Fw: RE: PLEASE CONTACT THE DHHS IN WASHINGTON FOR YOUR COMPLAINT AGAINST STATE AGENCIES
Jane Boyer
This was a response to a via e-mail submission for the GAO FraudNet, although it was a individual filing the claim for alleging the wrongful removals of children from a home because they could not investigate the case as a individual claim, unless it was a legislative committee member or Governor, or some one like the Secretary of the Kansas Department of Social Services, a Mayor, or a Senator a DA or Attorney General. Let's put this response to the test and flood the DHHS in Washington to see what response we get back. Everyone call the
1-800-447-8477 to complain about what's going on in your state.
A response to anonymous submission claim:
This responds to your Internet submission to the GAO FraudNET alleging the wrongful removal of children from a home by the Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services and the Kaw Valley Center in Kansas. We have assigned this matter control number and request that you cite this number in any future contact with our office.
We reviewed your information and found that the situation you describe is not within the scope of any on-going GAO work. Therefore in accordance with GAO FraudNET policy to forward instances of wrongdoing to executive agencies for appropriate action, we have referred your concerns to the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Inspector General (DHHS/OIG) for their review and whatever action they deem appropriate. The DHHS/OIG can be contacted at 1-800-447-8477, via email at hhstips@oig.hhs.gov or in writing at: DHHS/OIG; 330 Independence Avenue, S.W.; Washington, D.C. 20201.
For your information, GAO is responsible for assisting the Congress in carrying out its oversight responsibilities pertaining to government programs, activities and functions. Generally, this involves examining the programs and operations of federal departments and agencies, rather than reviewing singular allegations of wrongdoing or poor performance in connection with specific matters.
Thank you for your interest.
Isabella Brooke Knightly and Austin Gamez-Knightly
In Memory of my Loving Husband, William F. Knightly Jr. Murdered by ILLEGAL Palliative Care at a Nashua, NH Hospital
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Family says boy hiding from foster care
Family says boy hiding from foster care
Police say the search for Jaymie Fisher will continue until he is returned to his guardian.
VIDEO: Police probe mother on missing Hobart boy (7pm TV News TAS)
MAP: Glenorchy 7010
RELATED STORY: Police urge mum to tell them missing son's whereabouts
The grandfather of a boy reported missing last Friday has criticised police for insisting on seeing the boy after his mother claimed he had called her twice and he is safe.
Jaymie Fisher was dropped off at his mother's Glenorchy home on Friday for a weekly visit and reported missing on the same day.
Police have scoured nearby bushland for the boy who has twice phoned his mother Rachel Fisher.
But her father Brian Fisher believes his grandson will not say where he is hiding because he does not want to return to foster care.
"He's had a gutful of it, you know. He wants to go home, he wants to live his life properly," he said
Mr Fisher says police threatened his daughter when they spoke to her last night and she is frightened.
Police say Mr Fisher should lodge a formal complaint if he has concerns.
They say the investigation will continue until Jaymie is returned to his legal guardian.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/15/3011973.htm
Police say the search for Jaymie Fisher will continue until he is returned to his guardian.
VIDEO: Police probe mother on missing Hobart boy (7pm TV News TAS)
MAP: Glenorchy 7010
RELATED STORY: Police urge mum to tell them missing son's whereabouts
The grandfather of a boy reported missing last Friday has criticised police for insisting on seeing the boy after his mother claimed he had called her twice and he is safe.
Jaymie Fisher was dropped off at his mother's Glenorchy home on Friday for a weekly visit and reported missing on the same day.
Police have scoured nearby bushland for the boy who has twice phoned his mother Rachel Fisher.
But her father Brian Fisher believes his grandson will not say where he is hiding because he does not want to return to foster care.
"He's had a gutful of it, you know. He wants to go home, he wants to live his life properly," he said
Mr Fisher says police threatened his daughter when they spoke to her last night and she is frightened.
Police say Mr Fisher should lodge a formal complaint if he has concerns.
