Case Name: Lisa Grant et al., on Behalf of Themselves and All Others Similarly Situated, Respondents, and Carolyn Lee et al., on Behalf of Themselves and All Others Similarly Situated, Intervenors-Respondents, v. Mario M. Cuomo, as Governor of the State of New York, et al., Defendants, and Edward I. Koch, as Mayor of the City of New York, et al., Appellants
Court: New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1987-07-09
Citations: 130 A.D.2d 154
Docket Number: 
Parties: Lisa Grant et al., on Behalf of Themselves and All Others Similarly Situated, Respondents, and Carolyn Lee et al., on Behalf of Themselves and All Others Similarly Situated, Intervenors-Respondents, v Mario M. Cuomo, as Governor of the State of New York, et al., Defendants, and Edward I. Koch, as Mayor of the City of New York, et al., Appellants.
Judges: 
Reporter: Appellate Division Reports
Volume: 130
Pages: 154–201

Head Matter:
Lisa Grant et al., on Behalf of Themselves and All Others Similarly Situated, Respondents, and Carolyn Lee et al., on Behalf of Themselves and All Others Similarly Situated, Intervenors-Respondents, v Mario M. Cuomo, as Governor of the State of New York, et al., Defendants, and Edward I. Koch, as Mayor of the City of New York, et al., Appellants.
First Department,
July 9, 1987
APPEARANCES OF COUNSEL
Frederick P. Schaffer of counsel (Grace Goodman with him on the brief; Frederick A. O. Schwarz, Jr., Corporation Counsel, attorney), for appellants.
Raymond L. Falls, Jr., of counsel (Vivien B. Shelanski, Ellen L. Weintraub and Irene S. Cannon-Geary with him on the brief; Cahill, Gordon & Reindel and Robert M. Hayes, attorneys), for respondents and intervenors-respondents.

Opinion:
OPINION OF THE COURT
Sandler, J. P.
In an action seeking injunctive and declaratory relief originally commenced by four families and three organizations, the plaintiffs claim that the several defendants have violated their obligations to provide protective and preventive services under the Child Protective Services Act of 1973 and the Child Welfare Reform Act of 1979. The complaint alleged in substance with regard to the family plaintiffs, and other families said to be similarly situated, that the several defendants had failed to make available to families with children at risk of removal to foster care preventive services mandated by law that were required to permit those children to remain with their families. The complaint further alleged that the several defendants had failed to comply with their statutory obliga tion to provide protective services to children in danger of child abuse and maltreatment.
Following a court conference with counsel, the original families withdrew as party plaintiffs on their agreement that the defendants had satisfied their individual claims to preventive services. Thereafter, two other families asserting substantially the same claims sought, and were granted, permission to intervene.
The defendants appeal from an order dated May 27, 1986 of the Supreme Court, New York County, to the extent to which it (1) granted the motion of the intervenors-plaintiffs for a preliminary injunction requiring the city defendants to prepare service plans within 30 days, and thereafter to provide all services recommended in such plans, (2) granted the motion of the organizational plaintiffs for a preliminary injunction requiring the city defendants to commence investigations of reports of suspected child abuse or neglect within 24 hours of the receipt of such reports, and (3) denied the motion of the city defendants for summary judgment dismissing the complaint (134 Mise 2d 83). The city defendants also appeal from an order entered August 7, 1986, which granted their motion to renew, but thereupon adhered to the court's original determination.
The issues on this appeal concern the interpretation and enforcement of two major pieces of legislation in the area of child welfare—the Child Protective Services Act of 1973 (Social Services Law § 411 et seq.), which regulates the provision of protective services to abused and maltreated children, and the Child Welfare Reform Act of 1979 (Social Services Law § 409 et seq.), which regulates the provision of preventive services to children.
Protective services refer to the system for reporting and investigating cases of suspected child abuse or neglect and for protecting children and providing rehabilitative services to them and their parents. (Social Services Law § 411; 18 NYCRR part 432.) Preventive services are supportive and rehabilitative services designed to avert the placement of children in foster care, to enable children in foster care to return to their families at the earliest possible date, or to reduce the likelihood that children who have been discharged from foster care will be returned to it (Social Services Law § 409 et seq.; 18 NYCRR parts 423, 430.9).
The legal issues presented with regard to the alleged failure of the defendants to discharge their duties under the two controlling statutes are fundamentally different in character.
