Source: http://blog.liftingtheveil.org/2016/12/01/16-years-after-historic-ruling-some-foster-kids-may-see-light/
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 00:50:27+00:00

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﻿Many years after an historic series of legal battles began concerning the use of Supplemental Security Income by the foster care industry was waged in the courts, a modest step toward the attainment of a longstanding promise to foster children and their families has been taken by the Social Security Administration.
The Juvenile Law Center, Community Legal Services, and Homeless Advocacy Project have jointly created a toolkit for advocates that explains the new policy changes in plain English, providing them with valuable information – including forms – so that they may be better equipped to aid youth transitioning from foster care into adulthood.
As the toolkit explains it, this new policy allows foster youth of any age to apply for SSI up to 6 months (180 days) before they leave care. Beginning August 1, 2016, foster youth can submit an application and get a disability determination 6 months before their expected discharge date, even if they do not yet meet the income eligibility requirements due to their foster care payments.
Youth transitioning out of foster care are a particularly vulnerable population. Studies have confirmed what advocates in the field know from experience – that youth who age out of foster care are more likely to experience negative outcomes, including homelessness, unemployment, incarceration, and lack of access to health care. Many of these young people have disabilities that could qualify them for SSI, and that cash assistance can be a vital source of stability as they transition out of the foster care system. Yet too often, youth leave foster care without SSI benefits in place, and with no other source of income or support, placing them at a high risk of becoming homeless while they wait for their SSI applications to be processed and approved.
“Providing stability for these vulnerable youth as they leave care requires thoughtful planning and coordination among many different agencies and actors,” said Community Legal Services attorney and Independence Foundation Fellow Claire Grandison.
“We know that foster youth with disabilities face a tremendous uphill battle as they prepare for adulthood and independence,” said Karen Lindell, an attorney at Juvenile Law Center.
Advocates should avail themselves of this opportunity to help wards of the state approaching emancipation to increase their chances of a successful reunification with their families, as well as to provide them with something of a safety net against the well-documented perils they are certain to face on the streets devoid of families and other social supports.
DSHS admits it would probably not even apply to be a representative payee if it could not rely on the child’s SSI benefits to reimburse the cost of care. By the same token, DSHS admittedly cannot actively seek reimbursement from benefits paid to private representative payees because Congress specifically protects Social Security benefits from transfer, assignment, execution, levy, attachment, garnishment, or other legal process under 42 U.S.C. § 407(a). Thus, DSHS receives reimbursement for foster care only if it serves as a representative payee, and it only serves as representative payee so it can confiscate the child’s money.
Even as the case wound its way to the U.S. Supreme Court, the debate began in scholarly circles, with two early articles in particular standing out in the their harsh condemnation of the practice.6 An article by Tobias J. Kammer in Washington Law Review noted that the Supreme Court of Washington recognized that unless the state forced DSHS to apply for Social Security benefits, claiming the practice to be serving the best interests of foster children, many children would be left entirely without benefits.
The disenfranchised children of whom the Washington Supreme Court wrote in its first ruling had now become officially and irrevocably disenfranchised by virtue of the ruling of the highest Court in the land. And, their disenfranchisement was now officially sanctioned nationwide.
This is one of many areas open for exploration by advocates in light of the new regulations.
In 2002, the American Bar Association crafted a Resolution urging the Presidential Administration to support – and for Congress to enact – legislation that would serve to strengthen the safeguards and protections of individuals receiving benefits under programs administered by the Social Security Administration.
Authority for SSA to impose a civil monetary penalty against organizations which misuse, convert, or misappropriate payments for Beneficiaries received while acting in a representative payee capacity.
Several other specific reform proposals were put forth in the Resolution, and advocates may do well to consider it as something of a model from which to craft a similar contemporary position statement that they may collectively agree upon and ratify as signatories.
1. Susan Wilschke, “Helping Young People with Disabilities Successfully Transition to Adulthood,” Social Security Matters, September 8 2016.
