to get away with. No, it is hardly fantasy.
But how would you actually implement NOREIN? It’s a fair question.
The answer is simple: through the schools. The kids are a captive
audience; and the teachers, reduced today to teaching to a test, will have no
trouble making referrals and comments and filling out reports as they are told
to do. The administration is even easier; it is already accustomed to being
paper-pushers and taking direction from its downtown lawyers.
This explains why DCF absolutely hates home-schooling with a passion.
Although it is perfectly legal, DCF has often stated that parents are
neglectful, per se, because of home schooling their kids. DCF is maddeningly
frustrated by home schooling; and the obvious reason is that it has little or no
control over it.
The DCF pitch is simplicity itself: kids are victims, they cannot speak
for themselves, so we cannot wait for a neighbor or a teacher to call. We
have to investigate for ourselves. The need for more workers, more
investigators, more procedure writers, more supervisors, more legislative liaisons,
more think tanks, and more study groups, is clear; as is the need for more
taxpayer money to implement Big Brother (or Big Uncle) for our children.

Far-fetched? In truth, many lawyers today would say so. I do not. After
Vietnam and Iraq, and our energy policy, and our tax system, nothing done by
the Government would surprise me. I ask that lawyers and lay persons remain
vigilant: DCF will never give up its quest to be the premier State of
Connecticut agency.
Just Say NO to NOREIN.

The Possibility of Civil Rights
Civil rights cases might end up as the tool which forces DCF to respect
the rights of individuals. It is too early to tell, but this may be the wave
of the future.
On March 9, 2007, the popular TV show “20/20” ran a story of a woman
wrongfully convicted of murdering her 10-year-old son. This average
middle-class woman was sentenced to 65 years in prison.
Through good luck, after a few years, she got “Project Innocence” to
convince a high-powered lawyer to take her case pro bono. The woman had no
money, and her family could not afford over a million dollars in legal fees.
The lawyer got her a new trial, and the woman was heard and acquitted. As
the lawyer pointed out, there were numerous errors in the original case. As
I listened, I realized how similar errors applied to many DCF cases:
1.
The police determined from the start that the woman was guilty. They
certainly had every right to be suspicious, but they were so certain of her
guilt that they simply did not investigate or look for any evidence that might
have changed their theory. (The role that laziness plays in the American
Justice System deserves to be examined more closely).

In DCF cases, the investigator frequently determines guilt right away, and
will not pursue anything resembling an investigation to discover more
facts. The subject’s explanation will not be heard; fact witnesses will not be
consulted; and independent expert witnesses will be ignored. And without a
lawyer to press DCF, the verdict is a foregone conclusion.
1.
The prosecutor took the word of the police, pressed for no reasonable
investigation, and pursued the woman with a vengeance. He certainly had grounds
to be repulsed by this horrible crime, but he ignored his obligation to
find the truth.

In DCF cases, the AAG (Assistant Attorney General) virtually never
conducts or insists upon any meaningful investigation. In fact, DCF often writes
its own court motions, disguised as “affidavits” or “social studies”,
while the AAG just rubber-stamps it with the formality of a motion heading and
a signature. The traditional legal ethical rules requiring a good-faith
belief in your pleadings are ignored. Many AAG’s are indeed good and
fair-minded people, and I am pleased to know them; but others relish the idea of
persecuting defenseless people.
1.
The woman was given a lawyer who was, to be charitable, in over his head.
He did not object to improper evidence offered by the prosecutor; he did
not conduct his own detailed investigation; he did not properly investigate
the forensic evidence; and he talked the woman out of being a witness, which
she had initially insisted on being.

In DCF cases, some court-appointed lawyers act as an alter-ego for DCF. A
proper defense is not worth the trouble. Gathering and cross-checking DCF
evidence and producing computer-sorted chronologies to discover the smoking
gun; asking for discovery; filing pretrial motions to preclude prejudiced
evidence; gathering fact and expert witnesses to challenge DCF; objecting to
improper hearsay evidence; objecting to being bagged by DCF; insisting
that the child’s lawyer actually visit the child and observe visits; all
these and others may be deemed not worth the trouble.