As to the claimed violation of the city defendants to comply with their statutory duty to provide protective services, it is agreed that Social Services Law § 424 (6) requires each child protective service, upon receipt of a report of suspected child abuse or maltreatment, "to commence, within twenty-four hours, an appropriate investigation", and that in a certain percentage of cases, the exact per cent being a matter of disagreement, the city defendants have failed to comply with that statutory direction. The issues with regard to this part of the court's order are raised by the city's contention that the organizational plaintiffs lack standing to maintain the action, and that under all the circumstances, the issuance by Special Term of an injunction requiring full compliance with the statutory provision represented an improvident exercise of discretion.
As to that part of the court's order addressed to the claim of the intervenors-plaintiffs for preventive services, the central issues presented concern the interpretation of the relevant sections of the Child Welfare Reform Act of 1979. The first and most fundamental question is whether, as contended by plaintiffs and implicitly held by Special Term, Social Services Law § 409-a, when considered together with the regulations promulgated by the New York State Department of Social Services (18 NYCRR 423.2 [d]; 430.9), imposes an unconditional nondiscretionary obligation to provide preventive services under certain circumstances defined in the regulations.
The second issue of construction is raised by Special Term's determination that a child service plan, which a social services district is required under Social Services Law § 409-e to prepare with respect to each child identified as being considered for placement in foster care, is in the nature of a contract enforceable by a court, and that the city is obligated to provide all available services recommended in that plan subject only to its right under subdivision (3) to revise the plan from time to time.
Turning first to the issues raised by the city's conceded failure fully to comply with its obligation to commence investigations of reports of child abuse or maltreatment within 24 hours, we recognize that the factual demonstration by the organizational plaintiffs in support of their standing to seek judicial relief is unimpressive when considered in light of the established requirement that such organizations demonstrate that they have suffered an injury as a result of defendants' actions. (See, Matter of Dental Socy. v Carey, 61 NY2d 330, 334; Matter of MFY Legal Servs. v Dudley, 67 NY2d 706.)
As the defendants correctly argue, the claim of the organizational plaintiffs to have suffered an injury by way of an added burden on their resources is presented in general terms only. On the other hand, we cannot ignore the obvious fact that if organizations of this kind are denied standing, the practical effect would be to exempt from judicial review the failure of the defendants, here conceded, to comply with their statutory obligations. Manifestly, the abused children are not themselves able to seek a judicial remedy, nor is it likely that parents or caretakers, the objects of the claims of abuse or maltreatment, would undertake to secure a remedy. Given the obvious reality that the protection of abused or maltreated children is a central concern of our society, and given the historic relationship of organizations concerned with the care and protection of children to the goals sought to be achieved by the relevant statute, we are persuaded that Special Term was justified in denying the motion to dismiss as to the organizational plaintiffs.
Turning to the merits of this part of the order appealed from, the city defendants acknowledge their statutory obligation to commence investigations of reports of suspected child abuse or neglect within 24 hours of the receipt of such reports, and their failure to achieve full compliance with the statutory direction. In their appeal from the preliminary injunction requiring compliance with their statutory obligations, the city defendants contend that injunctive relief is inappropriate because they acknowledge their statutory obligations, have steadily increased their rate of compliance, have presently achieved a very substantial compliance with their statutory obligations, and have instituted procedures that will soon bring about the maximum possible compliance. To the extent to which full compliance has not been achieved, it is contended that the failure is attributable in part to human error, inherently not susceptible of being effected by injunctive relief, and a variety of administrative and budgetary circumstances that are inappropriate for judicial intervention.
This branch of the relief sought by the organizational plaintiffs, and granted by Special Term, has its genesis in a statistical report for 1985 that indicated compliance with the obligation to commence investigations within 24 hours in only 89% of the cases, a figure that represented an apparent retreat from the previous year's results and thus apparently belied the claim of ongoing improvement. The city defendants have presented follow-up studies for the year indicating that the 89% figure was in part affected by errors in reporting, and that the probable true figure of compliance for 1985 was 95%. Whether or not 95% is in fact the precisely accurate figure, the follow-up studies do support the conclusion that the true rate of compliance was greater than 89%, and may well have been 95%. But even a 95% figure necessarily means that there were numerically a significant number of reports of child abuse and maltreatment that were not responded to by the commencement of investigations within the statutorily mandated 24-hour period.
The reasons for this ongoing noncompliance cannot be set forth with absolute precision. In part, it may be assumed that some instances are attributable to human error, something not in the usual situation appropriately addressed by injunctive relief. (Cf., Bruno v Codd, 47 NY2d 582.) In part, the noncompliance would appear to be the result of a combination of factors set forth in different self-evaluations by the city defendants. These included the failure of budgetary allocations to keep pace with rapidly increasing complaints of child abuse, a high attrition rate among personnel assigned to what is often a difficult and onerous duty, the difficulty of finding and promptly training qualified persons, and possibly failures in communication among the several offices assigned the responsibility.
