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DCF pullout here puts savings over service

The Florida Department of Children and Families equates downsizing to dumping the work on others. And that's only if you can solve the mystery of who the others are.

DCF is abandoning a vulnerable population in Pasco County with its ill-advised plan to shut its Dade City office early next year. The state expects so-called community partners to pick up the slack and assist clients seeking to apply for food stamps, Medicaid and cash assistance.

But, the anticipated workload is so severe, the 18 community partners in east Pasco want to remain secret. They serve only their own clients and fear their staffs will be overwhelmed with requests for help from the general public.

The alternative, DCF says, is for people to apply for benefits online. Apparently, the state's social service agency forgot which population it serves.

"There are pockets of poverty that need access to these services," said state Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa, whose district includes east Pasco. "A number of these individuals don't have transportation and they are not computer literate."

Indeed. Nearly all the children attending Rodney B. Cox Elementary School in Dade City qualify for free or reduced-price lunches because of limited family incomes. In Lacoochee, household income is just more than $15,000, compared with the countywide figure of $33,000. In the Tommytown area, 29 percent of the population lives below the poverty line, compared with the national average of 12.4 percent.

About 700 people live in eight low-income housing complexes in Dade City and Lacoochee, none of which is equipped with public computer access. The housing authority, a state-run agency, directs its clients to the Hugh Embry library in downtown Dade City for computer time.

DCF is adopting the same strategy: Go find someone with a computer. Its rationale: the one-week statistics showing 85 percent of the applications from Pasco residents were made online. What that doesn't say is how many people weren't able to apply because they couldn't get to a computer.

DCF could provide personal computers and staff assistance at other state-financed locations like Health Department clinics, CARES and the housing authority to expedite online applications. But that only answers the paperwork question. It does not solve other services being transferred to New Port Richey. Crist correctly noted DCF clients need financial assistance, counseling and other help in an all-inclusive location and should not be shuttled from agency to agency.

Putting cost savings over client services is problematic. DCF's pullout of Dade City coincides with the expiration of its lease on an office building on State Road 52, just outside the city limits. If DCF's budget-crunchers demonstrated a more thorough understanding of the population it serves in east Pasco, it wouldn't be advocating moving its offices 30 miles to the west. Seeking smaller, less-expensive quarters elsewhere in the Dade City vicinity is a more appropriate alternative.

Crist promised to lobby DCF Secretary Lucy Hadi to rethink the decision. If the agency is intent on reducing costs, Crist said, it should maintain a presence in Dade City with staff available on an appointment basis, or it should contract with other agencies to provide the services now handled by DCF. Both are logical suggestions.

Finances shouldn't be a hurdle. DCF presented a $2.8-billion budget request to legislators last week, a proposed spending cut of $53-million over the current fiscal year.

Tweaking the budget numbers to continue adequate service for the needy population in east Pasco is imperative.

[Last modified October 21, 2005, 02:15:38]