A Dark View Of Foster Care

THURSDAY, JULY 01, 2010
A Dark View Of Foster Care
Panel is given a dark view of foster care


Many of the most troubled end up far from home, lawmakers are told

By TERRI LANGFORD

HOUSTON CHRONICLE

AUSTIN — Many of the most troubled foster children in Texas, some of them depressed and suicidal, are shipped hundreds of miles from home to residential treatments centers in Houston - where they have no family, no visitors and little hope of leaving state care.


These children are so afflicted with mental and emotional issues that caseworkers have little choice but to place them in the most restrictive of foster care centers, known as RTCs, one stop short of a psychiatric hospital, Anne Heiligenstein, Texas Department of Family and Protective Services commissioner, told members of the House Human Services Committee Wednesday.

Half of the RTCs in the state are in the Houston area. At least 1,600 children live in RTCs in Texas, representing 10 percent of the state's foster care children.

"What they don't understand and they will never forgive us for is why they can't be with their siblings," Heiligenstein said. "To separate siblings is another wound to children besides taking them from their own home that they really don't get over."

Six of 10 children who live in 33 Houston area RTCs, aren't from the Houston area.

By shipping children hundreds of miles from their families, the goal of eventually releasing them from state care becomes more elusive. Visits to siblings or non-abusive family members becomes too expensive, transportation-wise.

Press reports cited

Heiligenstein said one 17-year-old girl, placed in an RTC after she had been sexually abused, was transferred from one center to another because she was difficult to control, physically aggressive, suicidal and often engaged in self-mutilation.

"That means 26 times we had to remove her from her caregiver," she said.

Another child has had 50 placements.

Heiligenstein discussed the problems of RTC care as she fielded questions from members of the House Human Services Committee over conditions at the facilities, and outlined her plans to redesign the foster care system, untouched since 1991.

The care of children inside RTC's led the committee agenda as lawmakers questioned agency staff about steps that have been taken since a Chronicle/Texas Tribune report detailed 250 confirmed abuse incidents - from physical beatings to humiliating punishments - that have occurred in centers in the past two years.

In one 2008 case, staff at the Manvel-based Daystar Residential Inc. encouraged seven developmentally disabled girls to fight one another, rewarding the winners with snacks. In another incident at Houston's Serenity RTC, staffers forced residents to strip down to their underwear and take off their shoes so they wouldn't run away.

"Why did members of the Legislature have to initially find out about this problem, this issue, through the press?" asked Rep. Elliott Naishtat, D-Austin. "We need to know about these things."

Though Heiligenstein said the information was publicly available, she also conceded that lawmakers "have every right to be frustrated when you get caught by surprise."

Since the Chronicle/ Tribune report last month, the Department of Family and Protective Services has suspended placements at Daystar and hired an on-site monitor to help with training and check on conditions for Austin.


http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7088843.html


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