2. “New Social Security Policy Benefits Youth Leaving Foster Care,” Community Legal Services of Philadelphia. This point bears some emphasis, as families impacted by the system almost-invariable find themselves drained of their meager financial assets. They may – quite literally – find themselves forced to “reimburse” the state for the service of having destroyed their family.
3 See in Re Shawna Maye Galehouse, 326712 (Mich. Ct. App. 2016) (parents charged $126,494.22 by County	for costs of daughter’s care, regardless of culpability and regardless of duplicitous federal reimbursements); In re Interest of Gabriela H., 280 Neb. 284, 785 N.W.2d 843 (2010) (“It is clear from the record that DHHS declined to accept the relinquishment of parental rights because one of the parents was paying a ‘pretty substantial amount’ of child support which partially offset DHHS’ cost with respect to [the child’s] care”); In Re Betty P., E2010-00318-COA-R3-PT (Tenn. Ct. App. 2010) (termination of parental rights upheld where mother fell $400 behind on support obligation); Dorothy E Roberts, Northwestern University (Evanston, and Institute for Policy Research, Is There Justice in Children’s Rights?: The Critique of Federal Family Preservation Policy (Evanston, IL: Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University, 1999) (“The loss of benefits may cause parents to be evicted from their homes, run out of food, and lose other resources needed for reunification with their children.”); Harriet Shaklee, Jeri Bigbee, and Misty Wall, “Grand Families Count In Idaho,” Idaho Kids Count Policy Brief, 2008 (“Relative caregivers may find themselves seeking social services for the first time to manage the expenses of the additional children in their home, and many will need a lawyer to establish their rights and authority as caregivers. Some will deplete life savings and retirement accounts to meet these many expenses associated with kincare”); Daniel L. Hatcher and Hannah Lieberman, “Breaking the Cycle of Defeat for ‘Deadbroke’ Noncustodial Parents Through Advocacy on Child Support Issues,” Clearinghouse Review 37 (2003): 5–22 (“Unrealistic order amounts, inappropriate imputation of income, lack of access to agency files, agency failure to modify orders, inappropriate driver’s license suspensions and credit reporting, contempt proceedings against obligors who do not have the ability to pay child support, and errors in paternity establishment can significantly harm fathers, mothers, and children.”); Daniel L. Hatcher, “Collateral Children: Consequence and Illegality at the Intersection of Foster Care and Child Support,” Brooklyn Law Review. 74, no. 4 (2009): 1333–80 (“Saddled with the additional child support obligation, the parents’	struggles toward economic stability and family reunification are often derailed. Case plans required by federal law to aid reunification are illegally converted into debt-collection tools. If the parents fall behind, the government-owed debt can become a consideration, sometimes the sole factor, for the permanent seizure of their children through the process of terminating parental rights”); Families in Crisis,” Report 2, 1991-92 San Diego County Grand Jury, February 6, 1992 (“Judges and referees were observed, seemingly without thought, ordering parents into programs which require more than 40 hours per week. Frequently, these parents have only public transportation. Obviously, there is no time to earn a living or otherwise live a life”). But see also Child Welfare Services: Protection of Children, 2008-2009 San Diego Grand Jury, June 2009 (noting that “This practice continues nothwithstanding In re Ivan C., 2005 WL 1317045 (Cal. App. 2 Dist., 2005), in which the Court of Appeals ruled that: ‘The Department’s obligation to tailor services to an individual family’s needs includes making reasonable efforts to assist in areas where compliance is difficult. This includes helping to meet the scheduling needs of a working parent.’”); Leslie J. Harris et al., “Reasonable Efforts to Reunify in Dependency Cases” (Oregon Child Advocacy Project, 2009) (examining Oregon dependency system, noting that inherent in the general planning and reasonable efforts requirements is “the obligation of DHS to offer a parent a package of services that fit together and fit with the parent’s work schedule”).
4. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler v. Dep’t of Soc. & Health Servs., 145 Wash.2d 1, 4, 32 P.3d 267 (2001).
