Extra Extra: Trish Ploehn has a Clue!
Extra Extra: Trish Ploehn has a Clue!
By Joshua Allen:
The Business of Child Abuse.
News Broadcast: According to Trish Ploehn DCFS director:
“Social workers didn’t think much about education until the past few years. We kind of thought of it as the schools’ job,” said LA County Department of Children and Family Services Director Trish Ploehn. “But in LA we’re understanding that it’s not just about finding young people a safe and permanent home, but that we’re responsible for their general well-being — education included.”
Okay, so that’s taken a little out of context, the entire article and example of cutting edge journalism can be read here. http://www.pasadenaweekly.com/cms/story/detail/foster_care_learning_curve/8888/
There is so much wrong here, where to start? DCFS wasn’t aware how bad LA City schools are? Not aware how LA city and county schools were failing our children and foster children in particular? Didn’t reach out until very recently with a plan to assist foster teens to graduate and avoid being thrown out into the streets?
I wish the reporter Joel Piasecki had delved a bit more deeply into these and other questions that presented themselves. I’m not saying there is not a role for solution based journalism, but who is asking the tough questions?
Solutions beyond extolling success stories should include shedding light on the need for reform and exposure of malfeasance. There is more than enough to go around. And frankly, it is reporting that I just don’t see enough of.
Solutions include demonstrating when programs that cost tens of millions don’t work such as “Family Preservation,” considered by those in the know as a money-maker for minimally trained professionals and does little to actually keep families together or for children from ending up in the system.
DCFS is a multi-billion dollar program whose accountability needs to be called into question, and not just when a child like Viola Vanclief is killed, which is about the only time the LA Board of Supervisors gets into the act. These are the same people minus Ridley Thomas that allowed MLK Hospital to fester and kill for decades.
By now we know the horrible statistics: A huge percentage of foster teens never graduate, end up homeless after ageing out of the system, and while in school are placed in special education classes at a rate many times higher than other children.
And now thank heavens, DCFS and social workers have learned they are responsible for the “…general well-being, – education included,” of foster children.
Actually, any social worker of worth has known the above. Agency social workers in particular have epic fights with the public schools preventing throw away foster children from being placed into unnecessary special education classes, suspended without proper cause and having no parent to advocate on their behalf.
How would any child do if they were first abused, bounced around to an average of 4 homes and pulled from one therapist to another as they move from place to place? How can we expect any different from a public school system that lets down such a high percentage of children?
So for the past year or 2, County officials have now understood that Foster Teens need help within the schools? Our cup is now full! Only the problem of course is cost.
The program mentioned in the article actually seems helpful and was funded with discretionary funds from Gloria Molina of $400,000. Bravo!
The $400,000 is just a little bit more than the salaries from some of our illustrious double and triple dipping agency CEO’s for a single year.
CEO’s paid with tax dollars to work full-time in one county, who are also paid to run an agency with tax dollars to work full-time and run an agency in another county. (Um…just because you fill out time cards doesn’t mean you are working 80 hours at two jobs and besides, as far as government work is concerned, “full time,” equals a single job and a single payday. But alas as I am want to do, I quibble.
We have CEO’s and executives owning sex shops, another serially sexually harassing workers for years and trying to get the taxpayer to pick up the lawyer bill. We have CEO’s double and triple dipping in various counties, psychiatrists working part-time being paid by their board member friends several hundred grand a year. There is financial malfeasance all over the place and CEO’s who were forced out by the county allowed to mostly keep their ill-gotten gains. And agency board members with their little deals helping their friends do the above and more year after year.
Does anyone think this is acceptable? Do some of these CEO’s donate to particular candidates, or allow their agencies to be used as a political backdrop? I’d love to hear some of your stories.
I think a lot of other people would.
Joshuaallenonline.com
Joshuaallenonline@gmail.com
A Simple Trade: How a Humble Graduation Celebration for Foster Children turned into a Propaganda Coup for Scientology. Names were Taken.
A Simple Trade:
How a Humble Graduation Celebration for Foster Children turned into a Propaganda Coup for Scientology: Names were Taken.
The Business of Child Abuse:
By Joshua Allen
I first heard about this story a couple of days after the soon to be described event. I was more than a little surprised but I shouldn’t have been. The circumstances were such that I wanted to find more than a couple credible sources to confirm what can only be described as an unintelligible breach of ethics and downright stupidity by the organizers of a recent graduation celebration for foster children.
At the celebration, foster teens and a few adolescents received a donated bag filled with various sundries lotions and gift cards and as we see below, much more.
The breach took place a bit less than 2 weeks ago on Wednesday June 30th, and was by organizations that for the most part have a reputation for sincerely wanting to help graduating foster teens – but instead sent them, foster parents and ignorant administrators and CEO’s on a road paved with good intentions to the usual destination.