Undeniably, the appropriateness of injunctive relief under the circumstances disclosed in this record presents an issue that is not entirely free from doubt. In the absence of any reason to doubt the good faith of the responsible city agencies, the threat of contempt, the traditional tool for enforcing injunctive relief, would appear to be inappropriate. And the nature of the budgetary and administrative problems detailed in the record does not appear of a kind that courts are well suited to address by specific directions as to how funds should be allocated and as to how the concerned personnel should be organized and supervised. On the other hand, the persistence of an unacceptable degree of noncompliance with a specific statutory direction affecting the welfare of abused children, and the undoubted fact that this lawsuit itself brought about increased governmental concern and attention to the problem, persuades us that there was a suffi cient basis for Special Term to conclude that injunctive relief followed by a review of the steps taken by the city agencies to respond would serve a valid purpose.
Turning to the claims of the individual plaintiffs that defendants have violated their statutory obligations to provide preventive services, the central issue is presented by plaintiffs' claim that the Child Welfare Reform Act of 1979 (Social Services Law § 409 et seq.), when considered together with the regulations of the New York State Department of Social Services (18 NYCRR 430.9), imposes a nondiscretionary duty in circumstances set forth in the regulations to make findings which mandate the provision of preventive services. Plaintiffs' central thesis is set forth clearly in their appellate brief in the following language: "Respondents have never disputed appellants' discretion as to which of a menu of preventive services must be provided under appropriate circumstances. However, respondents do dispute the notion that such discretion extends to the initial determination that a child is at risk of foster care and in need of preventive services."
It is on the basis of this construction of the statute that plaintiffs contend that the issues are controlled by the decision of the Court of Appeals in Klostermann v Cuomo (61 NY2d 525), in which the court found legally sufficient a complaint seeking declaratory relief and mandamus on the claim that the State agency had failed to discharge a nondiscretionary statutory duty to provide services, in the face of the contention of the State agency that the failure to discharge its statutory duty resulted from a discretionary administrative judgment as to the allocation of limited budgetary appropriations and was accordingly nonjusticiable.
As becomes apparent on analysis, the construction of the statute urged by plaintiffs is critical both to that part of the court's order that enjoined the defendants to prepare a service plan and provide the services set forth in that plan to the intervenors-plaintiffs, as well as to that part of the court's order that denied the defendants' motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint to the extent to which it sought system-wide declaratory relief.
If the findings which are a precondition to the obligation to provide mandated preventive services involved discretion and judgment on the part of local social services officials, it is clear that the injunction granted by Special Term, in effect an order of mandamus, violated well-established principles with regard to mandamus, and that the appropriate remedy of the individual plaintiffs was to seek a review of the denial to them of preventive services in a fair hearing and subsequent judicial review in a CPLR article 78 proceeding if the determination was sustained after the fair hearing. Similarly, if the statutorily required findings involved the exercise of discretion and judgment, it is clear that system-wide declaratory relief would be unavailable since the issues presented would involve separate exercises of judgment and discretion by social services officials in widely varying circumstances.
The purpose of the Child Welfare Reform Act was "to delineate a state policy of providing permanent homes for children who are currently in foster care or at high risk of entering foster care." (Mem of Senator Joseph R. Pisani, NY Legis Ann, at 352.) This purpose was sought to be accomplished by "a new emphasis on preventive services to maintain family relationships and reunite families whenever possible." (Ibid.) This new approach was found necessary because "[t]he problems of the foster care system have been exacerbated by a lack of incentives to local district[s] to provide preventive services which may in some cases avert the need for foster care" (Pisani mem, op. cit., at 353).
As further set forth in the Pisani memorandum (ibid.): "The bill redefines preventive services and places their provision within an enriched funding formula. The bill delineates clearly standards for planning and caring for children with the goal of permanent homes whenever possible. Furthermore, the bill holds districts accountable for meeting these standards or suffer loss of reimbursement."
Consistent with these purposes, the Child Welfare Reform Act defines preventive services as: "supportive and rehabilitative services provided to children and their families for the purposes of: averting an impairment or disruption of a family which will or could result in the placement of a child in foster care; enabling a child who has been placed in foster care to return to his family at an earlier time than would otherwise be possible; or reducing the likelihood that a child who has been discharged from foster care would return to such care." (Social Services Law § 409.)