As 20/20 reported, after the woman was acquitted in her second trial, she
and her lawyer were mobbed by reporters. One question asked was: “Is it
necessary to have a million-dollar defense to vindicate your own innocence?”
Sadly, the answer is often “Yes.” Fighting the enormous bureaucratic
power of the State is not easy. The “good guys” usually win in the movies and
on TV, but not always in real life.
Civil rights would ensure that DCF follows the traditional rules of
evidence, that lawyers actually defend their clients, and that persons facing the
parental death sentence of TPR (termination of parental rights) be given a
fighting chance by the State.
It may yet happen.
But not if NOREIN becomes the rule.
DCF Budget and Audits
For fiscal year 2008, DCF’s budget was approximately $867 Million. That
amounted to approximately 4.93% of the entire State of Connecticut budget.
Personnel costs are approximately 31.44% of DCF’s budget.
Yet DCF pays NO outside organizations to conduct audits of any of its
programs.
DCF also receives federal funding of approximately $21.8 Million. That
amount is primarily based upon federal formulas relating to food stamp usage,
Indian tribes, the population of children in the state, and the state’s
average per capita income. Some funds also depend upon the number of
children committed to DCF.
DCF has no outside auditors evaluating its programs, or the programs of
any of its numerous service providers. There are no outside independent
audits to study and evaluate any programs in terms of their adequacy, cost
effectiveness, success in meeting goals, or any other criteria.
Therefore, an agency with a budget of nearly one billion dollars, and one
which will surely grow over the years, operates virtually without
oversight. It is true that the Commissioner must report to the State Legislature
and the Governor. But if those persons have no detailed idea of program
success, other than what internal DCF staffers tell them, then how well-served
are the taxpayers?
DCF, as mentioned frequently, has a serious and important mission. But
how much of its mission of child protection would be better directed to child
welfare? Who is tracking individual examples of DCF waste? who is
evaluating programs and determining if they are useful? who follows-up on
complaints? who decides if a program should be replaced by one that will employ
fewer people?
DCF is the size of a small public corporation. Operating it as an
audit-free entity makes no sense, whatever your political persuasion.
A private company always wants to cut expenses. A public entity, such as
DCF, seeks to increase expenses, as a way to get more money and increase
its presence. At the very least, meaningful outside independent auditing
should be required.
Budget Implications for Child Welfare
Anyone who reads the above section, and who has the slightest concern for
child welfare, could be forgiven for breaking down and crying.
Can you imagine what a billion dollars would do for child welfare in
Connecticut? No, we will never have perfection; that is unattainable and in
some ways undesirable. But we could make significant improvements in the
following areas:
1. Medical care for innocent children (and adults) who cannot afford
it.
2. Dental care for innocent children (and adults) who cannot afford
it.
3. Psychological care for innocent children (and adults) who cannot
afford it.
4. Improved enforcement of child support orders, including finding
and jailing offenders until they worked off their obligations, so that
innocent children will receive their rightful funds.
5. Assistance for innocent children who need food and clothing, when
their parents or guardians cannot or will not provide these.
6. An improved Big Brother/Big Sister program for innocent children
who lack appropriate role models to have them develop into responsible
adults.
7. Payments for legal services for innocent children (and indigent
adults), that are above the lawyer-poverty level.
8. Improved child visitation facilities, so that parents would not be
limited to 1-2 hours a week of supervised visitation when their innocent
and frightened children have been temporarily taken.
9. Improved education for innocent kids who really want to learn, and
not simply be taught to pass a multiple-choice test. Such kids would be
less likely to have low self-esteem and to succumb to peer pressure.
10. Improved school offerings in art, music, physical education,
drama, and the like, so that innocent kids might be exposed to the beauties of
Western culture, and not find it necessary to major in subjects such as
Corporate Communication and lead bureaucratic lives.
11. Meaningful substance abuse and gambling abuse prevention and
education programs, so that innocent kids would have a better chance to succeed
in life.
12. Removing children from their homes when absolutely necessary.
Of course, there are many other possibilities, and I do not wish to get
overextended. Any of these items is debatable. However, I find it hard to
believe that any reasonable person could prefer the following over child
welfare:
1. Meaningless conferences and task forces on diversity.
2. Hounding parents every time that a kid has a childhood bruise.
3. Placing people on the Registry for one-time non-serious acts.
4. Hauling people into Juvenile Court because they are not properly