Surely the event organizer Pam Woods, (Ex Wife of disgraced former United Care CEO Craig Woods) and the current administrator of a group home that was forcibly split off from United Care a couple of years ago must have understood the obvious impropriety when she allowed the Headquarters of Scientology in Los Angeles to partially sponsor a graduation ceremony for foster teens at their banquet hall located within the Scientology Los Angeles compound.
The participants who were willing to speak reported that Scientologists (recognized by their uniforms among other things – you can Google it) handed out leaflets and interacted with foster parents, foster teens and foster children with nary a peep of concern or outrage from the organizers and various administrators who should have known better or at least said something at the time about what is clearly a violation of common sense, title 22 regulations and confidentiality laws regarding foster teens and foster children. Oh, and a little thing called Church and State but let’s not quibble.
One individual who would only speak off the record said, “…I was shocked when the pretty Scientologist in her blue uniform came to the podium, spoke for perhaps 20 minutes about L. Ron Hubbard and his book, and then screened a 5 or 10 minute clip of a film. The clip… depicted an abusive father who berated and verbally abused his young boy and then smashed the child’s various art work several times while growing up until finally the now older boy painted a mural which the horrible father couldn’t destroy.”
When asked about the content of this clip, others at the event confirmed the above description as true. Said another, “…It seemed inappropriate for foster children to be exposed to this… Many of the children and teens had parents who did things like this or much worse and it certainly wasn’t the time or place for such a depiction.”
After screening the clip and speaking a bit more about the success Scientology in New York had working with violent teens, the Scientologist at the podium announced a surprise for everyone in the audience.
Each and every person in the ballroom was set to receive free of charge a DVD of the entire film, a book or literature about scientology and joy of joys and absolutely free of charge!!!! an introductory class for anyone who chose to stay after the event! And some including the kids may have done just that!
To facilitate this, a blank contact list was passed around by various Scientology adherents to every adult, child and teen participating in the event asking for name, address and telephone number so that additional information can be provided at a later date. The blank lists was passed around to the various tables while the individuals encouraged everyone more than once (including the foster children) to write down their names and contact information.
Many of the foster parents who had never heard of Scientology innocently put down their contact information and allowed the foster teens whom they had brought to the graduation to do so thinking the organization (Scientology) something like the various coalitions and organizations like Boys and Girls Clubs that help foster children and teens graduate, emancipate from the system and apply for colleges, vocational schools, and independent living facilities as well as loans and grants for their continuing education.
In other words, the foster parents believed it was something that would offer material help to the foster children in a manner approved and sanctioned by DCFS, Community Care Licensing and the various group homes and foster organizations who attended.
In fact, many of the foster parents had no idea that Scientology is considered to be a religion. Some of the teens were a bit more “hip,” to this, having seen the depiction of Scientology on one of the more famous episodes of South Park.
(The author will allow the famous episode of South Park as well as numerous Google references to Scientology speak for itself should the reader have more interest in the subject matter. The reader can therefore judge for themselves if exposing vulnerable foster teens that are emancipating from the system with few possessions and even less adult guidance, received an appropriate and ethical as well as a legal tradeoff by enjoying the use of the Ballroom facility as well as receiving other free goodies for their graduation ceremonies).
And it should be noted that many of the graduating teens had their foster brothers and sisters at the celebration who were much younger and who were also provided with, and encouraged to fill out the blank contact list. This is especially disturbing.
Again, to stress, many of the foster parents allowed this to happen as they assumed the organization had been cleared to do this by their foster agencies, group homes and event organizers, and did so as they believed the foster teens and children would receive further benefits, goods and services. Something that everyone associated with foster care in Los Angeles believes is sorely lacking. One questions therefore what the Scientology Institute in Los Angeles plans to do with this information?
The foster parents, the teens, as well as many of the attendees originally arrived with an invitation that included a pleasant graphic, a date and time about the event. More than one participant was shocked when they realized the location of the event upon arrival. And even that would have been acceptable (but perhaps still questionable) had there been no proselytizing, propaganda and collection of confidential information by an organization that remains controversial to say the least.
What were Pam Wood and the other organizers thinking? One hopes that they were simply sandbagged and really had no idea but what does this say about their collective intelligence and common sense?
And think about the double standard. Imagine if at this event, (which to repeat was a graduation celebration for foster teens) a Christian organization had screened a clip about the Gospel of Jesus, passed out Christian Literature, gave out a free film that advocated for their particular denomination, and then took down contact information of everyone in the room including foster children and foster teens while offering a free class right after the event to trusting participants.
