Innovation Site for Family Centered Practice

Innovation Site for Family Centered Practice

Circuit 8 – The Alachua County Plan: Strengthening Families Keeps Children Safe and In Their Homes

Participation as an Innovation Site will use progress and momentum from the many Foster Care Redesign efforts to safeguard children with assistance to their parents and caregivers. The plan below is based on the last year and a half of work and positive changes made through the partnership between Casey Family Programs, DCF staff, Partnership for Strong Families, and our many valued community partners.

Section A: The first portion of the plan is organized around the recognized components of family centered child welfare practice to address the barriers, strengths, needed supports and any desired system changes for implementation.

Section B: The second portion of the plan addresses additional work that will be needed to support the implementation of the plan as an Innovation Site.

_{A. Family
Centered Practices}

_Barriers

_Strengths

_{Needed Services/
Supports}

_{System Changes}

^Engagement:

^{Families engaged in ways relevant to the situation and
sensitive to the values of their culture}

^·^{Time
constraints for staff}

^·^{Past
practice emphasis on investigation not building a relationship to solve
issues}

^·^{Staff
training that insures transfer of knowledge to practice}

^·^{Co-location
of CPI’s and services staff of CBC}

^·^{Early
Engagement efforts underway with VPS and high-risk cases}

^·^{Working
with partner agencies to emphasize upfront engagement}

^·^{Cultural
sensitivity training}

^·^{Support
from managers and supervisors}

^·^{Training
for managers and supervisors to support changes in practice}

^·^{Help
in monitoring}

^·^{Coaching
staff to see practices in action}

^·^{TA
on successful interventions}

^·^{Differential
Response}

^Assessment:

^{Assessment protocols look at family capabilities,
strengths & resources throughout life of the case and are reassessed.
Strategies build on assets, capabilities and resources of family}

^·^{Staff
new to using SDM tools}

^·^{Lack
capacity for wider use of Family Team Conferences (FTC)}

^·^{Providers
may be unable to attend FTC to personnel costs}

^·^{CPI’s
using CSA and SDM Risk Assessment}

^·^{Up
front assessments with CPI by DV, MH/SA providers}

^·^{MCRT
– Mobile Crisis Response Team}

^·^{CBC
uses SDM Risk Reassessment and SDM Reunification Assessment through out life
of the case}

^·^{Initial
family assessment also done by FCC}

^·^{Implementing FTC with VPS cases}

^·^{Plan to address disproportionality}

^·^{Additional
help using SDM to best advantage}

^·^{State
TA group on SDM}

^·^{Evaluation
of impact of SDM & FTC’s}

^·^{Streamline
communication & staffing processes across DCF and CBC providers}

^·^{Training
on Critical Thinking and Creating a Culture of Constant Change}

^·^{TA
on successful interventions on disproportionality}

^·^{Casey
TA to implement “Grand Rounds”}

^·^{New
staffing allocation process to support this new kind of work}

_{Section A. Family Centered Services}		_Barriers		_Strengths		_{Needed Services/ Supports}		_{System Changes}
^{Safety Planning:} ^{Families involved in designing safety plan based on information and support of worker/team members}	^·^{Inconsistent involvement of families in breadth and scope of cases} ^·^{Continue to clarify working relationship between attorneys, CPI’s and DTC in safety planning}		^·^{DV/SA/MH input at start re: safety issues} ^·^{New upfront multidisciplinary team decision making process, but family does not attend} ^·^{Safety plan in FSFN} ^·^{Support from courts for changes} ^·^{Implementing new community wide lethality assessment by DV Task Force (includes LE)} ^·^{Community Child on Child Sexual Abuse Task Force}		^·^{More training on child on child sexual abuse as it pertains to safety plans} ^·^{Coaching to improve use of safety plans}		^·^{Involve community partners and continue task force work}
^{Out of Home Placement:} ^{Partnerships are built between families and foster/adoptive families or other placement providers. Respectful, non-blaming approaches are fostered.}	^·^{Recruiting, training and nurturing permanency planning families} ^·^{Placement disruptions with relatives} ^·^{Limited involvement of fathers & their families} ^·^{CPI’s need help in searching for family members at start of case}		^·^{Concurrent Planning Pilot Project} ^·^{Increasing use of relative placements} ^·^{Diligent Search specialist at CBBC} ^·^{Brookdale Foundation grant to support relative care-givers} ^·^{Beginning training on Concurrent Planning Model}		^·^{Improve diligent search capacity during initial investigation} ^·^{Additional consultation on relatives’ placement stability from National Resource Center} ^·^{TA on Family to Family Model} ^·^{Information on Best Practices in alternative processes for placements} ^·^{Ongoing TA for full implementation of Concurrent Planning}
^{Permanency Planning:} ^{Families, child welfare workers, community members and service providers work together to develop alternate forms of permanency.}	^·^{Difficulties with targeted recruitment} ^·^{Recent breakdowns in system that had worked well in the past are impacting timeliness} ^·^{Attorney focused mediation}		^·^{Independent Living Court} ^·^{Brown bag lunches with judges, GAL, CLS and other s to share info} ^·^{Use of mediation} ^·^{Concurrent Planning Pilot} ^·^{State plan for Permanency} ^·^{Long history of meeting adoption targets} ^·^{Monthly APPLA staffings}		^·^{See information above for OOH placements} ^·^{Transition to family driven mediation}