With respect to the provision of preventive services, the Child Welfare Reform Act (Social Services Law § 409-a [1] [a]) provides in relevant part: "A social services official shall provide preventive services to a child and his family, in accordance with the child's service plan as required by section four hundred nine-e of this chapter and the social services district's child welfare services plan submitted and approved pursuant to section four hundred nine-d of this chapter, upon a finding by such official that (i) the child will be placed or continued in foster care unless such services are provided and that it is reasonable to believe that by providing such services the child will be able to remain with or be returned to his family".
Social Services Law § 409-a (2) further provides: "A social services official is authorized to provide preventive services to a child and his family to accomplish the purposes set forth in section four hundred nine of this chapter, when such services are not required to be provided pursuant to subdivision one of this section."
Social Services Law § 409-b (1) provides in substance for reimbursement to each social services district of "(a) seventy-five per centum of allowable expenditures for preventive services provided pursuant to subdivision one of section four hundred nine-a of this title and (b) fifty per centum of allowable expenditures for preventive services provided pursuant to subdivision two of section four hundred nine-a of this title".
Social Services Law § 409-e, entitled "Child service plan", in effect the record-keeping section of the act, provides in substance that the social services district shall perform an assessment of each child and his family circumstances in accordance with procedures and criteria to be prescribed by the Department where the child has been "identified by a social services district as being considered for placement in foster care as defined in section three hundred ninety-two of this chapter" (subd [1]).
Social Services Law § 409-e (2) directs the social services district to establish and maintain a child service plan upon completion of the assessment, which shall include, inter alia, identification of required services and their availability and the manner in which they are to be provided.
Social Services Law § 409-e (3) directs review and revision of the plan, in consultation with the parent or guardian, where appropriate, within the first 90 days and at least every six months thereafter. It provides, among other things, that the review shall indicate the types, dates and sources of services that have actually been provided.
Critical to the issue presented is that part of Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) which obligates a social services official to provide preventive services to a child and his family in accordance with the child's service plan "upon a finding by such official that the child will be placed or continued in foster care unless such services are provided and that it is reasonable to believe that by providing such services the child will be able to remain with or be returned to his family."
On the face of it, the two findings specified in this section as a prerequisite to the obligation of the social services official to provide mandated preventive services manifestly involve the exercise of discretion and professional judgment, and indeed, the plaintiffs do not argue to the contrary. The plaintiffs' basic contention is that the regulations issued by the State Department of Social Services specify circumstances under which there is an unconditional nondiscretionary obligation on the part of social services officials to make the statutorily prescribed findings.
Although introductory sentences in the pertinent part of the regulations provide some color of support for this construction, a study of the regulation as a whole makes it incontrovertibly clear that it was not intended, and could not possibly have been intended, to impose a nondiscretionary duty on the part of social services officials to make the statutorily required findings under the described circumstances.
18 NYCRR 430.9 (a), as pertinent to the issue presented, provides: "[T]he provision of preventive services shall be considered mandated if one of the following standards is met: the standard for the provision of mandated preventive services to clients at risk of placement".
18 NYCRR 430.9 (c) goes on to provide in its introductory sentence as follows: "Standard for the provision of mandated preventive services to clients at risk of placement. The provision of preventive services shall be considered mandated when such services are essential to improve family relationships and prevent the placement of a child into foster care. The circumstances in which preventive services shall be considered essential for these purposes are the following".
Undeniably, this phrasing provides apparent support for the plaintiffs' theory that when the circumstances thereafter described are present, preventive services must be provided. -What an examination of the specific circumstances thereafter identified makes clear is that this interpretation is untenable. Let us consider the relevant subdivisions in turn.
18 NYCRR 430.9 (c) (1), captioned "Health and safety of child", sets forth a circumstance in which one or more children in a family have been subjected by parents or caretakers, within a 12-month period prior to the date of application for services to serious physical injury by other than accidental means, or to serious impairment or risk of serious impairment of their physical, mental or emotional condition as a result of a failure of the parents or caretakers to exercise a minimum degree of care, and such action by the parents "has resulted in a determination that an allegation of abuse or maltreatment is indicated."
Undeniably, a finding of such abuse would in the usual situation call for consideration by the social services official of removal of the child from the parent or caretaker. But even with regard to that circumstance, it is surely clear, and indeed illustrated in the case records of one of the original family plaintiffs, that there may be many situations in which a finding of abuse is properly made, but in which a professional assessment of the situation as of the time of such finding by a social worker would support the conclusion that the child should not be removed from the parent or caretaker.