deferential.
5. Paying outrageous salaries and benefits to DCF social workers,
managers, lawyers, and the Assistant Attorneys General who prosecute their
cases.
DCF will respond that it has no choice. It will point to various federal
child welfare acts, starting with social security, and continuing through
to the 1980 Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act, the Adoption and Safe
Families Act, and others, which effectively put a premium on removing kids
and placing them in foster care or putting them up for adoption. And, of
course, this almost always means “poor kids.” The well-off can hire
better lawyers and work around it.
The rationalizations do not impress me. The failure of the United States
to provide meaningful child welfare is a very sad situation. Both
political parties are culpable.
MISSION STATEMENT
Our mission statement is clear:
1. DCF is, today, where the police were a century ago.
2. We believe in law and order and the need for a police force. But
sometimes, the police go to far, and the rights of people must be
protected. Much progress has been made in the past century.
3. Similarly, we believe in child protection and the need for DCF.
But sometimes DCF goes too far, and the rights of the people must be
protected.
4. DCF is relatively new and most people are not aware of its powers.
It will take many years to get the need for protection from DCF abuses
understood, the way that protection from police abuses is taken for granted
today. But we are committed to it.
5. Therefore, we believe in child protection, we believe in child
welfare, and we believe in family rights and Constitutional rights.
WILL DCF EVER GO AWAY?
People often ask me if DCF will ever go away, or at least be replaced by a
kinder and gentler agency.
I would say that that is highly unlikely.
Connecticut has two growth industries left: gambling, and government
bureaucracy. When I was growing up in the 1950’s, we led the nation in many
things: typewriters, insurance, defense, education, quality of life. Things
changed. Don’t ask why: Democrats blame Republicans and Republicans blame
Democrats; business and labor blame each other; big cities and small towns
blame each other. It’s a fun debate, but one without a purpose.
We are what we are. Gambling sneaked in, with the help of no-income-tax
Weicker and never-answer-your-mail Gejdenson. It is run by questionable
Indians from non-existent tribes. The lessons of “Without Reservation” and “
Hitting the Jackpot” are ignored, even by those who once opposed legalized
gambling. No one will give up the money.
As outsourcing increased, public employee unions became stronger. DCF is
part of that. No one seriously questions its budget in terms of its actual
performance. What counts is making government the employer of last
resort.
Bureaucracy is the strangest phenomenon in the intellectual history of the
world. It is the only idea, to my knowledge, that everyone is publicly
against; and yet it keeps growing. That tells you two things: bureaucracy
serves a purpose, and people are ashamed of that purpose. The purpose, of
course, is to foster security while reducing risk; but without paying a
premium as is done in private insurance. Bureaucracy appeals to two well-known
human foibles: laziness and greed. Sometimes these foibles are countered
by religion and scholarly education, but those two concepts are somewhat
out of fashion today.
Until some future Utopia arrives, DCF will be a way of life. And other
States are getting on the bandwagon. The child protection game, minus the
child welfare, is good for business.
As to our two major growth industries:
Recently, this country went on an anti-smoking campaign. A move to ban
smoking in casinos, however, was defeated. Legislators, to their credit,
openly acknowledged the danger of second-hand smoke to casino employees; yet
they openly admitted that they would do nothing that might arguably hurt
casino business.
Similarly, legislators will do nothing that might hurt government
employment. DCF is a perfect way to ensure more power to public employee unions,
while avoiding the thornier question of child welfare. Legislators know
that most people will equate DCF’s version of “child protection” with the
concept of “child welfare”.
The real problem is that we do not have enough jobs in this country to
support our population. Hence, make-work is the order of the day. There is
plenty of work to do; make no mistake about that. But it cannot be done
under our current minimum wage and welfare and vote-buying climate. A very
sad commentary on our education system.
The Hartford Courant recently wondered why students were learning less
today than in the bad old 1950’s. They proposed all sorts of gimmicks for
improvement. It never occurred to the Courant that the gimmicks were the
problem in the first place. Educators are supposed to educate; not to solve
the problems that the rest of society ignores.
Connecticut has indeed come a long way since I was a child.
The bottom line is that, given current political realities, DCF will only
get stronger. You must live with DCF. This web site is intended to make
that easier.

©2009 The Law Offices of Michael H. Agranoff
99 Stafford Road, Rt. 30
Ellington, CT 06029
Phone: 860-872-1024
Fax: 860-871-1015
Email: attymikea@agranofflaw.com