DCF helps kids meet families for the holidays

Judges expedite paperwork to let foster kids travel.

By KEVIN GRAHAM, Times Staff Writer
Published December 23, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT [Cherie Diez | Times] Safe Children Coalition case manager Michael Forster checks in at the Tampa International Airport on Saturday. He was escorting a 14-year-old girl to meet her relative as part of the Department of Children and Families' Home for the Holidays program.

TAMPA -- The 9-year-old foster girl saw her father at Thanksgiving for the first time since Hurricane Katrina tore them apart in 2005.

Sending the child, now living in a foster home in Hillsborough County, back to Mississippi to spend Christmas with her dad might have required a miracle to get her case before a judge in time to approve the visit and other paperwork. A request from Department of Children and Families Secretary Bob Butterworth helped make it happen.

Earlier this month, Butterworth asked dependency court judges to give priority to cases for foster children like the 9-year-old, who were eligible to visit relatives this holiday season. The girl came to Hillsborough with her mother after Katrina, and then went into foster care after her mother had problems.

"While continued separation is sometimes necessary to protect these children, the fact remains that there are some children within our care who can be home for the holiday with just a little extra work," Butterworth said in a memo about his "Operation Home for the Holidays" initiative.

The process for approving a home visit for a foster child can often take weeks, if not months, because of the paperwork and multiple agencies involved. Background checks and home visits must be done. Hearings must be set before judges.

"Why not get them home for the holidays if at all possible and not let bureaucratic procedures get in the way?" Butterworth said.

His long-term goal is to shorten the amount of time it takes to get children out of foster care and into the home of a relative willing to permanently care for them.

The process can take as long as six months in some cases, he said. Before DCF paperwork goes from the city where the foster child lives to the city the child plans to move, it has to pass through the capital. That includes the capital of another state if the child is leaving Florida.

"It's totally unconscionable that we can't move a child relatively quickly," Butterworth said. "You want stability and permanency with the children, and a lot of time that may be with a relative who wants the child."

He plans to meet soon with officials in Georgia, where many Florida foster children find placement, to work on streamlining the process.

Meanwhile, Butterworth hopes "Operation Home for the Holidays" is successful. He won't know how many children statewide will benefit until after the visits have taken place.

Hillsborough Kids Inc., which oversees foster care in Hillsborough County, identified about 30 children eligible to leave the county and another 20 who will come here for Christmas, said Sunny Hall, Hillsborough Kids' chief operations officer. Foster children will visit Hillsborough relatives from as far away as California and Minnesota. Hillsborough children have trips planned to see relatives in places like New Jersey and Maine.

"We do this every year," Hall said. "The thing that's helpful with the department is it gets everybody excited. Everybody really rallies around that kind of initiative. We are greatly appreciative of that."

When relatives can't afford the travel expenses, Hillsborough Kids provides gas money, plane tickets or has a case worker travel with the child to the destination.

Hillsborough Circuit Judge Tracy Sheehan, who handled the 9-year-old girl's case, called Butterworth's plan worthwhile. The children who are eligible for home visits are "just waiting on somebody to dot the I's and cross the T's," Sheehan said.

Sheehan pointed to a breakdown in communication with local authorities in Mississippi that was slowing approval for the 9-year-old's visit. One of the problems comes with too many forms still being handled on paper, instead of electronically, she said.

Hillsborough Circuit Judge Herbert J. Baumann is part of a committee studying the process for approving home visits and permanent placement.

"I think there's not a person working in foster care who doesn't want our timeline to permanency to drop so that we are making these arrangements faster," Baumann said. "The system doesn't respond as quickly as it should. Part of that is the lack of communication occurring directly. We're trying to figure out ways to make the system more efficient."

For "Operation Home for the Holidays," Baumann approved a home visit for a teen to see her mother in Fort Lauderdale and another for a teen to see his grandparents in Louisiana. All the children are expected to return from their trips in time to go back to school after the New Year.

Kevin Graham can be reached at kgraham@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3433.

[Last modified December 22, 2007, 23:47:02]