Or to add to this point, what if the Mormon Church had done this, or an Islamic organization, or a Jewish group? This is not neuroscience, although apparently certain individuals involved with this fiasco should avail themselves of such practitioners.
Or in lay terms, they should have their heads examined.
Joshuaallenonline.com
Joshuaallenonline@gmail.com
It’s not the Truth, it’s the Narrative
It’s not the Truth, it’s the Narrative.
By Joshua Allen
The Business of Child Abuse.
The County lets us know that everything is in hand. CSW’s have been given a ‘new’ tool that enables them to check every home that is in the FFA system. (The tool is a check list. I feel better, don’t you)?
Homes have been checked and rechecked, officials from state and county agencies have visited homes from the disgraced agency United Care a half-dozen times by various workers ensuring that foster children remain well cared for and that homes at FFA’s are acceptable. (The majority of Los Angeles foster homes are run directly by the county and visited less than once per month by CSW’s but don’t worry, they have the check list for them too).
Homes with other agencies have been checked much more than usual, and compliance with title 22 regulations is now ensured. Audits of agencies are now much more intensive (Hooray!). Agencies have to prove that rules are followed and that foster homes are appropriate and foster children have their needs met. (The check list again. But dat’s okay).
The county shall now require appropriate proof (beyond checking time cards) that CEO’s with little or no mental health expertise or credentials as well as family and friends are no longer on county payroll with salaries incommensurent with their duties and responsibilities. (They have always done this right? Right..? Well one can hope…) The county will ensure to the best of their ability that there is no Falsifying Time Cards which is considered fraud and has legal consequences. (“Consequences,” said the FFA. “What are those?”)
Board members (of course) shall no longer be allowed to work for agencies, vote on their on salaries and work performance, and appropriately, shall be held responsible for the mismanagment of agency funds and ethically breaching the public trust by giving contracts to themselves for unaudited services. (Uhh, sounds like a good idea right)? (Then why aren’t you doing it?!!!) What does it take to change this?
Los Angeles Board of Supervisors including Mark Ridley Thomas and Gloria Molina (and staff member Martha Molina-Aviles) will as always, perform due diligence before assisting or looking the other way for disgraced or suspect agencies such as United Care, America Care, Fred Jefferson Homes, Wings of Refuge, Homes of Hope, Hanna’s Foster Agency, Nuevo Amencer and Futuro Infantil Hispano. (There are others but you get the idea). (It’s the money stupid!)
County auditors shall continue to diligently assure when examining the above and other agencies, that no tax money is used on mostly absent executives who receive full salary despite being semi-retired, wholly involved in outside business activities, or frequently absent from the office because they can do it with impunity. (If auditors would just talk with underlings from various agencies they may learn a thing or two). It’s the money stupid.
If auditors want to interview an ‘at will’ employee to determine ethical violations or financial malfeasance, they will do so under circumstances that protects the worker from retaliation.
Any taxpayer money used for consulting services from executives of concern such as Craig Woods, Louise Fernandez, Joe Steinberg and George Gutierrez will be monitored to assure proper usage. The county will assiduously assure that any monies owed to the county by these and other agency executives be returned without preconditions. Any laws previously violated shall be prosecuted. Consulting fees shall not be used as a cover for steering foster parents to a particular agency.
Having a reputation for serially sexually harassing female employees (including settling financially with several-many-mucho-a lot) should probably be enough for the county to insist that you can no longer work with or in the vicinity of abused and neglected children. (Ya think?)
The county will admit to turning a blind eye (perhaps unintentionally) to malfeasance and strongly assure that taxpayer monies go towards the care and maintenance of abused and neglected children.
The county shall stop obsessing on “measurable goals,” in reports and “disaster plans et al… and instead ascertain how taxpayer money is being spent towards the children’s benefit. (Just like students who are taught to pass the standard test, social workers write what auditors want to see which is a win-win for everyone but the foster child. Ask any social worker if they are thinking about “measurable goals,” when they try to help foster children to the best of their abilities. Does the county really believe that requiring Social Workers to write about such things actually helps the child? Who comes up with this stuff?
Intentionally making false allegations of child abuse is a crime and will be prosecuted. The making of false allegations of child abuse by an individual with an agenda has done more damage to children placed in foster care than just about anything the author can think of. Indeed, the author cannot think of one time where an intentional false allegation has ever been prosecuted in Los Angeles.
Next: Letters from Foster Children…
Joshuaallenonline
Joshuaallenonline@gmail.com
The More Things Change…
Things I lose sleep over:
By Joshua Allen
The Business of Child Abuse.
How come some Agency CEO’s allowed to pay themselves six figures while working very little? And when office employees know this person is rarely in the office or involved in the day-to-day dealings, why do county auditors do nothing more than glance at the CEO’s time cards if there is any question?