Even more clearly, it is apparent that there are many situations in which a parent or caretaker has imperiled the health and safety of the child, and in which it would make no sense whatever to permit the child to remain with the parent or caretaker, and in which no responsible social services official could conceivably find "that it is reasonable to believe that by providing such services the child will be able to remain with or be returned to his family." (Social Services Law § 409-a [1] [a].) It simply could not have been intended to impose a nondiscretionary duty on social services officials to provide preventive services in an effort to avoid foster care every time a finding of abuse and maltreatment of a child by a parent is made.
18 NYCRR 430.9 (c) (2), captioned "Parental refusal", sets forth a circumstance in which the parent or caretaker has refused to maintain the child in the home or has expressed the intention of surrendering the child for adoption.
In this situation, the fact itself would appear to be a simple one, leaving little room for discretion or judgment as to whether such an event has occurred. But it cannot follow from such a circumstance that the social worker must find it reasonable to believe that the provision of preventive services would avoid the necessity for foster care in every such situation. Undoubtedly there may be occasional situations in which that would be an appropriate conclusion, but it is obvious that in most such situations, it would be absurd to so find. Surely, the regulation cannot be sensibly interpreted as mandating the social worker to make the required findings and to provide preventive services to every parent who refuses to maintain the child in the home or is determined to surrender the child for adoption.
The third paragraph, captioned "Parent unavailability", describes a circumstance in which the child's parents or caretakers have become unavailable due to (a) hospitalization; (b) arrest, detainment or imprisonment; (c) death; or (d) the fact that their whereabouts are unknown.
Once again, the circumstance described would seem to involve relatively little room for discretion or judgment as to its presence. But it is not conceivable that it was intended in every situation of parent unavailability described in the regulation that the social services official had a nondiscretionary duty to find it reasonable to believe that preventive services would avoid foster care. Suppose the only parent is under a life sentence in prison, or is dead, or that his whereabouts are unknown. Plaintiffs' interpretation of the regulation calls for a declaration that every such situation imposes a nondiscretionary duty to provide preventive services, and this is surely wrong.
The fourth paragraph, headed "Parent service need", describes a circumstance in which a child is at risk of serious harm "due to an emotional, mental, physical, or financial condition of the parent or caretaker which seriously impairs the parent's or caretaker's ability to care for the child."
As to this circumstance, it is apparent that a determination of the fact of the circumstance by the social services official involves discretion and professional judgment. But let us assume a situation in which it is clear that the described circumstance exists. Can it reasonably be inferred that the social services official must find in every such situation that preventive services will avoid foster care? Assume the parent's emotional and mental condition is such that there is no reasonable possibility that the parent can be entrusted with the . child at any time in the foreseeable future. Can the regulation conceivably have been intended, as plaintiffs urge, to require preventive services to avoid foster care in that situation?
The fifth paragraph, headed "Child service needs", describes a circumstance in which a child has special need for supervision or services which cannot adequately be met by the child's parents or caretakers without the aid of preventive services.
On its face, this paragraph clearly involves a professional evaluation as to the existence of the circumstance, which cannot reasonably be construed as ministerial or nondiscretionary.
The sixth paragraph, headed "Pregnancy", describes a circumstance in which "[a] woman is pregnant or has given birth and has shown an inability to provide adequate care for her unborn or infant child." Manifestly, there is no plausible basis for the conclusion that every time a woman is pregnant or has given birth that the social services agency is under a nondiscretionary obligation to conclude that the unborn or infant child is at risk of foster care, and that preventive services are therefore mandated.
Once it is accepted that the findings specified in Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) involve the exercise of discretion and judgment, it follows that Special Term erred in that part of its order that granted the motion to the intervenors-plaintiffs for a preliminary injunction requiring the city defendants to prepare service plans within 30 days, and thereafter to provide the services recommended in such plans. In issuing this injunction, in effect an order of mandamus, Special Term substituted its judgment for that of the responsible social services officials in matters involving discretion and judgment, and thereby departed from well-established principles governing the granting of mandamus.
As observed in a leading treatise, the principle is well established that "mandamus compels action admitting of no discretion and so clearly required as to be merely ministerial" (Siegel, NY Prac § 577, at 775). This long-standing principle was squarely reaffirmed by the Court of Appeals in Klostermann v Cuomo (61 NY2d 525, supra), the authority primarily relied on by plaintiffs on this issue, in terms that leave no room for reasonable disagreement. With regard to mandamus, the Court of Appeals reaffirmed (at 539) that " '[m]andamus lies to compel the performance of a purely ministerial act where there is a clear legal right to the relief sought' (Matter of Legal Aid Soc. v Scheinman, 53 NY2d 12, 16). The long-established law is that ' "[w]hile a mandamus is an appropriate remedy to enforce the performance of a ministerial duty, it is well settled that it will not be awarded to compel an act in respect to which the officer may exercise judgment or discretion" ' ".