6. Jim Moye, “Get Your Hands Out of Their Pockets: The Case Against State Seizure of Foster Children’s Social Security Benefits,”	Georgetown Journal on Poverty Law & Policy 10 (2003): 67; Tobias J. Kammer, “Keffeler v. Department of Social and Health Services: How the Supreme Court of Washington Mistook Caring for Children as Robbing Them Blind,” Washington	Law Review. 77 (2002): 877. Both of these influential articles predated the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on the Keffeler case.
7. Kammer, p. 877, fn 3.
8. Washington State Dept. of Social and Health Servs. v. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler, 537 U.S. 371, 123 S. Ct. 1017, 154 L. Ed. 2D 972 (2003).
9. Angie Schwartz and Diana Glick, “Use of Supplemental Security Income to Maximize Assets and Income for Foster Youths with Disabilities, The,” Clearinghouse Review 41 (2008): 602. In support of their claims of malfeasance, Schwartz and Glick cited two government-issued reports in particular: Office of the Inspector General, “Financial-Related Audit of the Baltimore City Department of Social Services-An Organizational Representative Payee for the Social Security Administration,” Audit (Social Security Administration, September 2001) (Baltimore Department “did not record, or incorrectly recorded, benefit receipts and/or disbursements” in 82 percent of sampled cases. These and other problems were identified as pervasive, and the OIG recommended that the agency must install controls to ensure that it could “significantly improve its financial management and oversight of Social Security benefits”); Office of the Inspector General, “San Francisco Department of Human Services – An Organizational Representative Payee for the Social Security Administration,” Audit (Social Security Administration, November 2003) (finding duplicated payments with regard to the SSI and Title IV-E programs; a lack of meaningful financial controls; that the Department had mis-allocated funds; and that certain child beneficiaries had been underpaid or not paid at all).
10. Emily W. McGill, “Penny Wise, Pound Foolish: Child Welfare Agencies as Social Security Representative Payees for Foster Children,” Case Western Reserve Law Review	58 (2007): 961.
11. Ibid at 964. The by-now-infamous case to which McGill refers is, of course, Wash. State Dep’t of Soc. & Health Servs. v. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler, 537 U.S. 371, 381, 123 S. Ct. 1017, 154 L. Ed. 2D 972 (2003).
12. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler ex rel. Pierce v. State, 151 Wash.2d 331, 88 P.3d 949 (2004).
13. Washington State Coalition for the Homeless v. Department of Social & Health Servs., 133 Wash.2d 894, 949 P.2d 1291 (1997).
14. 949 P.2d at 1297-1298.
A social worker employed by DSHS testified by affidavit that the parents’ procurement of safe and stable housing is a precondition to the return of the children in 90 percent of her caseload. The caseworker testified that DSHS caseworkers are not able to offer any housing assistance to families, even when it would prevent a foster care placement or allow a family to be reunited. Another caseworker testified that he frequently includes the need for adequate housing in the court orders of parents whose children are in foster care and that, in his opinion, if adequate housing were available to caseworkers for use in these cases, reunification would happen earlier and more frequently than it currently happens. Another DSHS caseworker testified that caseworkers are not able to address problems of at-risk families and prevent foster care because, without housing, services or treatment are either inaccessible to the family or ineffective. When the family is homeless, the caseworker is often left with the choice of doing nothing or taking the child into foster care. Former King County Superior Court Judge Terrence A. Carroll testified by affidavit that a family’s homelessness or other lack of adequate housing is a significant factor contributing to the need for foster care placement in a substantial number of cases in Washington State and that homelessness prevented or significantly delayed the child’s return to the family in a substantial number of cases. Former Judge Carroll also testified that DSHS has not equipped its caseworkers to provide effective housing resources and that caseworkers routinely opposed proposals that the court order such services by asserting that the caseworker lacked the resources.
16. Social Security Advisory Board, “Social Security Advisory Board Statement on the Supplemental Security Income Program,” concluding statement, 2014 Annual Report of the SSI Program (Social Security Administration, August 22, 2014). The Florida audit cited therein was: Office of the Inspector General, “Florida’s Title IV-E Waiver May Impact Supplemental Security Income Benefits” (Social Security Administration, May 2009) (“We believe Florida’s accounting system does not provide enough detail to confirm State funds, rather than Title IV-E funds, are being used for foster care maintenance payments for those children also receiving SSI payments. As such, the State could be receiving Federal funds from two sources for the same purpose”).