After agencies are shut down for gross mismanagement, how come CEO’s who paid themselves millions of dollars over their term of administration are allowed to simply walk away without further consequences?
And…Why are these CEO’s allowed to continue to consult, and or work with abused and neglected children after numerous ethical breaches?
Why are agency CEO’s allowed to use taxpayer money to rent buildings and land from themselves? Why has this practice been allowed to continue? Does anyone think this is proper?
When an agency CEO has settled many-many claims of sexual harassment before reaching trial, then tried to use taxpayer money to pay attorney fees in at least 3 of these cases, then continued to serially sexually harass ladies of all types; (and within the industry this is all common knowledge), well why is he still given clearance to work around abused and neglected children?
When an agency is closed down for mismanagement and there is money left over, what happens to this money? Is it true that some CEO’s are allowed to continue on their same salary for quite some time doing very little beyond perhaps running a simple parenting class or putting on picnics for kids?
When somebody is reportedly warned that there are major problems with a foster home, does nothing, and a child dies – why are the involved individuals allowed to move on to other agencies to consult and supervise?
When a CEO brags several times in front of witnesses that a Los Angeles County Supervisor helped him personally get his agency off of administrative hold, and apparently does this without talking to the county officials who know of him and the circumstances of the hold, and then a child dies – how come the Supervisor won’t answer the question if what the CEO said was true? And if it is true, what exactly did the Supervisor do to help the CEO get his agency off of administrative hold?
Why is there seemingly never any consequences for Board Members of grossly mismanaged agencies who vote huge salaries for disgraced CEO’s, do little deals with the CEO’s, and know the whole time this is unethical if not illegal?
If the county because of a change in policy, is now substantiating a much higher percentage of child abuse allegations, what happened to all the children (before the change in policy) who were previously abused when the allegations against their abusers were incorrectly found to be unsubstantiated?
The last one haunts me the most…
Joshuaallenonline.com
Joshuaallenonline@gmail.com
Redemption
Redemption
By Joshua Allen
Dear Birth Parent,
Hey I know it wasn’t your fault for having your kids taken away. That damn social worker bitch what’s her name – she’s the real criminal. What’s a little tweaking anyways? You’re a good parent, the kids love you don’t they? They always say it when you ask.
And that judge! Who the fuck is that SOB to tell you that you need to be drug tested? The hell with those dirty tests! It’s the God damn system that destroyed your family. That judge is paid a big hunk of change to rip families apart. They all make money from messing with you.
And that mother-of-all-fights the two of you had that night. God was that a bitch of a fight or what! You were both messed up good remember? But you gave as good as you got.
But the kids weren’t touched, so what’s the big deal? God Damn neighbors ratting to the cops, I bet you know which one too. Always so nosy, asking about the kids. Who the hell was she to offer to take care of them? Why can’t people just mind their own fucking business! Lots of people do worse and they still have their kids, so why you?
They should go after the real criminals. You know the freaks that do those unspeakable things to their kids? You’ve never did anything like that. Neither did babydoll;… well he said he didn’t. Pricks, it was all lies. The middle girl was always trouble. Why did they make her lie?
What did those county assholes say? The allegation was substantiated? Unsubstantiated? Who the hell knows?
He should be getting out of the joint soon anyways. And yeah they said he’s got to stay away but they can’t really be there all the time. Man do you miss babydoll…
You love your kids, why can’t they see that? Okay so you shouldn’t have missed those visits. Especially the youngest ones birthday. Anyways she’s just 3 so she doesn’t really care about such things. But yeah, you shouldn’t have told her you’d be there, but you’ll make it up, you always do.
But why is the older one so angry?
Damn foster parent! Who the hell is she to say you can’t talk to your kids when you call any time, day or night. She’s poisoning them against you! That’s why they’re so angry. They’d probably be back with you by now if that lady hadn’t been speaking smack about you to that bitch CSW. And don’t get started again about that excuse for a human being.
Okay, it probably wasn’t too smart to yell at her those times, especially when you need your kids back. I mean you admit it, that wasn’t too smart.
But can’t they see how much the kids love you? How they cry when it’s time for you to leave the one hour weekly visit at McDonald’s?
What’s the foster parent so mad about anyways, so you missed a few visits when you were supposed to be there – the kids ate real good didn’t they? They love McDonald’s. You took them there almost every day when you had money before losing that job for tweaking during the lunch break.
Man that shit is gnarly, and yeah it was uncool to use before the baby was born. But you know better now. Next time you’re pregnant you’ll do it right. You’ll have the kids back too.
They need their mommy. Especially the baby. She’s got all sorts of problems but you’ll take her to the best doctors. You still got the Medi-Cal card, you never lost it. Doesn’t that prove something?
