Cuts in child services restored

Facing a threat of legal action, the state’s Department of Social and Health Services announced Tuesday it will spend as much money as needed in the next six weeks to ensure the “health, safety and well-being” of children.

The agency made the announcement just days after receiving a letter from child-welfare attorneys who warned they may ask a court to intervene if more than $3.4 million in recent cuts to programs for children are not immediately suspended and reviewed.

The agency declined to say how much money can be spent by officials in the Children’s Administration to reinstate the cuts, which were made in an effort to bridge a projected $12 million shortfall in the agency’s budget.

“It is not a fixed dollar amount,” said Cheryl Stephani, assistant secretary for children’s services. “If you need a service to be in place to protect the health, safety and well-being of kids, you don’t have to worry about the budget shortfall.”

But many of the cuts have already taken a toll, and the announcement raised the question of whether it is fiscally sound or even practical to reinstate the programs for the remainder of the fiscal year, which ends on June 30. Next year’s contracts will be independently reviewed to determine if they are effective and may not be renewed, Stephani said.

Ken Kraft, regional administrator for children’s services, said he did not anticipate that any of the $520,000 in contracts that were cut in Eastern Washington would be restored.

“By the time you get through the paperwork, it would be July 1,” Kraft said.

Jon Gould, deputy director of the Children’s Agency, a nonprofit advocacy group, said he has not received any information on which programs will be reinstated.

“DSHS is being extremely cagey about what this means,” Gould said. “Our perception is that the (agency) is using the short-term deficit as cover to end services that they may not favor. What happened to the commitment to collaborative decision-making?”

The announcement was the latest turn in the ongoing troubles for the Children’s Administration, which has been accused of financial mismanagement and haunted by a string of high-profile child deaths. In April, agency head Uma Ahluwalia resigned after 19 months on the job when the budget problem became widely known.

Stephani declined to confirm or deny that the projected deficit was actually $16 million – a figure cited in a May 20 letter from the nonprofit law firm Columbia Legal Services.

This month, child-welfare advocates criticized the administration and threatened court action after state leaders quietly slashed millions of dollars in contracts that provide support services to children and families.

In Spokane, the agency cut $62,000 in funding to Sally’s House, a center for foster children that is run in conjunction with the Salvation Army. The agency also severed a contract with the Foster Parent Association of Washington, which for 25 years provided support to families caring for troubled children in the state’s child welfare system.

The agency also restricted travel and administrative expenditures to pare down the budget.

The reductions, which disproportionately hit programs in Eastern Washington, caught the attention of attorneys involved in the Braam settlement, a landmark six-year lawsuit that promised dramatic reforms in Washington’s child-welfare system.

On May 20, those attorneys warned the state that they were “very near to seeking the court’s intervention if the budget cuts are not suspended until a full and complete review of them can be completed.”

The attorneys attached a 17-item request for state records surrounding the decision to cut the programs. The attorneys allege the cuts affected programs that provided mental-health treatment, support services to foster families and children, and educational programs.

“These actions will result in a substantial departure from professional standards,” the attorneys wrote.

The letter stated the agency had previously reported that approximately $600,000 in funds would be available to reinstate some of the cuts.

On Tuesday, Stephani said the figure was not correct.

“You want to get a number, and I don’t have a number,” Stephani said. “It is whatever service array needs to be in place to meet the health, safety and well-being of children.”

Stephani said state leaders also “expect the regional administrators to be fiscally prudent in making those decisions.”