LINCOLN — A member of Nebraska's embattled Foster Care Review Board warned lawmakers Friday against rushing to change the agency.
"Change made too hastily may have unintended and costly consequences," said Marcia Anderson, an Omaha lawyer.
But she was the only person who raised concerns about a proposal to make the review agency an arm of the Legislature.
Legislative Bill 998 would eliminate the statewide governing board but retain local boards to continue case-by-case reviews of children in foster care.
State Sen. Bob Krist of Omaha said he introduced the proposal out of concern that lawmakers haven't been getting information they need from the agency.
He said he believes the Legislature didn't get sufficient warning about problems that were developing with the privatization of child welfare.
Lawmakers also didn't get all the information requested in 2008 about the children who were dropped off at hospitals by desperate families before Nebraska added an age limit to its safe haven law.
"My intent is to remove any glimmer of impropriety, of conflict of interest, of filtering of information," Krist said.
He said he began work on the bill well before the state board removed longtime Executive Director Carol Stitt a week ago.
But that action fueled interest in his bill. Since then, 12 senators have signed on as co-sponsors, including three other members of the Health and Human Services Committee.
Two people involved with creating the review board in 1982 urged lawmakers to make the change. One was former Sen. Loran Schmit. The other was Ann Coyne, a professor of social work at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.
Coyne said the original intent was for the agency to provide advocacy, oversight and citizen reviews of children in the foster care system.
To do that, it needed to be independent of the main players in the child welfare system, especially the Department of Health and Human Services and the agencies it funds, she said.
But later changes in the board structure have created conflicts of interest, Coyne said.
Legislation passed in 2005 added specific types of child welfare professionals to the board. Some of those appointed since have had ties to HHS.
Anderson defended the board's record, saying she hasn't seen any instance in which a board member attempted to protect HHS or the state's private child welfare contractors.
In testimony on another bill Friday, board member Mario Scalora said the board has never attempted to withhold information from the Legislature.
He said the board's decision to halt a study of the safe haven children, despite legislative requests, was made so employees could focus on reviews mandated by state law.
The committee took no immediate action on Krist's bill or on LB 929, introduced by Sen. Amanda McGill of Lincoln.
McGill's bill would bar people from serving on the state review board if they or their spouses receive money from HHS.
The review board oversees citizen reviews of children in the foster care system, monitors facilities that house children, collects information, and makes recommendations about the child welfare system.
The agency has about 28 employees, who support 46 local volunteer review boards.
Contact the writer:
402-473-9583, martha.stoddard@owh.com
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