Anyways all that’s behind you. You’re barely using these days, not for a couple of days anyways. And you are taking your parenting classes. Haven’t missed a single one and you have the papers to prove it.
The judge said you’d get the kids back soon if you could just string together a few clean tests and your grandmother gets a bigger place. That’s what your mom did when you were a kid and you and your brothers came back home after a few months.
And when your babies come home it will be different this time. You and babydoll will do it right. No more partying. No more tweaking. And you’ll be a happy family this time.
Or not.
Joshuaallenonline.com
Joshuaallenonling@gmail.com
Community Carelessness
Community Care Licensing has announced to various foster agencies they will now be cross referencing contract social workers who work for 2 or more locations to ensure that foster care social workers will have a total of cases that does not exceed 15 foster children at any one time.
This is a relatively simple thing to do, easily done with a pencil and ledger. And while the intent is to insure that a contract social worker gives their full attention to a limited caseload there remains a significant flaw with this concept.
A contract social worker may still have many other jobs with county agencies. Therefore while a worker is limited to having 15 abused and neglected children on their caseload, other county funded jobs they may have will continue to undermine the intent of this enforcement of previous policy which was ignored for over a decade.
And why exactly was this ignored for so long? Perhaps because foster agency management as well as DCFS at all levels have a vested interest in allowing the current non-enforcement to continue as is.
The contract system is a significantly cheaper way for foster care agencies to provide case management services to foster children, allowing revenues to be diverted to higher and higher management salaries, especially the salaries of the CEO’s (as well as their assistant CEO spouses, bookkeeping family members and cousin Vinnie who is the I.T. specialist who maintains all the floppy drives).
If one examines those agencies which make the highest use of contract workers (as opposed to full-time salaried social workers) you will likely find the highest paid CEO’s and family members in the entire foster care agency system.
We know of no other way a contract social worker can survive on a living wage without having other employment. Since caseloads remain variable, income from such activity is limited to monies well below the typical salary of a kindergarten teacher. And recall the teacher has health and other benefits which the contract worker is completely lacking.
So apparently the county expects contract workers to have other jobs, just not with case managing foster children beyond a total of 15. We’re not sure therefore how this does any good and while we clearly do not advocate a social worker being allowed to burden themselves professionally to the point where they are no longer effective at their job, it would be foolish to think this new preoccupation with caseload will do anything to improve the lives of foster children.
But then that’s not the intent. The intent here is to demonstrate that the ineffective and unnecessary bureaucracy called Community Care Licensing is finally doing something to prove their worth in regulating foster agencies, guarding taxpayer finances and, oh yeah, ensuring the proper care and nurturing of abused and neglected children caught up in the system.
CCL’s position to this seems to be “Don’t worry, we looked into it, nothing to see here.” I wish this was true.
Joshua Allen
Joshuaallenonline@gmail.com
Mark Ridley Thomas: Still Waiting. Did you Do Anything to help United Care?
Did disgraced CEO Craig Woods contact you? Did you help United Care Foster Agency get off of Administrative hold before the death of Viola Vanclief?
If you made any calls or contacts on United Cares behalf, did you research first the kind of people you were helping? Did you contact county auditors, quality assurance or Anthony McDaniel’s who knew very well what was going on with this agency?
Oh, and about the remaining $200,000 that is still owed to us the taxpayer, who will pay?
Remember, United Care reached a settlement reported to be around $200,000 or over with the previous accountant in a best practices lawsuit.
However, instead of returning the money to the county, it was instead used for bonuses, the largest of which went to disgraced CEO Craig Woods. A lot of the employees interviewed had no idea why they were getting such a large bonus, larger than anything they had ever seen. Now we know it was most likely because that was the only way Woods could give a bonus to himself!
So do Woods and the Board of Directors have to make good on this still owed money? Or do they just get to slink away, as Chicky Baby says… “No harm no foul.”
By the way, what about that? Will anyone actually serve time? I know if I shoplifted a pair of shorts I would, but hey, what’s a quarter million amongst friends.
Silence speaks volumes, but well, I’m just asking. Because um, I would like to know.
So please oh please Supervisor Mark Ridlely Thomas. Tell us you were too busy planning your almost million dollar office renovations and 25 grand ads in Who’s Who in Crenshaw to have helped United Care in it’s hour of financial desperation. Desperation that caused them to overlook all sorts of things… Say it ain’t so.
PS: Oh, and I got a question for you, and it may have nothin to do with nothin…so I’m gonna ask it hypothetically.
If a guy – lets say a guy who has a contract to provide services for abused and neglected children – anyways, lets say this guy has a perfectly legal business that sells for example, sex toys, or porn, or similar stuff imported from Brazil…well what I mean is, would this guy still be allowed to have a contract to run a foster agency?