Quoting from People ex rel. Francis v Common Council (78 NY2d 33, 39), the Court of Appeals reaffirmed in Klostermann (supra, at 540): " '[T]he writ of mandamus may also be addressed to subordinate judicial tribunals, to compel them to exercise their functions, but never to require them to decide in a particular manner A subordinate body can be directed to act, but not how to act, in a manner as to which it has the right to exercise its judgment Where a subordinate body is vested with power to determine a question of fact, the duty is judicial, and though it can be compelled by mandamus to determine the fact, it cannot be directed to decide in a particular way, however clearly it be made to appear what the decision ought to be.' "
In issuing the preliminary injunction at issue here, Special Term in effect directed the responsible social services officials to exercise their discretion and judgment in a particular way, something which the court was not authorized to do. If, in fact, the intervenors-plaintiffs were denied preventive services to which they were entitled as the result of an erroneous failure by the social services officials to make the statutorily prescribed findings, the appropriate response would be that set forth in a regulation promulgated by the State Department of Social Services in 1983, which explicitly provides for a fair hearing to persons aggrieved by the denial, reduction, or termination of preventive services. (See, 18 NYCRR 423.4 [l] [4].) If, after requesting and obtaining a fair hearing, an applicant for preventive services receives an unfavorable decision, he has a right to judicial review by means of an article 78 petition (Social Services Law § 22 [9] [b]).
Although the intervenors' complaint is not precise as to the theory underlying their request for system-wide declaratory relief with regard to preventive services, or the exact form that such declaratory relief was to take, it is apparent from plaintiffs' appellate presentation that the application for system-wide declaratory relief with regard to preventive services was based upon the theory that the statute, considered together with the regulations, imposes a nondiscretionary duty on social services officials to make the findings set forth in Social Services Law § 409-a (1)—a construction we have found to be untenable.
The record discloses no other legally viable basis for granting system-wide declaratory relief, nor are we able to find in plaintiffs' presentation any claim that such relief is appropriate on a different theory. To the extent to which it may be concluded on the basis of various studies presented in the record that the defendants have erred in many individual cases in failing to make findings under circumstances in which such findings should have been made, it is clear that system-wide declaratory relief is not available to address claims of individual errors of judgment in separate cases involving different factual situations, none of which (except for the intervenors-plaintiffs) are before us for our consideration, and which have not been shown to involve any single principle equally applicable to any defined group of families.
We note additionally that the record discloses no claim, nor any basis for such claim, that it was the policy of the defendants to refuse to make the statutorily required findings, even where the facts were believed to justify them, in an effort to limit or avoid expenditures. Indeed, given the central reality that the governing statute provides enriched State reimbursement where mandated preventive services are provided, it would seem unlikely that financial considerations have improperly affected individual decisions.
Finally, we are unable to agree with Special Term's conclusion that whatever child service plan pursuant to Social Services Law § 409-e "is in effect at a particular time is in the nature of a contract by the city, the performance of which is enforceable by a court [and that] the city has an obligation to deliver whatever available services it proposes at any particular time." (134 Misc 2d, supra, at 86-87.) We find no basis in the statute for this construction, which seems to us to misconceive the clear meaning of the relevant statutory sections.
As previously observed, Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) requires a social services official to "provide preventive services to a child and his family, in accordance with the child's service plan as required by section four hundred nine-e of this chapter and the social services district's child welfare services plan submitted and approved pursuant to section four hundred nine-d of this chapter". The critical statutory phrase— "in accordance with"—plainly does not mean the same as "all" or "all available services". If the Legislature had intended that "all services" or "all available services", or all available services appropriate to short-range goals identified in the plan, were required to be delivered, it is not easy to see why language embodying that intent was not used.
Nor is it difficult to discern the reason for the use by the Legislature in Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) of the words "in accordance with the child's service plan as required by section four hundred nine-e of this chapter".
The words used were consistent with, and in furtherance of, the fundamental distinction drawn in the statute between mandated preventive services—services provided under Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) following the findings that have been discussed at length—and preventive services provided in the absence of such findings under subdivision (2). As we have seen, the statute provided an enriched reimbursement formula for mandated preventive services. The clear reason for the statutory phrase was to make certain that the enhanced reimbursement provided for mandated preventive services would be limited only to such services when the justification for them had been documented in a record that could be reviewed by the New York State Department of Social Services.
