UPDATE OF THE
FULL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF THE
CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES
Timeliness of Child Abuse Investigations Continues to Improve, but Variations
Among Counties Remain
OFFICE OF LEGISLATIVE AUDITOR
Performance Evaluation and Research Division
Building 1, Room W-314
State Capitol Complex
CHARLESTON, WEST VIRGINIA 25305
(304) 347-4890
Despite these improvements, the percentage of cases that had interviews between 15 and 90 days has been virtually constant at close to 20% in the last three years reviewed. Furthermore, several counties in the 1998 sample did not obtain the 14-day standard in 30% of their cases. Table 1 shows the average number of days it took to conducted interviews with alleged victims in cases where the interviews were beyond 14 days. In 1995, nearly 30% of the cases had face-to-face contact with alleged victims well after 14 days. The average time in these cases was 117 days. This has dropped substantially over the last three years. For 1998 cases, the average is 25 days. However, there were several cases that took between 40 to 76 days to finally interview alleged victims. On an individual basis, Mercer county took an average of 34 days when it exceeded the 14-day criteria. Although the risk of children being further abused has declined over the last three years because of improved response time, there still is reason to be concerned.
Table 1 The Average Time of Interviews When They Exceed 14 Days | |||
1995 Cases | 1996 Cases | 1997 Cases | 1998 Cases |
117 Days | 32 Days | 37 Days | 25 Days |
Source: From samples of CPS cases. |
Individual Results of 1998 Cases
The 1998 sample included seven counties that were reviewed in the 1997 case sample. These seven counties were selected for this audit update because they had the lowest response time in either CPS or APS in the 1997 sample. These seven counties are Jackson, Mercer, Monongalia, Preston, Putnam, Summers, and Taylor. In addition to these seven counties, five new counties were systematically selected that have never been reviewed by the the Legislative Auditor's Office. The counties are Brooke, Harrison, Mingo, Raleigh, and Randolph. The purpose for reviewing these new counties is to determine if the recommendations of the original audit are being implemented statewide as opposed to only the counties that were reviewed in previous reviews. Tables 2 and 3 provide a comparison of the counties with the lowest response time in the 1997 audit with the results of the 1998 sample.
Table 2 1997 CPS Cases: Counties With Lowest Response Time | ||||
County | Interviews Within 14 Days | Interviews Between 15 an 90 Days | Interviews over 90 Days | Cases Without Face-to-Face Interviews |
Jackson* | 75.0% | 25.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Mercer | 57.1% | 42.9% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Monongalia* | 87.1% | 12.9% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Preston | 44.4% | 44.4% | 11.1% | 0.0% |
Putnam | 66.7% | 29.2% | 0.0% | 4.2% |
Summers* | 96.0% | 4.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Taylor | 27.3% | 31.8% | 18.2% | 22.7% |
* Selected to be evaluated based on their low response times in the 1997 APS sample. |
As Tables 2 and 3 indicate, the counties reviewed last year showed significant improvement or maintained good performance the following year. The only exception was Mercer county which had a relatively low response time in both years. The greatest improvement occurred in Putnam, Taylor and Preston counties.
Table 3 1998 CPS Cases | ||||
County | Interviews Within 14 Days | Interviews Between 15 an 90 Days | Interviews over 90 Days | Cases Without Face-to-Face Interviews |
Jackson | 87.1% | 12.9% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Mercer | 65.7% | 31.4% | 0.0% | 2.9% |
Monongalia | 91.2% | 8.8% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Preston | 83.5% | 16.7% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Putnam | 93.9% | 6.1% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Summers | 88.5% | 11.5% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Taylor | 82.6% | 17.4% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Review of Five New Counties Is Mixed
Table 4 contains the results of the sample of 1998 cases for Brooke, Harrison, Mingo, Raleigh, and Randolph counties. For Mingo county, over 90% of the cases were within 14 days of the referral. Harrison county had interviews within 14 days of referrals in nearly 85% of its cases. However, Brooke, Raleigh, and Randolph counties conducted face-to-face interviews beyond 14 days in nearly a third of their cases.
Table 4 1998 CPS Cases: Response Time of New Counties | ||||
County | Interviews Within 14 Days | Interviews Between 15 an 90 Days | Interviews over 90 Days | Cases Without Face-to-Face Interviews |
Brooke | 69.0% | 31.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Harrison | 84.8% | 15.2% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Mingo | 91.2% | 8.8% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Raleigh | 68.6% | 31.4% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Randolph | 70.0% | 30.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
Slow Response Times In Some Counties
In general, the results from the sample of 1998 cases show improvement in response times for several counties. However, four counties (Brooke, Mercer, Raleigh and Randolph) had difficulties meeting the 14-day time standard in nearly a third of their cases. This has been true for Mercer county in the sample of 1997 and 1998 cases. Table 5 shows the average number of days these four counties took to conduct face-to-face interviews when they exceeded the 14-day time standard.
