County Shuts Down Latino Family Unit
Social workers assigned to the one-time model program are redeployed to other divisions.
By Paul Aranda, Jr., EGP Staff Writer
Last Friday marked the final day for a group of Los Angeles County social workers assigned to provide Latinos with community-based and culturally-sensitive family preservation services.
On March 12, social workers from the Latino Family Preservation Program (LFPP) were reassigned to the County’s emergency response units, a move that brought an end to a unique program that has serviced the East Los Angeles and Boyle Heights community for the past 18 years.
The shutdown of the model program came as administrators with the County’s Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) set out to decrease the average caseload for its social workers. The department also shut down the Black Family Preservation Program.
In 2009, several high-profile child deaths highlighted issues over the way the department handled cases of child abuse. On July 18, 2009, four-year-old Lars Sanchez was stabbed to death in the 300 block of Vista Place in Highland Park. The boy’s mother, Yolanda Tijerina, 43, took her own life soon after killing her son. The murder-suicide gained more attention after it was found that the principal at Lars’ preschool had contacted the County child abuse hotline nine months prior to report the mother’s erratic behavior. Social workers with LFPP were not involved in the Sanchez case because the family did not reside in the program’s district. Whether their involvement would have made a difference is hard to say, but chances are that their mode of operation which calls for a social worker to stay with a case from first intake or contact, through the investigation and to provide on-going monitoring, may have “made it harder for a case like this to fall through the cracks,” said a member of the team who has been redeployed and asked not to be named.
County social workers with LFPP were trained to use a comprehensive strategy, including partnerships with various community-based organizations, to meet the culture-specific and language needs of Latino families,
In July of 1991, the County Board of Supervisors, wanting to meet the unique service needs of Latinos in the foster care system, approved the funding for the DCFS to develop and implement LFPP. The Office of Supervisor Gloria Molina (1st District) pioneered the program’s initial development. A special task force comprised of various Latino children and family welfare advocates designed the program’s procedures.
The small unit was assigned to service an area in unincorporated East Los Angeles and Boyle Heights where there was a large concentration of Latino families involved in DCFS and the dependency court system, and a high rate of juvenile court interventions.
LFPP social workers focused their efforts on strategies to strengthen families where cases of abuse, neglect or risk to safety were reported. Social workers were given expanded roles from traditional social workers within the DCFS. For example, a LFPP social worker would handle both the initial intake caseload as well as the continued follow-up caseload for a particular family. This allowed the social worker more time to identify the needs of the family and see that its specific needs were addressed, such as food and clothing assistance. LFPP social workers partnered with local community-based organizations to make referrals for mental health services, parenting classes and other family resources.
Alan Clayton, director of the Chicano Employee Association (CEA), said the program’s social workers carried fewer caseloads than their traditional counterparts because of their increased role with each family. In a memo dated February 18, Roberta Medina, regional administrator for DCFS Service Bureau 1, stated that the changes were the result of, among other things, the small caseloads of LFPP staff.
According to Medina, as of December 2009, DCFS had successfully reduced each social worker’s caseload from 2,500 to 2,000 children. Medina said DCFS has established a threshold goal of 18 cases for staff with emergency response files and 24 cases for staff with generic files.
Medina stated that an internal study concluded that over 300 social workers would be needed to meet the department-wide reduction goal. Given the current budget issues faced at all levels of government and the amount of time it would take to train new staff, the department decided to reevaluate if it was making efficient use of its resources. The study found that LFPP cases had dropped significantly as of January 2010. A redeployment of the staff would help achieve its general goal to reduce caseloads for workers.
Clayton said he is upset that the department’s executive team did not sit down with LFPP staff to see if there was a way for the program to remain operational.
“The bottom line is that the employees were willing to work with management,” Clayton said. “But in the end, the executive team made a decision and that was it.”
Clayton said several proposals from the employees were disregarded. The employees suggested that the program be expanded throughout the region and they called for a revision of the program’s referral criteria. Clayton went on to compare the efforts the employees made to compromise with management to those of a homeowner who complies with all the requests of a bank for a home loan modification application only to be denied because a decision was made before the process had even begun.
“It’s outrageous that they shut the program down,” Clayton said. He went on to say that he found it more troubling that a management team that includes no Latinos amongst its members would choose to eliminate the only program that provided specific services for local families in need of culturally sensitive and competent services that might not be widely available outside the program.
“My main concern is with management getting rid of a program that greatly benefits Latinos,” he said. “There are so many areas in the County where Latinos could receive better services and this program met one of those.”
Clayton said previous attempts to work cordially with management proved to be unproductive. He said the next step is to initiate contact with local state legislatures to highlight the program’s benefits for their constituents. Clayton said legislators provide the County with significant state funds to run the department so they may be concerned to learn that LFPP was eliminated. Despite his criticism of DCFS management team, Clayton was quick to state that he does not believe the programs elimination will directly hurt Latino families.
“We’re not charging that Latinos will be worse off,” Clayton said. “There is a difference between a decision that creates a disaster versus a decision that can make a program better.”
“[LFPP] was really nice for Latinos.”
Print This Post
March 18, 2010 Copyright © 2010 Eastern Group Publications, Inc.
Comments
One Response to “County Shuts Down Latino Family Unit”
Feel free to leave a comment.... but for your safety, please do not post personal information such as home addresses and phone numbers. If you would like to contact us directly or give us your contact information another way, you can call our office number at (323) 341-7970 or email us at editorial@egpnews.com.
We Are the Largest Chain of Hispanic Owned Bilingual Newspapers in the U.S.
Eastside Sun / Northeast Sun / Mexican American Sun / Bell Gardens Sun / City Terrace Comet / Commerce Comet / Montebello Comet / Monterey Park Comet / ELA Brookyln Belvedere Comet / Wyvernwood Chronicle / Vernon Sun
55.5%
This is the percentage of children under the supervision of DCFS are Latino. There is no one advocating or asking the right questions.
This was a model program that challenged and questioned DCFS’ delivery of services to prevent child abuse and out-of-home care. DCFS never supported this program.
There were many staff that are no longer with us that took pride and courage to work in this program. Social workers like John Serrano, Armando Cortez, David Gomez, and Margarita Mendez were social workers that convinced me to go to work for the last 18 years.
I am not mad but I am very disappointed that no one but Alan Clayton assisted us in challenging DCFS’ insensitive decision.