How does that all work? Because people keep asking me that.
An Inconvenient Allegation
LA Foster Care: An Inconvenient Allegation:
The Business of Child Abuse.
By Joshua Allen
On May 16 Garrett Therolf of the Los Angeles Times reported that tips made to the DCFS child abuse hotline involving over 3,700 children are taking the county more than 60 days to resolve, well over the currently extended deadline that is mandated by the state to conclude if child abuse did or did not occur.
I’ll put a link to the article here: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-child-abuse-20100516,0,213758.story and I would like to comment a bit. Since I don’t want to risk taking anything out of context it’s probably a good idea to read the whole article.
A couple things stand out, and my first thoughts stem from these quotes:
“But the work proved to be too much for the county’s 596 emergency response unit workers — up only 80 from a year ago. They are charged with investigating about 160,000 tips that arrive each year through the child abuse hotline. Since July, about 7.5% of the cases opened based on those tips remained unresolved after 60 days or more.”
And:
“The study found that evidence was often insufficient to fairly judge the situation or had been improperly gathered. Children were interviewed alone in only 66% of cases. And social workers on average spoke with fewer than two so-called collateral contacts — neighbors, friends, school officials and healthcare providers who know the children best.”
As one excuse for the dismal record of timely resolution, the county is quick to beleaguer the lack of funding resources to hire more investigators despite having a budget little changed from when the amount of abused children placed into foster care was more than double it is now. (Inflation isn’t that bad!)
I can also understand why Trish Ploehn may be uncomfortable in discussing the huge attrition rate of County Social Workers (CSW’s) that occurs every year. I’ve heard stats of up to 50% but don’t know the actual numbers. Regardless this has to be a factor in their inability to properly staff these emergency departments.
My other observation is this. Many of the abused children and collateral contacts are not being interviewed by investigators – either alone or at all – because the investigators simply don’t speak the language of the child or contact, and those who do are stretched as thin as the departments excuse as to why these factors exist in the first place.
Frequently investigators will need to coordinate a translator to accompany them, and this is not always easy. What this leads to is a lot of ad hoc translation which can’t be good when you are asking the neighbor if she ever heard loud shouts or screaming coming from that orange home down the street.
In the article, a county spokesman, Nishith Bhatt, seems to note approvingly that the department is now filing “far fewer unsubstantiated cases.” But misses out on the irony (oh I love irony!) that if true, means that hundreds, perhaps thousands of allegations of abuse and neglect that were found to be unsubstantiated (in the past) were in fact, very real instances of child abuse.
So I’m glad that the county is now evaluating the evidence better, but our joy is tempered when considering the abused children who slipped through the cracks, and who were probably abused further over time, by adults who initially got away with it.
But don’t worry, all we need to do is hire 113 more emergency workers and all will be well.
Joshuaallenonline.com
Joshuaallenonline@gmail.com
How to Succeed in the Business of Child Abuse Without Really Trying
How to Succeed in the Business of Child Abuse Without Really Trying.
LA Foster Care: The Business of Child Abuse.
By Joshua Allen.
Since the very first article and post, the author has attempted to explain how corruption, and ethical lapses, as well as governmental apathy, has led to the creation of a class of business amateurs who made their fortunes by exploiting weak, and non-existent regulations in California legal codes – and who therefore exploited weak abused and neglected children for financial gain.
The laws in question concern the creation, and running, since the mid 80’s of Foster Care Agencies designed to care for foster children. Please note, many of these agencies do a good job of caring for foster children as intended.
Regular readers will recall the intent of these agencies was to act as a sort of safety valve, when county government cannot find safe and appropriate foster homes through their own efforts. Indeed, the agencies were originally created to assist government with the care of ‘D’ rated children who suffer from difficult mental health issues, and require significant care and monitoring.
A key to understanding a lot of this stuff is that every nonprofit has to file tax returns with the state, and through GuideStar.com, you can find out things like who the Executive Director or so-call CEO, is and how much they pay themselves.
And “pay themselves” they do!
In the coming months we shall happily publish some of this information to make it a bit more readily available to those who have an interest in such things. (And even those who don’t which include the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors, who seem to wish the whole problem would just disappear).
These executive positions are needless positions, and siphon off foster care monies. Money meant for abused and neglected children. Money that for certain individuals turns abused children in gold.
One executive who prefers to remain anonymous perhaps says it best;
“When the regulations call for administrators to have certain education levels with particular experience, and certain duties to perform, and then someone with no qualifying experience gets himself appointed as the Executive Director or CEO, (with a salary higher than the administrator), and personally benefits from little deals he makes with the friends he has put on the Board, and then proceeds to tell the qualified people how the agency should be run, and brings the agency to its knees through mismanagement—well, there’s something wrong.” (Especially when you don’t like long sentences).