They say the investigation will continue until Jaymie is returned to his legal guardian.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/15/3011973.htm
Seclusion And Restraint In Child And Adolescent Mental Health Care
Seclusion And Restraint In Child And Adolescent Mental Health Care
Seclusion And Restraint In Child And Adolescent Mental Health Care
Introduction
Mental health care settings present a series of challenges, more so when patients are children and adolescents. One of these controversial issues is the use of seclusion and restraint. Many nursing practitioners find that it is extremely difficult trying to balance between the civil rights of the child or adolescent patient and the needs of the patient as a health care consumer. When most people think about seclusion and restraint, they imagine that it is a form of punishment, neglect, institutional abuse or custodial care. However, certain instances necessitate its use and if used in the right manner, it may even be regarded as a form of therapeutic treatment.
http://www.ios-unlock.com/seclusion-and-restraint-in-child-and-adolescent-mental-health-care/
Seclusion And Restraint In Child And Adolescent Mental Health Care
Introduction
Mental health care settings present a series of challenges, more so when patients are children and adolescents. One of these controversial issues is the use of seclusion and restraint. Many nursing practitioners find that it is extremely difficult trying to balance between the civil rights of the child or adolescent patient and the needs of the patient as a health care consumer. When most people think about seclusion and restraint, they imagine that it is a form of punishment, neglect, institutional abuse or custodial care. However, certain instances necessitate its use and if used in the right manner, it may even be regarded as a form of therapeutic treatment.
http://www.ios-unlock.com/seclusion-and-restraint-in-child-and-adolescent-mental-health-care/
Suicide Among Youth Within Residential Group Facilities and Single Family Foster Homes
Suicide Among Youth Within Residential Group Facilities and Single Family Foster Homes
12
SEP
Recent years, researchers admit high rates of suicides among youth within the foster care system. Researchers explain that suicides are caused by social and emotional conditions rather than a mental disease. Furthermore, it is often associated with hundreds of suicides and suicide attempts. “Researchers discovered attention problems and aggressive or delinquent behavior in 40 per cent of children aged five to 17 who were in home-based foster care, up to eight times more than in the general school-age population” (Gough 2007). Though the statistics vary extensively, it is generally believed that some 18 percent of patients with psychological problems finally do kill themselves, and illnesses may be associated with approximately 50 percent of all suicides (Youth Suicide Fact Sheet 2009). The data show, that miserable youth teenagers do not always kill themselves. Symptoms of psychological distress serve as a strong warning signal. They are a good indicator that someone is a potential suicide, especially if he or she has tried suicide before, and it is important to know about psychological distress if researchers are to understand suicidal behavior.
http://nicanmopohua.org/suicide-among-youth-within-residential-group-facilities-and-single-family-foster-homes.html
12
SEP
Recent years, researchers admit high rates of suicides among youth within the foster care system. Researchers explain that suicides are caused by social and emotional conditions rather than a mental disease. Furthermore, it is often associated with hundreds of suicides and suicide attempts. “Researchers discovered attention problems and aggressive or delinquent behavior in 40 per cent of children aged five to 17 who were in home-based foster care, up to eight times more than in the general school-age population” (Gough 2007). Though the statistics vary extensively, it is generally believed that some 18 percent of patients with psychological problems finally do kill themselves, and illnesses may be associated with approximately 50 percent of all suicides (Youth Suicide Fact Sheet 2009). The data show, that miserable youth teenagers do not always kill themselves. Symptoms of psychological distress serve as a strong warning signal. They are a good indicator that someone is a potential suicide, especially if he or she has tried suicide before, and it is important to know about psychological distress if researchers are to understand suicidal behavior.
http://nicanmopohua.org/suicide-among-youth-within-residential-group-facilities-and-single-family-foster-homes.html
Open Child Neglect Hearings To Public
Open Child Neglect Hearings To Public
By RICHARD WEXLER
September 14, 2010
There is only one thing worse than a child welfare agency stonewalling after it botches a case: a legislator grandstanding about problems he and his colleagues could have fixed long ago.
So state Sen. Ed Meyer, D-Guilford, stalked out of a recent hearing called in response to a child neglect case in Torrington shocked — shocked! — that the Department of Children and Families won't discuss the case at hand.
But who, exactly, made the absurd confidentiality laws that prevent DCF from talking? The General Assembly. That's why they're called lawmakers.
Several states have laws allowing their child welfare agencies to comment on cases if they've already become public. DCF claims it has unsuccessfully tried to get Connecticut to pass a similar law.
[Sample Our Free Breaking News Alert And 3 P.M. News Newsletters]
We'd all know far more about what goes on not just in the egregious cases, but the everyday cases, if all court hearings in child welfare cases were open. But the legislature has refused to join at least 15 other states with fully open courts, approving only a pilot project in one court.