Table 5 The Average Time of Interviews When They Exceeded 14 Days 1998 Cases | |||
Brooke | Mercer | Raleigh | Randolph |
25 Days | 34 Days | 28 Days | 26 Days |
Source: From a sample of 1998 CPS cases. |
Of the four counties that had relatively slow response times in the sample of 1998 cases, Mercer and Randolph identified the lack of staff as part of the problem. The Community Service Manager for Mercer county wrote the following in response to his county's 1998 performance:
During the period of time (1998) of this review the Mercer District was short CPS Intake staff. We had just hired a new CPS worker the end of November 1997. As it took several months to train her in all aspects of CPS we could assign few referrals to her. This left us short the first half of 1998. In addition, we lost a CPS worker in August 1998 and did not get to replace her until November leaving us short the second half of 1998.
In regard to CPS, the statistics show that when the Randolph/Tucker District is fully staffed, we are only at 51% of case load standards which were determined Pre-FACTS....and FACTS has only served to be an added clerical burden to my staff. As you can see from page 1 of the chart, under Factors, we were often short at least one worker, which would mean we were operating at 44% of case load standards. As a matter of fact, by September, 1998, we had 4 of 7 workers in CPS with less than 1 year of experience.
Table 6 shows the number of allocated CPS positions compared to the number of filled positions. Eight of the twelve counties in the sample had at least one vacant position, of which five had two or more unfilled positions. Although Putnam county is listed as having no vacant positions, it had two vacancies during 1998 before they were filled. For several counties to have one or more vacancies only hinders the agency's ability to provide effective child protection.
Although vacant CPS positions may impact the agency's ability to be effective, it does not appear that it is a primary factor. A correlation analysis was conducted on the number of vacant positions for each local office and the local office's rate of compliance with the 14-day standard. The correlation coefficient equaled -0.202. The sign was appropriate, indicating that compliance suffers when vacancies increase. However, the correlation is relatively low. This suggests that there are other factors that influence the rate of compliance for local offices. These other factors include management controls, staff turnover, travel time needed to contact children, etc.
Table 6 Allocated & Filled Positions Child Protective Services | |||
CPS Positions | |||
County | Allocated | Filled | Vacant |
Brooke | 8 | 7 | 1 |
Harrison | 12 | 9 | 3 |
Jackson | 5 | 5 | 0 |
Mercer | 15 | 13 | 2 |
Mingo | 8 | 6 | 2 |
Monongalia | 10 | 7.5 | 2.5 |
Preston | 4 | 4 | 0 |
Putnam | 7 | 7 | 0 |
Raleigh | 17 | 15 | 2 |
Randolph | 7 | 6 | 1 |
Summers | 2 | 2 | 0 |
Taylor | 9 | 8 | 1 |
Allocated and filled positions as of December 31, 1998. |
Investigation Process Continues to Improve
The review of 1998 cases found that the agency has increase the use of the Child at Risk
Field System (CARF). Part of this system includes an Initial Assessment instrument (CPS-2).
This instrument is important because it assists the agency in making objective conclusions as to
what action should be taken by DHHR in a case. The review of 1995 cases in the original
report indicated that only 56% of the cases used the Initial Assessment
instrument. The sample of 1998 cases shows approximately 98% of the cases had
the Initial Assessment instrument (see Table 7).
Table 7 County Performance Regarding the Completion of Initial Assessments | |||
County | Percentage of Cases With Initial Assessments | County | Percentage of Cases With Initial Assessments |
Brooke | 0.966 | Preston* | 0.900 |
Harrison | 1.000 | Randolph | 1.000 |
Monongalia | 1.000 | Taylor* | 0.913 |
Jackson | 1.000 | Mercer | 1.000 |
Mingo | 1.000 | Raleigh* | 0.971 |
Putnam | 1.000 | Summers | 1.000 |
* These counties are in the Family Options Initiative pilot project. They follow a different process that in some cases may not require the use of the Initial Assessment instrument. |
A case is either tracked into A, B, or C at the point of intake. If it is tracked A, it is assigned to a CPS worker to complete a full initial assessment and safety analysis. If it is tracked B, it is assigned to a CPS worker for completion of a safety check. If it is tracked C, it is given directly to a Community Provider with whom a letter of agreement exists to complete a short term service needs assessment and no more than 60 days of service provision. Upon completion of the service provision by the Track C Community Provider, a report form and billing invoice are submitted to the local CPS Supervisor.
Table 8 Family Options Initiative Budget & Expenditures | |||||
Fiscal Year | Budget | Total Expenditures | Personal Service & Benefits | Current Expenses | Services |
1996 | $899,500 | $429,881 | $241,693 | $122,942 | n/a |
1997 | $899,500 | $636,556 | $478,749 | $112,113 | $42,261 |
1998 | $899,500 | $640,441 | $473,492 | $124,765 | $42,184 |
1999* | $899,500 | $803,444 | $509,939 | $202,384 | $91,120 |
*Expenditures for 1999 are projected. Source: Department of Health and Human Resources, Bureau for Children and Families. |
Table 9 Performance of Counties Involved in the Family Options Initiative Percent of Cases In Compliance with the 14-day Standard | |||
1996 Cases | 1997 Cases | 1998 Cases | |
Barbour | 54.5% | ||
Preston | 44.4% | 83.5% | |
Raleigh | 68.6% | ||
Taylor | 27.3% | 82.6% |