Unfortunately, this is exactly what afflicted such disgraced and now defunct agencies (and there are others), such as United Care, El Camino, International Foster Family Agency and Refugio Para Niño’s.
The latter two agencies were indeed run by people who had some social worker experience, but little administrative experience. And as linked to and detailed in previous posts, their greed led to stupendously idiotic salaries, waste of tax payer money, and corruption, that reached the level of millions of dollars.
That nobody was ever held accountable beyond the loss of a job, and a return of a fraction of monies, is a further disgrace. And it speaks volumes about the priorities of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.
And, in the case of United Care and El Camino Family Services, neither United Care’s disgraced CEO Craig Woods, nor the disgraced Executive Director from El Camino Family Services, Gutierrez, had more than high school degrees when they became the ultimate head of non-profit foster care organizations, with multi-million dollar budgets.
Like the others, they paid themselves salaries greatly out of proportion to similar positions from those individuals who work for ethically run charities. But then it’s not about running a charity for the greatest good, the purpose of these non-profits was wealth creation and prestige in their perspective communities. Oh, and any guess as to who is now in the foster care consulting business?
I can make a snarky comment here about just who is running the hen-house, but I’m at a loss when one considers the damage done by this money not reaching and not helping in any way abused children. So for now at least here I will leave aside the sarcasm.
There’s another issue here that I alluded to in previous posts and articles, and this must be part of anything written about unqualified people assuming positions over administrators who are qualified by education, experience, and character, with the latter being of special import, when working with a population of abused children.
There remains a huge hole in the foster care regulations that allows (i.e., the regulations don’t disallow it so it can be done), anyone to be an Executive Director and be the boss of more qualified administrators.
This loop-hole ultimately resulted in a lot of mismanagement and fraud, and the transfer of significant real estate into private hands.
However it is important to stress, that many Executive Directors do go on to do a good job. And make a real contribution towards the care and wellbeing of foster children.
Unfortunately, that is not the major theme of this piece, which is about the others who are referenced above. To go back to our former anonymous executive who says it best;
“When they started up “their” agencies as nonprofits with their own seed money (start-up costs are a non-allowable expense and therefore non-reimbursable by the state), it gave the non-profit founders the justification that it was really their business. “
So easy to forget, but it is not ‘their business.’ It is ours, the taxpayers. And this is what they ignore to their profit, and is where the problem lies. Remember, this is a nonprofit business, the purpose of which is to help abused children in any way possible. The purpose is not wealth creation, or the transfer of real estate into private hands.
All this returns us to the make-up of Boards of Directors. It is important to note right away, “Board minutes of nonprofits are open to public inspection, and must be handed over for reading within 48 hours when anyone places the request.” I doubt this occurs often but is something to consider.
At least half of the board members of Foster Agencies must be made up of individuals, who are considered by the state, and county, to be disinterested parties.
The other half of course are free to work for the agencies, set and vote on their own salaries, and I suppose, write up their own employee evaluations.
Okay, at this point I am now officially ending my moratorium on sarcasm. I have a daughter aged 12 and I know for a fact that she wishes she could do the same with her own report card.
But let’s get back to the ‘disinterested parties,’ as defined by regulation as individuals who don’t work for the agency. At agencies, “disinterested parties,” means family, friends, cohorts and cronies. Or to be clearer, Aunt Lupe, Cousin Bernie, Norm, from down the street, and that hood you went to school with. And these groups are guarding the hen-house.
Foster Care can be a horribly lonely place. Please picture this. These children are abused and neglected in their homes. They are removed; usually late at night, with all their possessions put in a garbage bag, and then sent to the home of a loving stranger, if they are reasonably lucky.
Social workers do their best to arrange proper medical care, therapy, proper education, and contact when appropriate with birth families.
And then because of the reprobates siphoning off money meant for our weakest and most deserving of aid, these damaged angels are to some degree denied the help of tutors, mentors, trips to museums, dance, karate or guitar lessons, a week or two at summer camp and fees for little league.
Good foster parents, and honestly there are a lot of them, do what they can but this money means they could do more. And they are the first people who would tell you this.
All this so Mr/Mrs Important Business Person can live in their million dollar home in West Covina, or Palm Springs, hobnob with minor and not so minor politicians, and go on talk radio aimed at their particular community, and present themselves as a tireless champion of the rights of abused and neglected children, while seeking donations.
Some of us would prefer to make our money the old fashioned way, where words like integrity, morality and ethics still have meaning.
And some of us want to write about it.