But worst of all, such grandstanding encourages the kind of response to high-profile cases that always makes everything worse — a foster care panic.
Compare the number of children torn from their parents to the number of impoverished children in each state, and Connecticut already takes away children at a rate well above the national average, and more than double the rate of states widely regarded as, relatively speaking, models for keeping children safe.
This high rate of removal has plagued Connecticut for decades. But that didn't prevent the death of Baby Emily in 1995 or Al-Lex Daniels in 2003, and many others.
With workers terrified of having the next such incident on their caseloads, the number of children torn from everyone they know and love is likely to soar, exactly as it did after the deaths of Emily and Al-Lex. And that is a disaster for vulnerable children.
The trauma of removal is, itself, so devastating that two landmark studies of more than 15,000 typical cases found that children left in their own homes typically fared better even than comparably maltreated children placed in foster care.
Worst of all, foster care panics overload caseworkers, so they have even less time to investigate any case thoroughly — so more children in real danger are missed.
Connecticut's high rate of removal and, in particular, its overuse of what is both the worst and the most expensive form of care — institutionalization — also explain why the state spends so much on child welfare, and gets so little protection for children in return.
DCF's handling of the Torrington case was idiotic. DCF concluded in May that the danger to the children required taking them from the home, yet also felt the removal could wait for two months.
What DCF should have done in May was try Intensive Family Preservation Services. Under this program, a worker with a caseload of no more than three families is in the home several days a week, sometimes for several hours at a time — for no more than six weeks. This kind of intervention costs less than foster care and has a better track record for safety.
After six weeks, either the family is linked up to less intensive help — or the worker concludes the family really is hopeless and recommends removal. Either way, odds are there would have been no crisis in July requiring police to intervene.
The reason to try it is because, as in the overwhelming majority of cases, family preservation is, in the words of the late Yale University child welfare scholars Albert Solnit and Joseph Goldstein, the least detrimental alternative.
Yes, the response of DCF in the Torrington case was idiotic. But the solution to the problems of idiocy is not more idiocy.
Richard Wexler is executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, a nonprofit child advocacy organization based in Alexandria, Va.
http://www.courant.com/news/opinion/hc-op-wexler-dcf-0914-20100914,0,5748613.story
By RICHARD WEXLER
September 14, 2010
There is only one thing worse than a child welfare agency stonewalling after it botches a case: a legislator grandstanding about problems he and his colleagues could have fixed long ago.
So state Sen. Ed Meyer, D-Guilford, stalked out of a recent hearing called in response to a child neglect case in Torrington shocked — shocked! — that the Department of Children and Families won't discuss the case at hand.
But who, exactly, made the absurd confidentiality laws that prevent DCF from talking? The General Assembly. That's why they're called lawmakers.
Several states have laws allowing their child welfare agencies to comment on cases if they've already become public. DCF claims it has unsuccessfully tried to get Connecticut to pass a similar law.
[Sample Our Free Breaking News Alert And 3 P.M. News Newsletters]
We'd all know far more about what goes on not just in the egregious cases, but the everyday cases, if all court hearings in child welfare cases were open. But the legislature has refused to join at least 15 other states with fully open courts, approving only a pilot project in one court.
But worst of all, such grandstanding encourages the kind of response to high-profile cases that always makes everything worse — a foster care panic.
Compare the number of children torn from their parents to the number of impoverished children in each state, and Connecticut already takes away children at a rate well above the national average, and more than double the rate of states widely regarded as, relatively speaking, models for keeping children safe.
This high rate of removal has plagued Connecticut for decades. But that didn't prevent the death of Baby Emily in 1995 or Al-Lex Daniels in 2003, and many others.
With workers terrified of having the next such incident on their caseloads, the number of children torn from everyone they know and love is likely to soar, exactly as it did after the deaths of Emily and Al-Lex. And that is a disaster for vulnerable children.
The trauma of removal is, itself, so devastating that two landmark studies of more than 15,000 typical cases found that children left in their own homes typically fared better even than comparably maltreated children placed in foster care.
Worst of all, foster care panics overload caseworkers, so they have even less time to investigate any case thoroughly — so more children in real danger are missed.
