TExAs DEPARTMENT OF FAMILY AND PRoTEcTivE SERvIcEs

COMMISSIONER

H. L. Whitman. Jr.

October 20, 2016

The Honorable Greg Abbott

Office of the Governor
P. 0. Box 12428
Austin, Texas 78711-2428
The Honorable Dan Patrick
Lieutenant Governor
P. 0. Box 12068
Austin, Texas 787 11-2068
The Honorable Joe Straus
Speaker of the House
P. 0. Box 2910
Austin, Texas 78768-29 10
Dear Governor Abbott, Governor Patrick, and Speaker Straus:
Thank you for your letter of October 12. Your support of our agency, and the needs of Texas
children across the state, is greatly appreciated. We have made substantive progress on Child
Protective Services (CPS) Transformation and toward achieving the benchmarks of my 10-point
plan that was released in July. However, it is important to make clear that my expectations are
not being met.
Texas children remain at risk. This is unacceptable.
In response, I have ordered my staff to enhance our current improvement efforts into a point-bypoint plan that can effectively and quickly address the urgent needs facing children in crisis. One
of our most pressing challenges is the substantial increase in CPS investigations. The state has
seen a ten-percent increase since 2014. For this reason, the plan must be flexible to meet higher
intakes and the need for more placements of children into state care.
And lastly, the plan must acknowledge that while the protection and care of children is a state
responsibility, each child also belongs to a community and a congregation. For protection efforts
to ever truly take root, engaging the faith community must be etched into our blueprint for
success.
W.51s STREET, P. 0.
701 T

Box 149030,

AusTIN, TEXAS 78714-9030 (512)438-4800

An Equal Opportunity Employer and Provider

The Honorable Greg Abbott

The Honorable Dan Patrick
The Honorable Joe Straus
October 20, 2016
Page 2

Here is our specific response to the issues raised on your letter:

Develop a plan, including a strategic hiring and training schedule, which will ensure the
Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) is staffing an increased number of the
necessary caseworkers to account for the increase in workload and system backlog of
serving children and families. In addition, DFPS should prioritize these hires in the most
critical regions across the state.
The agency will hire an additional 200 investigative caseworkers for CPS. The primary
purpose of an investigation is to ensure the safety of children. In doing so, investigators
determine whether abuse or neglect has occurred, assess whether a child may be at risk of
abuse or neglect in the future; refer children and families to services to reduce the risk of
abuse and neglect and enhance the well-being of the family, or recommend that a child be
removed from their home.
CPS is struggling to meet the timeframes for initial contact and timely case closure in the
following regions: 3 (Dallas/Ft. Worth), 6a (Harris County), and 7 (Travis). The additional
staff resources will be targeted to those areas to improve timely face-to-face initiation of an
investigation and case closure.
The increase in investigators will allow more children to be seen on time, but will also ensure
that children who have sadly never been seen will finally be contacted. These additional
children, in many cases, will need to have services provided or will need to be removed from
their homes. To address this downstream impact, the agency will hire and train an
additional 145 Family Based Safety Services (FBSS) caseworkers and 105 Conservatorship
(CVS) caseworkers. Table 1 below shows how an increase in the number of intakes assigned
for investigations can result in an increase in the number of FBSS cases and/or CVS cases.

Table 1
Changes in Cases and Caseworkers from FY2014 to FY2016
Region
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
State

Change In Intakes
Assigned for INV
6%
8%
13%
2%
4%
13%
11%
10%
9%
2%
6%
10%

Change in Case
Carrying Staff
10%
-2%
-6%
-3%
4%
8%
17%
20%
12%
11%
-3%
6%

Change in New
FBSS Cases
-2%
10%
11%
8%
26%
8%
35%
3%
-12%
10%
-6%
7%

Change in Case
Carrying Staff
-14%
7%
-3%
0%
-24%
-3%
-21%
-4%
-5%
31%
-13%
-6%

Change In New
CVS Cases
19%
63%
4%
16%
19%
10%
10%
-1%
12%
-19%
-3%
8%

Change in Case
Carrying Staff
-1%
-2%
0%
3%
-6%
-16%
6%
2%
2%
11%
10%
-1%

The Honorable Greg Abbott

The Honorable Dan Patrick
The Honorable Joe Straus
October 20, 2016
Page 3

Develop a plan to hire and train more special investigators, building on their law
enforcement backgrounds and utilizing the safety and risk assessment tools available to find
the children that the agency has been previously unable to locate. This will assist in reducing
the backlog of initial face-to-face visits.
To assist with the investigations and help locate children and their families, the agency will
hire an additional 100 CPS Special Investigators (SIs) to add to the current total of 179. With
their law enforcement background, SIs are uniquely positioned to help with the most
complex and serious investigative cases and when a child or family cannot be located.
The additional staff will be strategically placed in those areas of the state where need is the
highest. Table 2 below shows which regions and caseworker stage will be the focus of the
agencys efforts.
Table 2
CPS Direct Delivery Staff
Region
2
3
5
6
7
8
Total