^{Section A.
Family Centered Services}

^Barriers

^Strengths

^{Needed Services/
Supports}

^{System Changes}

^{Implementation of Service Plans:}

^·^{Workers
ensure that families have reasonable access to a flexible, affordable,
individualized array of services and resources so they can maintain
themselves as a family}

^·^{Many
changes recently with FCR and may be resistance}

^·^{Family
team conferences may be seen as “inconvenient” part of workload}

^·^{Emphasis
on compliance of caregivers and not behavior changes}

^·^{Lack
of emphasis on strategies that strengthen families capacities}

^·^{Utilization
management provides purchase of services not contracts that allows
flexibility for individualized plans}

^·^{Only
priority services will be offered initially}

^·^{Process
measures in place}

^·^{Library
Partnership}

^·^{Co-location
of CPI’s and FCC}

^·^{Diversion
services}

^·^{Feedback
loops between staff being established}

^·^{Need
to expand CQI capacity}

^·^{Assess
impact of services on reducing risk vs. compliance with plans}

^·^{Protective
factors training related to worker tasks}

^·^{Identify
best practices related to setting priorities with families}

^·^{QM
staff should be part of pilot to expectations of reviews align with system
and practice changes}

^·^{Assistance
to identify grant opportunities to support family centered practices &
innovative services to families}

(Source for elements in the right hand column of the above plan: National Child Welfare Resources Center for Family Centered Practice, “A Snapshot of Family Centered Practice,” from the Summer 2000 newsletter, http://www.hunter.cuny.edu/socwork/nrcfcpp/downloads/newsletter/BPNPSummer00.pdf)

^{Section B:} ^{Needed Supports for Implementation}	^Barriers	^Strengths	^Actions
^Leadership	^·^{Line staff understanding and support for additional changes}	^·^{DCF Circuit Administrator and CEO at Partnership for Strong Families support plan publicly} ^·^{Established, cross program committees for FCR}	^·^{Need to identify project leader from DCF and Partnership}
^{Communication}	^·^{Limited staff resources to keep community informed of value of the changes and importance of partnerships}	^·^{Communication plan with Foster Care Redesign} ^·^{Community Steering Committee for Foster Care Redesign} ^·^Neighborhood^{Resource Center}^{Community Steering Team} ^·^{Strengthening Families newsletter}	^·^{Re-convene original community group (100+ participants) to update on success of foster care redesign and introduce Innovation Site plans}
^{Client Satisfaction}	^·^{Limited processes to get routine client feedback on the process of “being helped”}	^·^{Yearly client satisfaction measures across region and monthly review in Circuits} ^·^{Some experience with focus groups}	^·^{Needed TA: Best/promising practices in seeking timely client feedback while case open to services and at case closure}
^{Outcome Measures}	^·^{Need to develop additional process and end measures for new practices} ^·^{Further analysis on re-abuse cases or “re-entries” to system is needed}	^·^{Staff and supervisors accustomed to tracking/ using data for process and end measures} ^·^{New tracking systems for Early Engagement and VPS cases will improve ability to spot trends and issues}	^·^{TA on best/promising practices for identification of measures of family centered practice} ^·^{Link CFSR measures to FCP plan} ^·^{Clarification of definitions used statewide for re-abuse}