Connecticut's high rate of removal and, in particular, its overuse of what is both the worst and the most expensive form of care — institutionalization — also explain why the state spends so much on child welfare, and gets so little protection for children in return.
DCF's handling of the Torrington case was idiotic. DCF concluded in May that the danger to the children required taking them from the home, yet also felt the removal could wait for two months.
What DCF should have done in May was try Intensive Family Preservation Services. Under this program, a worker with a caseload of no more than three families is in the home several days a week, sometimes for several hours at a time — for no more than six weeks. This kind of intervention costs less than foster care and has a better track record for safety.
After six weeks, either the family is linked up to less intensive help — or the worker concludes the family really is hopeless and recommends removal. Either way, odds are there would have been no crisis in July requiring police to intervene.
The reason to try it is because, as in the overwhelming majority of cases, family preservation is, in the words of the late Yale University child welfare scholars Albert Solnit and Joseph Goldstein, the least detrimental alternative.
Yes, the response of DCF in the Torrington case was idiotic. But the solution to the problems of idiocy is not more idiocy.
Richard Wexler is executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, a nonprofit child advocacy organization based in Alexandria, Va.
http://www.courant.com/news/opinion/hc-op-wexler-dcf-0914-20100914,0,5748613.story
New Hampshire Creates Ombuds Office for Health & Human Service Issues
New Hampshire Creates Ombuds Office for Health & Human Service Issues
The state agency has unveiled a website for a new Ombuds program for clients, employees, and members of the general public. Although it does not explicitly adopt IOA standards of practice, the New Hampshire DHHS Ombuds is confidential, unbiased and informal.
The new program most closely resembles the Organizational Ombuds model, despite the fact that it serves internal and external stakeholders. Moreover, its methods of complaint resolution are strikingly familiar and include the option of upward feedback:
The Office of the Ombudsman responds to complaints and requests for assistance from clients, employees, and members of the general public to resolve disagreements in matters that involve DHHS. The Office of the Ombudsman is dedicated to maintaining an environment that supports the civil rights of all served.
http://ombuds-blog.blogspot.com/2010/09/new-hampshire-creates-ombuds-office-fo.html
The state agency has unveiled a website for a new Ombuds program for clients, employees, and members of the general public. Although it does not explicitly adopt IOA standards of practice, the New Hampshire DHHS Ombuds is confidential, unbiased and informal.
The new program most closely resembles the Organizational Ombuds model, despite the fact that it serves internal and external stakeholders. Moreover, its methods of complaint resolution are strikingly familiar and include the option of upward feedback:
The Office of the Ombudsman responds to complaints and requests for assistance from clients, employees, and members of the general public to resolve disagreements in matters that involve DHHS. The Office of the Ombudsman is dedicated to maintaining an environment that supports the civil rights of all served.
http://ombuds-blog.blogspot.com/2010/09/new-hampshire-creates-ombuds-office-fo.html
'I Do' To Divorce Insurance
'I Do' To Divorce Insurance
By Angela Kennecke
Published: September 13, 2010, 9:50 PM
SIOUX FALLS, SD - You buy car insurance, home insurance and life insurance. Do you need to insure you marriage?
A North Carolina insurance company is selling the "first" divorce insurance, designed to cover the costs of divorce if your marriage doesn't work out.
Nobody wants to think their marriage will end in divorce, but the fact is some 40 to 50 percent of marriages do.
That's where WedLock divorce insurance comes in. If you get divorced and the policy has matured, you send the company proof and you get cash to cover your legal and housing expenses.
"It's a novel idea. I don't propose it for my clients," Family Law Attorney Jim Billion said.
http://www.keloland.com/News/NewsDetail6376.cfm?Id=104853
By Angela Kennecke
Published: September 13, 2010, 9:50 PM
SIOUX FALLS, SD - You buy car insurance, home insurance and life insurance. Do you need to insure you marriage?
A North Carolina insurance company is selling the "first" divorce insurance, designed to cover the costs of divorce if your marriage doesn't work out.
Nobody wants to think their marriage will end in divorce, but the fact is some 40 to 50 percent of marriages do.
That's where WedLock divorce insurance comes in. If you get divorced and the policy has matured, you send the company proof and you get cash to cover your legal and housing expenses.
"It's a novel idea. I don't propose it for my clients," Family Law Attorney Jim Billion said.
http://www.keloland.com/News/NewsDetail6376.cfm?Id=104853
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