INV
-

83
-

53
64
-

200

SI

FBSS

40

41

40
10
10
100

60
23
21
145

CVS
20
16
-

69
-

105

Total
20
164
16
153
166
31
550

As part of the plan, CPS will transform its business practices to improve child safety,
permanency, and well-being outcomes. New models for investigation will be implemented.
These will include:
> repurposing units to modified work schedules to better meet seven-day demands by having
investigators work four 10-hour days with overlapping schedules;
implementing a team approach that allows two investigators to locate and interview children
and families; and
consolidating SIs under one line of supervision.
CPS also will continue to improve their identification of local performance issues with the use of
regional information analysts and monitoring through the use of quarterly business reviews.
The agency will hire a total of 550 additional front-line investigators, Special Investigators, and
caseworkers. In support of those staff, the agency also will hire 279 staff to provide supervision,

The Honorable Greg Abbott

The Honorable Dan Patrick
The Honorable Joe Straus
October 20, 2016
Page 4

support, hiring, and training. The total cost to the State for fiscal year 2017 is $53.3 million in all
funds including benefits for state employees of $7.9 million all funds.

Reinforce the culture of accountability at all levels of management by inspiring your

worlcforce to rise to the challenge and embrace the commitment to the safety and risk
assessment tools as an aid in their critical decision making.
The agency will continue to implement initiatives to improve supervision such as
establishing new regional directors in some areas, new hiring practices to screen supervisor
candidates for competencies before interview process, newly developed supervision training
model, and revised performance plans for all levels of management.

Build upon your ongoing efforts to enhance more partnerships with local faith-based
communities. Their assistance in recruiting amazing families is mission critical, and we need
their support within the child welfare community now more than ever.

The agency will continue to build on the successes of coordinating with faith-based
communities by working with congregations and their members to help with outreach,
prevention and the recruitment of foster and adoptive parents. The agency also will continue
reaching out to faith communities to host support groups, collect donations for emergency
resource rooms, and offer foster and adoption information sessions. DFPS and faith
communities have begun looking at new opportunities for congregations and their members
to provide respite care and other services to children in foster care. The Faith Leader Summit
on November 2 will be another opportunity to discuss how congregations around the state
can support children and families involved with CPS.
DFPS has developed a Faith-Based Work Plan that outlines the agencys efforts to bolster
engagement with the faith community. The plan includes: setting, monitoring, and tracking
progress of statewide and regional goals; producing a monthly report on the outcome
measures of faith-based engagement; and developing training for regional faith-based
specialists to engage faith communities.
A new Faith-Based Director position has been created to develop, implement, and monitor
programs designed to increase the number of faith-based communities involved in activities
to promote child abuse prevention, prevent removals of children from families, promote and
support foster care, and increase permanency. The position will act as the CPS lead and
liaison to faith-based activities and ministries and will supervise the faith based specialists
placed across the state.

The Honorable Greg Abbott

The Honorable Dan Patrick
The Honorable Joe Straus
October 20, 2016
Page 5

In the coming weeks, develop an innovative plan as to how the agency and high-quality
providers can partner in solving this (capacity) challenge. We have faith that there are
opportunities available if we call upon the many Texans who have expressed their
commitment to lend a hand.
Building high quality foster care capacity that best meets the needs of children in foster care
remains a high priority. CPS has seen an increase in the number of children without
placement. The result of this capacity issue is that the agency must enter into expensive
child-specific contracts with providers that are not the best setting for childrens needs, or
have children spend extended time sleeping in CPS offices, hotels, or emergency shelters.
The number of available placements for our highest-needs children are also limited by a federal
court ruling that prohibits children from being placed in foster group homes that do not have
24-hour awake supervision. DFPS also has lost several hundred residential treatment center beds
due to facility closures or poor performance.
In the coming weeks, DIPS will submit a plan that addresses both the short-term needs of
available placements plus a long-term plan to build capacity.
Let me reiterate my appreciation for your support during this very difficult period for child
protection in our state. I am aware of the tremendous responsibility you have placed on my
shoulders and pledge all I have to give to you, to the citizens of Texas, and most of all to our
children.
Sincerely,

H. L. Whitman, Jr.