Since the recession hit, cases of child abuse and neglect have gone up around the country and here in Kern County. CPS officials say in June of 2009 they had 37 percent more referrals for possible abuse or neglect than in June 2008.
An ex Child Protective Services supervisor says Kern CPS department was overworked to begin with, and this makes a bad situation worse.
With Senate Bill 2030, California legislators commissioned the Child Welfare Services Caseload study in 1999.
The conclusion was that social workers across the state were handling roughly three times the optimum caseload.
"As far as the (Senate Bill) 2030 standards, it would be great if at some point we could get funding to be there,'' said DHS Director Pat Cheadle. ''No county has every been there. The state doesn't fund there, so it's like the dream that never materialized." The recommendations made in the study were not adopted.
A former CPS supervisor, who didn't want to be identified to protect his family and job, thinks actual case-loads should be closer to the standards recommended in the study.
"It's mathematically impossible for CPS staff to do the work required of them according to policies that are set by the state and also by the county." He says that means people suffer. "Children fall through the cracks." This man worked with CPS as a supervisor for 15 years before being fired in 2008.
Now on top of the already heavy work load, the country is in a recession. "When stresses go up in the communities, almost all the negative things also go up, child abuse, alcoholism, which leads to child abuse," said Bill Walker with the Kern county Mental Health Department.
So with a system already struggling against tough odds, how does CPS handle the increase?
"There are certain things that we must ensure we do every time to ensure those children are protected. Does that mean that something else may fall by the wayside, or another function doesn't have as much priority as something else? Those are management decisions that have to be made unfortunately," said Cheadle.
Funding on the state level could be getting worse for CPS. In California's budget struggle, says a chunk of funding was taken out, but they won't know what that means for the county for another week.