The error in Special Term's construction of the statute seems to us further confirmed by Social Services Law § 409-e (3) which directs a review of a child's service plan "in consultation with the child's parent or guardian, where appropriate, at least within the first ninety days following its preparation and at least every six months thereafter." The section goes on to provide: "Such revisions shall indicate the types, dates and sources of services that have actually been provided and an evaluation of the efficacy of such services, and any necessary or desirable revisions in goals or planned services." What unmistakably appears from this subdivision is that it was contemplated by the Legislature that services listed in the plan might not actually be provided within the time intervals for review and revision.
Moreover, we think it likely that Special Term's construction would have consequences that are almost precisely the opposite of those that were intended. Where a child has been identified as being at risk of foster care it surely seems preferable, and in accordance with sound professional practice, that the concerned social services officials identify all services relevant to the existing situation to permit maximum flexibility in responding to quickly changing circumstances without being apprehensive that every identified service would be required by law to be provided. The almost certain consequence of Special Term's construction, and one that the Legislature surely did not intend, would be to induce social services officials to limit narrowly the services identified in the original child's service plan lest they be obligated to provide services that experience and changing circumstances may indicate to be unnecessary or inappropriate.
The dissenting opinion opens its discussion of the issues that divide the court with the comment that the writer agrees "with much of the majority's opinion, including the finding that the preparation of the child service plan and the provision of mandatory preventive services in accordance with such plan involve the exercise of discretion". In this candid observation the dissenting opinion finds untenable, although the opinion does not so state explicitly, the legal theory on the basis of which the plaintiffs sought, and secured, an order of mandamus requiring as to the intervenor families the preparation of child support plans, and the provision of services identified in such plans, and which is also central to the claim for system-wide declaratory relief with regard to preventive services. Nonetheless, the dissenters would affirm the relevant parts of the order appealed from, justifying this conclusion on the basis of a complex analysis, the different parts of which are not easy to follow or to understand, but which in effect obliterates the distinction between discretionary and ministerial acts that is central to the law of mandamus.
Thus, the dissenting opinion contends that the provision of preventive and protective services "are but discretionary means to the fulfillment of SSC's nondiscretionary duty to protect children who are believed to be suffering from abuse or neglect".
What becomes immediately apparent upon analysis is that this formulation reaches an untenable conclusion on the basis of two fundamental errors. First, as is obvious from an examination of the Child Welfare Reform Act of 1979, preventive services are not authorized for the purpose of protecting abused or maltreated children. Under Social Services Law § 409 preventive services are defined as "supportive and rehabilitative services provided to children and their families for the purpose of: averting an impairment or disruption of a family which will or could result in the placement of a child in foster care". Undoubtedly it will often be the case that abuse or maltreatment of children by a parent will justify the conclusion that there is danger of the impairment or disruption of a family which could result in the child being placed in foster care, in which event preventive services are authorized, mandated under Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) if the statutory findings are made, and discretionary under section 409-a (2) in the absence of such statutory findings. But it is indisputably clear that preventive services are authorized only for the purpose of avoiding the risk of a child being placed in foster care, not for the purpose of safeguarding abused or maltreated children. The safeguarding of abused or maltreated children was clearly intended to be advanced by the protective and rehabilitative services authorized by the Child Protective Services Act of 1973.
As a study of the regulations promulgated by the New York State Department of Social Services makes clear, the preventive services authorized to prevent disruption of families and the placement of children in foster care, and the protective services authorized for the safeguarding of abused and maltreated children, are in many respects the same or quite similar, the principal differences arising from the separate, if related, purposes sought to be achieved under the two statutes.
Assuming, however, that preventive services were to be considered as authorized for the purpose of safeguarding abused or maltreated children, it is clearly wrong for a court to issue an order of mandamus directing a social services official to provide a service which in the exercise of discretion the official found to be unwarranted on the theory that the discretionary service is simply a means to the fulfillment of a nondiscretionary duty. This notion effectively eliminates the distinction between discretionary and ministerial acts. Moreover, it seriously distorts the legal reality to describe as nondiscretionary the duty to protect children believed to be suffering from abuse.
As an examination of the relevant statutory section makes clear, some aspects of the duty of child protective service workers are nondiscretionary, one of which, the duty to commence investigations within 24 hours of receiving a report of child abuse or maltreatment, was an issue specifically raised on this appeal. However, many of the critical decisions made by child protective service workers in discharge of their duties clearly involve the exercise of discretion and judgment. Is there credible evidence supporting the report of child abuse or maltreatment? Do the circumstances require action pending a determination as to whether the report of abuse is supported by credible evidence, and if so, what action? Assuming that the report is confirmed by credible evidence, should the child be removed from the parent or parents, or should protective and rehabilitative services be provided, and if so, which services? It is by no means always the fact that a confirmation of validity of a report will require that either a child be removed or that protective services be provided. All of these are clearly matters involving the exercise of judgment and discretion, and under established rules courts may not by way of mandamus require a social services worker to take one or another action which that worker has concluded was unjustified in the exercise of discretion and judgment.