17. Office of the City Auditor, “Department of Social Services CSA and Foster Care Audit” (City of Richmond, VA.	May 2011). p. 20. A close reading of this and related financial audits in light of the findings made in the Florida audit may suggest that the Title IV-E waivers may not in and of themselves be responsible for the duplicate billings; rather it appears likely that the waivers provide states with greater opportunities to better obfuscate their billing practices and procedures, thus rendering it impractical or exceedingly difficult for outside auditors to conclusively identify the actual source (as well as the underlying intent) of the financial discrepancies.
These are but	the tip of the proverbial iceberg. By the mid-1990s, similar federal revenue maximization practices had become pervasive throughout the foster care system. See for example Inspector General, “Accounting for Social Security Benefits by the County of Los Angeles, California,” Audit (Social Security Administration, April 1998) (County routinely reimbursed itself retroactively for foster care costs without seeking prior authorization, failed to create dedicated accounts for large lump-sum awards, and misappropriated the interest earned on children’s SSI accounts to the tune of $72,000 in 1997); Inspector General, “Review of the County of Los Angeles’ Peformance as Representative Payee for Title II and Title XVI Children in Foster Care,” Audit (Social Security Administration, July 1997) (“DCFS voluntarily returned over $1 million to SSA representing children’s conserved funds in excess of the $2,000 title XVI resource limit and benefits received for children who were not in the County’s care”); Inspector General, “Accounting for Social Security Benefits by Contra Costa County, California,” Audit (Social Security Administration, November 1998) (similar financial improprieties).
Such fiscal improprieties were not limited to SSA-administered programs, and were found to be not only statewide in scope, see e.g. Inspector General, “Foster	Care Training Administrative Costs Claimed for Federal Reimbursement by the California Department of Social Services,” Audit (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, September 1997) ($8.4 million inappropriately claimed resulting in an overclaim of Federal funds totaling $2.1 million; $2.8 million federal funds claims inadequately supported; two duplicate claims totaling $6.8 million in costs claimed); Inspector General, “Audit of Title IV-E Foster Care Eligibility in California for the Period October 1, 1988 through September 30, 1991,” Audit (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, March 1994) (review of a statistical sample of 805 cases statewide resulted in the identification of 313 cases for which eligibility for federal financial participation “was not supported for all or part of the payments made on behalf of children”) but rather were nationwidein their scope. See Inspector General, “Summary Report on Nationwide Audit of Training Contract and Administrative Costs Charged to Department of Health and Human Services Supported Programs,” Audit (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, April 1997) (“we found improper practices for identifying and charging training and administrative costs existed to some extent in all seven States reviewed. As a result, we have recommended financial adjustments totaling $58,222,453”). While numerous newer audits reveal strikingly similar results, I focus herein on a representative sample drawn from the 1990s to illustrate that this is part of a continuum that remains an unchanging constant in the foster care industry.
18Inspector General, “Benefit Payments Managed by Representative Payees of Children in Foster Care,” Evaluation Report (Social Security Administration, June 2010). p. 3.
21. Nathanael J Okpych, “Receipt of Independent Living Services among Older Youth in Foster Care: An Analysis of National Data from the U.S.,” Children and Youth Services Review 51 (2015): 74–86.
22. ABA House of Delegates, “Legal Problems of the Elderly,” Resolution (American Bar Association, February 2002).
23. Social Security Advisory Board, “Social Security Advisory Board Statement on the Supplemental Security Income Program.” See note 16.
24. Program Operations Manual System (POMS), GN 00502.110 Taking Applications in the eRPS. Section C. 3. Social Security Administration. Effective dates 11/02/2016 – Present. Program Operations Manual System (POMS), SI 00830.410 Foster Care Payments, details the new policy concerning foster children.

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