Mattingly: Long Way to Go In Fixing What Ails ACS; Describes Foster Care Changes
By DAVID SIMS
Children's Services Commissioner John B. Mattingly Sept. 16 said during a panel discussion on the changing face of foster care in the city that there was a "long way to go" in reforming the Administration for Children's Services and that there was "no quick fix to a huge system of child welfare ... this is a 10-year effort, minimum."

JOHN B. MATTINGLY: 'No quick fix.'

Speaking to a board of experts including two foster parent activists, a young reporter who grew up in the foster-care system, and the executive director of a foster-care agency, Mr. Mattingly said that he was seeking to change the administrative structure of ACS and put more emphasis on supporting foster parents.

An Uphill Task

The discussion at the New School was focused on the increasing role of foster parents in caring for children with emotional and mental health problems. Mr. Mattingly admitted the system at ACS was imperfect and said that it wanted to streamline the selection process of potential foster parents. "Any foster parent who treats the child as if they are chattel ... shouldn't be with us," he said.

Mr. Mattingly also conceded that with threats of budget cuts and with the city embroiled in crisis on Wall Street, reform of the agency he has headed since 2004 will be difficult.

"We're entering a very serious time of cutbacks at the state level ... [there's] no particular system that will resolve our challenges," he said.

Mr. Mattingly emphasized ground-level support of ACS's social workers and foster parents as crucial parts of his plan for change. "A principle that our child welfare system will operate under is that every member of the child welfare team deserves and has the right to be treated respectfully and be given support ... it's mutuality that works," he told the audience.

He said that the practical side of social work and foster care was where ACS was lacking, and that a reduction in bureaucracy and an increased focus on field work would improve the administration immensely. "It's all about practice — that is the single lesson I have learned in my four years the most," he said. "We haven't paid enough attention to practice."

A Failure to Communicate

A key component of this reform is significant overhaul of ACS office procedure. "We are doing away with the case-management process that has called for hundreds of people to sit at their desks ... [instead] we will have a team that are responsible for seeing to it that each agency is doing the right thing," Mr. Mattingly explained. "It's starting to have an impact."

Still, Mr. Mattingly admitted that such an overhaul was difficult because of the way the ACS offices were structured. "I've never seen a more hierarchical system than what we've got here ... the lack of communication up the ladder is startling," he said.

Another shift in policy involves the foster families themselves, with a pilot project that demands official conferences of the entire foster family, with social workers present, to make key decisions, such as whether a child wants to move out of the family. Mr. Mattingly said that the program is in effect with 38 percent of children in the system and that "we've cut the number of moves in half," increasing overall stability in the foster units.

Phasing Out Group Homes

His stress on the foster-family unit is part of the ACS's move away from group care, of which he said "the system has been, over the years, addicted to." Many group homes in the city have been closed as Mr. Mattingly tries to eliminate their use as a last-resort option for the ACS. "We have to move out of that ... group homes were not good places for kids," he said.

Despite his concentration on practical reform in the face of budget cuts, Mr. Mattingly admitted that he was "running out of crazy ideas" and that the ACS needed more than budget help. "New York's classic answer for everything is 'more money,''' he said. "[But] this is about building families ... it requires resources, but is not driven by resources. You can still have a very strong network if you support families."