IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 14-0847

Filed September 17, 2014

IN THE INTEREST OF J.H., 

Minor Child,

J.H., Father,

Appellant.

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Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Dallas County, Virginia Cobb, 

District Associate Judge.

A father appeals the termination of his parental rights to his son, born in 

2008. AFFIRMED.

Jesse A. Macro of Gaudineer & George, L.L.P., West Des Moines, for 

appellant father.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Janet L. Hoffman, Assistant Attorney 

General, Wayne Reisetter, County Attorney, and Sean Weiser, Assistant County 

Attorney, for appellee State.

Kayla Stratton of the Des Moines Juvenile Public Defender, Des Moines, 

attorney and guardian ad litem for minor child.

Considered by Vaitheswaran, P.J., and Doyle and McDonald, JJ.
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VAITHESWARAN, P.J.

A father appeals the termination of his parental rights to his son, born in 

2008. He contends the Department of Human Services failed to make 

reasonable efforts towards reunification. 

I. Background Facts and Proceedings

The child was removed from the parents’ custody in 2010, based on 

substance abuse and domestic violence. He remained out of the father’s care for

over three years. During that period, the father spent a significant portion of time 

in jail or prison. He was most recently released just two months before the 

termination hearing. 

Following the hearing, the district court terminated the father’s parental 

rights pursuant to Iowa Code sections 232.116(e) (requiring proof of several 

elements including proof that parent failed to maintain significant and meaningful 

contact with the child); and (f) (requiring proof of several elements including proof 

that child could not be returned to parent’s custody). Iowa Code §§ 232.116(e), 

(f) (2013). The father appealed.

II. Reasonable Efforts

The department has an obligation to “make every reasonable effort to 

return the child to the child’s home as quickly as possible consistent with the best 

interests of the child.” Iowa Code § 232.102(7). The concept includes “visitation 

designed to facilitate reunification while providing adequate protection for the 

child.” In re C.B., 611 N.W.2d 489, 493 (Iowa 2000). 

The district court addressed the department’s reasonable efforts obligation 

as follows:
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[The father] claims that reasonable efforts have not been made to 

reunify him with his son. He claims that he has not been permitted 

to have family interactions with [the child] for a significant period of 

time, and that he has written letters which have not been delivered 

to his son. [The father], however, also acknowledged in writing to 

the court that he has not done what has been asked of him, 

although he claims he could not afford treatment, or tried and was 

turned away. He was offered individual therapy, substance abuse 

treatment, mental health treatment and anger management 

treatment. The court finds that reasonable efforts to reunify were 

provided.

On our de novo review, we are less sanguine about the department’s 

reunification efforts. 

The department social worker overseeing the case admitted she did 

nothing to facilitate reunification while the father was incarcerated. Her only 

reason for declining to afford services during these periods was that the agency 

was not requested to do so. 

The department’s reasonable efforts obligation is not triggered by a 

request. Although a parent is required to seek new and different services if the 

original services are deemed inadequate, the department’s duty to work towards 

reunification of parent and child begins at the moment of removal and continues 

through termination, unless statutorily waived. In re C.B., 611 N.W.2d at 492-93

(stating concept “covers both the efforts to prevent and eliminate the need for 

removal” and stating several termination provisions contain “a common element 

which implicates the reasonable effort requirement”). While incarceration may 

render the provision of services more difficult, it does not absolve the department 

of the obligation to make reasonable reunification efforts. See In re S.J., 620 

N.W.2d 522, 525 (Iowa Ct. App. 2000). Notably, the obligation was a substantive 

requirement of both statutory grounds on which the district court relied in 
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terminating the father’s parental rights. See Iowa Code §§ 232.116(1)(e), (f). 

For these reasons, the department could and should have tried to address the 

concerns that led to the removal of the child, even when the father was behind 

bars. 

While the department shirked its responsibilities to the father during his 

periods of incarceration, we nonetheless conclude the agency minimally satisfied 

its statutory mandate by paying for a psychosocial evaluation and by facilitating 

the father’s participation in a drug treatment program. 

That said, we are troubled by the refusal of the child’s therapist to 

recommend any contact between the father and child, including supervised visits 

or correspondence, which the father agreed to send to the department for prescreening. Her rationale essentially boiled down to “once a bad parent always a 

bad parent,” a view that is inconsistent with the department’s statutory 

reunification obligation. The department was remiss in unquestionably accepting 

her opinion. But, in the end, the department’s decision to deny contact was

based on the father’s established past conduct, which revealed he was not a safe 

person to be around the child. The department summarized the safety concerns 

as follows: 

[The father’s] involvement has been very sporadic with [the child]. 

He has disengaged from [the child’s] life on several occasions since 

DHS became involved in 2010. The[r]e are times when [father] 

admits to using chemical[s] again, not taking his medication, and 

not being able to work or find a place to live on a consistent basis. 

[The father] reports he is now homeless following a protective order 

forcing him out of his mother’s home. . . .

[The father] has a history of violence. He has a pending domestic 

violence charge where he is alleged to have assaulted a cousin that 

was living in his Mom’s home with him. [The child] is not safe to be 
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around his father at this time. [The father] can lapse into anger 

easily. 

These concerns required a limitation of contact between father and child. See 

S.J., 620 N.W.2d at 526 (holding "While a once unfit parent may not 

automatically be deemed unfit, a parent may not wipe the slate clean merely by 

professing a desire to do so. We have considered a parent's arrests and 

incarcerations in determining whether return of a child to a parent would result in 

harm.").

Significantly, the father only began to correspond with the child shortly 

before the termination hearing. By this time, three years had elapsed since the 

child’s removal, and the State had filed its petition to terminate parental rights. 

Under these circumstances, we conclude the department’s decision to rely on the 

therapist’s no-contact recommendation is not a violation of its reasonable efforts 

mandate.

We affirm the termination of the father’s parental rights to his child.

AFFIRMED.