Joshuaallenonline.com
LA Foster Care: Licensing to Kill
LA Foster Care: Licensing to Kill
The Business of Child Abuse
By Joshua Allen
Sources now report that Community Care Licensing (CCL) has been conducting extensive, hours long, interviews of previous United Care administrators, supervisors and other personnel, some of whom hadn’t worked for United Care several months or longer before the death by hammer of Viola Vanclief.
What is unusual is these interviews are happening many months after the fact, something which for CCL is very rare, even when a child is dead. That they would interview an employee who hadn’t worked at the agency for more than a half-year is unheard of.
What CCL usually does is talk perfunctorily to those involved in any allegations the first week or so that it is reported, wait several more months, and then write their report that gets duly filed and uselessly buried long after the fact.
No doubt those with an axe to grind -whether legitimate or because they are a disgruntled employee- will relish the opportunity to lambaste Craig Woods and Tamara Komashko to their hearts content. And CCL will hang on every word as if they were Homeland Security. They do have something to prove at after all.
One has little confidence in the ability of CCL to properly interview the dog catcher let alone those who may have something to hide or who obfuscate their own tawdry role in the death of Viola Vanclief. (No offence to Dog Catchers who are a lot better at their job than these guys are at weeding out folks who take advantage of abused children). Speaking with CCL for 2 hours is like spending your birthday at the DMV.
These people aren’t police after all, and we haven’t found anyone in awe of their ability to ferret out truth or to do so in a timely manner. CCL is notorious for allowing investigations to fester beyond any measure of competence. And exactly who audits them?
Foster parents who are victims of false and ridiculous allegations have waited months if not years for a seal of approval. Erring on the side of the children is one of the biggest lies incompetent child care bureaucrats use when excusing themselves from acting in a professional manner.
A private responsible firm would be able to do their job in one tenth the time, do it cheaper, and would not be subject to public union foolishness if somebody doesn’t do their job properly. A further belief is that murderous foster parents like Barker (allegedly) would be separated out quickly as well as other foster parents who shouldn’t be allowed near their own children let alone those who are abused and neglected.
CCL is in hyper derriere-covering mode since they originally allowed the foster parent to be certified despite being the proud owner of a substantiated allegation of child abuse towards her own child, and a conviction for theft in 2002.
What exactly was CCL thinking when this report came across their desk? Let me guess, (”5:00, time to go home. I’ll just throw it in this box.”)
No these retired-in-place champions of abused children are not the FBI. Undoubtedly the individual who messed up and made their own small contribution towards Viola’s death will be written up with a note placed on their permanent record. Well, actually we’re not so sure.
CCL should be abolished and their audits assigned to private sector investigators who have an economic incentive to be competent, and are subject to a bit more than a one day suspension if they fail in their job. Frankly, any private sector firm or individual would have been fired and possibly prosecuted had they allowed some of this stuff to continue.
Remember, these are the same people who in the past called Foster Care Agencies and told them in advance which files they planned to look over the next week when they strolled on by for their audits. (You see it saves time if the files are already out and waiting).
Not that Woods and Komashko don’t have much to answer for as clever readers can ascertain. The belief of course (and currently unproven we must admit), is that that Ms. Komashko (and in extension Craig Woods) was warned several times in advance that Viola’s foster home was unacceptable, that foster parent Barker was nuts (to use a clinical term) and that Barker not only lied about living with a convicted felon, but that both Kamoshko and Woods knew about this and hoped a self-serving signed and written promise would be enough if the convicted felon ever acted out or harmed Viola. The latter stretches credibility to a breaking point.
Komashko is reported to have brought foster parent Barker over to United Care from her previous employment at a now defunct foster agency called Hollygrove and apparently, Barker was never properly vetted or examined before she was certified by her new agency United Care.
Remember, United Care was hurting from the administrative hold and dying on the vine when the warnings from the foster care social worker first passed before their glazed eyes. Actually, Barker was assigned other FCSW’s before the last one, and one wonders what they have to say.
The point is, and must be asked, how much did they feel they needed the bed space and the money that it provided?
What was reported to this site (Joshuaallenonline.com) is this; and although the numbers aren’t exact they are close. There is something like 5,700 abused and neglected children under the care of Agencies with Los Angeles County and something like 768 allegations within this group that are yet to be fully investigated or adjudicated. The county and state has now in its wisdom decided to take a close look at these allegations.
No doubt many-many of these allegations are bogus IE: stuff from angry child abusing birth parents or more understandably, devastated children who just want to go home, and some of the allegations are true.
Why though, does it take 6 months or longer to find out? What other word besides ‘outrageous’ can we use here? Unprofessional? Bureaucratic? And why did it take the death of a toddler to jump kick this belated diligence?
I can think of a few reasons.
Joshuaallenonline.com
Joshua Allen Online 