Texas’ protective services agency plans to outsource case management

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The new chief of Texas’ protective services agency hinted at modifications Friday that the agency can have to make because it continues transitioning towards a brand new approach of managing foster youngsters’s circumstances.

Department of Family and Protective Services Commissioner Stephanie Muth, who started her tenure a couple of month in the past, advised lawmakers writing a brand new two-year state funds that the agency can have completely different wants because it strikes into the brand new system of outsourcing case management services to nonprofits.

Implementation of the brand new method, known as community-based care, started about six years in the past however continues to be not absolutely in place. It was adopted in 2017 and is supposed to preserve foster youngsters nearer to house whereas they’re in state care. It is presently used solely in components of three of the agency’s 11 regional service areas, and there are plans to introduce it to extra areas throughout the subsequent two-year state funds cycle, in accordance to a map shared during Friday’s meeting.

The change will seemingly require fewer in-house case employees. It can even require a unique agency mindset, Muth mentioned at Friday’s Senate Finance Committee listening to.

“We’re in two worlds,” Muth mentioned. “We have the legacy world, we have the CBC world. We know how to operate the legacy world — that’s our comfort zone. But as you look at moving to community-based care, it’s very different skillsets that we need as an agency.”

Muth mentioned meaning pondering extra about managing contracts with third events and fewer about staffers managing circumstances.

“You have to have contractual expertise, you have to have financial expertise and we need to start building that into our DNA so that we are equally comfortable operating in a CBC world as we are in a legacy world,” she mentioned.

Muth’s feedback got here because the agency laid out its funds requests for the following biennium, the two-year interval that the state funds covers. It was the primary of many conferences that can occur within the coming months. The funds listening to arrived as DFPS stays gripped in a lawsuit that has already price tens of millions whereas the agency retains attempting to implement modifications in the way it cares for teenagers ordered by a federal choose six years in the past.

While DFPS plans to increase community-based care, it seems it’ll proceed at a gradual tempo. There’s a objective to have half of the state’s geographic areas utilizing that mannequin by the top of fiscal 12 months 2023. But that can nonetheless cowl solely about one-third of the inhabitants needing care, Muth mentioned.

George Cannata, who oversees the DFPS transitioning workplace, advised lawmakers it may take six extra years to roll out this system, which has not but been carried out in a few of the state’s main city areas, together with Houston.

Sen. Charles Perry, R-Lubbock, requested Cannata why it might take that lengthy.

“I’m not mad at you, I’m not upset with you — I need to fully understand the complexities that you’ve put to pencil and said, ‘It’s going to be six years,’” Perry mentioned. “I just need to fully understand why because that doesn’t make sense to me now.”

Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, famous that full rollout of this system was initially estimated for the early 2030s.

“I appreciate your admission that we probably have not refocused the agency to become more of a contractual agency,” Kolkhorst mentioned. “You can be retrained. Doesn’t mean we’re getting rid of everybody at DFPS. It’s a different approach.”

Among different requests Muth made to lawmakers throughout a presentation Friday have been retention bonuses to assist triage an exodus of staff. That was as well as to proposed raises presently included within the Senate’s present draft funds. DFPS additionally needs to fund grasp investigators who would assist with a backlog of inquiries of neglect and abuse.

The agency’s turnover amongst entry-level investigators is at an all-time excessive fee, exceeding 60%, Muth mentioned.

“The high level of turnover — there’s really like a hole in the bucket,” Muth defined in response to a query of the difficulty’s influence. “It’s a drain on the capacity overall that you have available in your system when you’re constantly training and deploying new workers.”