Nor does it seem to us helpful to an understanding of the legal issues raised to assert that the "duty to timely investigate all reports, to probe for credible evidence of neglect as legally defined, and to provide whatever services are necessary to safeguard the child during the investigation and thereafter, is not discretionary." Manifestly, child protective services caseworkers have a nondiscretionary duty to timely investigate all reports of abuse or maltreatment.
It seems equally obvious, although the contrary view is central to much of the dissenting opinion, that a claim that in a particular case a worker did not adequately "probe for credible evidence of neglect", and that the worker failed in the exercise of discretion and judgment to provide services alleged to be necessary, does not convert these manifestly discretionary duties into nondiscretionary ministerial acts.
Although an evaluation of the correctness of the determinations of the social services workers with regard to the needs of the plaintiff families for preventive services is not an appropriate issue on this appeal, the comment in the dissenting opinion on that subject requires something to be said as a matter of fairness to those workers and to the larger group of social services workers of whom they may be thought to be representative. What an objective evaluation of the entire record discloses is that in almost all of the cases the judgment of the social services workers that children were not at risk of foster care was clearly correct in light of the facts known to them, and that for the most part the correctness of the determinations was not affected by any facts subsequently developed.
Nor do we think the record justifies the observation that as a whole the response of the social services workers to the undoubted needs of the family plaintiffs was lacking in competence. Undoubtedly the record discloses what appear to be omissions and lapses. When considered as a whole, the response of the several social services workers to the problems presented was far more substantial than is suggested in the dissenting opinion. As to two of the original plaintiff families, the record establishes that preventive services appropriate to their situations were in fact authorized prior to the commencement of this lawsuit, although the direction for such services had not been put into effect at that time. As to almost all of the family plaintiffs, the record is clear that the parents did not request at any time prior to the commencement of the lawsuit those services, the denial of which was set forth as a ground for relief in this action, and the record does not establish for the most part that the social services workers should have been aware of those needs. In one case, and that one of the two intervening families, the Lee family, the parent emphatically denied in response to inquiries the existence of conditions that might have justified the providing of such services, and on the very day she signed the affidavit claiming a failure to respond to her request for services, denied in response to a specific inquiry by a social services worker that she had any need for services.
In the above observations we of course do not suggest that social services employees are only obligated to provide services where requested. Obviously, they have an obligation to provide services where the need for such services is established to the satisfaction of the social services worker. The fact that families did not request such services, although the denial of requests for such services was alleged in plaintiffs' affidavits, is surely relevant to a fair evaluation of the manner in which the social services workers discharged their obligations.
Nor is it accurate to say that the inquiry into the report of child abuse relating to the Lee family was limited to the inquiry of the mother. The record is clear that the social services worker questioned not only the mother, but also the oldest child in the family and the boyfriend whose alleged conduct was central to the complaint of child abuse. In addition, the social services worker determined on the basis of personal observation and investigation that there was no substance to the claim in the report of abuse that the family was lacking sufficient food or clothing for the children.
What clearly appears is that the central problem of most of these families was their lack of a permanent home, and although the social services workers are authorized to assist them in securing permanent homes, and in fact did so, it is clear that they had neither the authority nor the ability to provide such homes.
This is not to say that the record does not disclose inadequacies and failures, nor that it does not disclose room for considerable improvement, but it is not fair to this group of workers to present them as uniformly incompetent, callous, or insensitive to their important obligations.
In addition to confirming the order appealed from, our dissenting colleagues have concluded "upon searching the record that appellants have failed to comply with the mandatory directives of Social Services Law § 423 and 424 in all cases, due to an erroneous policy promulgated by defendant Commissioner of the New York State Department of Social Services". In particular, it is urged that a regulation promulgated by the New York State Department of Social Services, 18 NYCRR 432.2 (b) (4) (x), impermissibly limits the discretionary power of the social services workers under Social Services Law § 409-a (2) to provide preventive services. On the basis of this analysis, it is urged that a declaratory judgment should be entered striking down that section as arbitrary and invalid, and giving detailed instructions to the several agencies as to how they should discharge their functions.
In this aspect of the dissenting opinion our colleagues raise and determine an issue not presented by the notice of appeal in this case, and grant to plaintiffs, who did not cross-appeal from Special Term's order, relief not requested in the motion that gave rise to that order, on the basis of a theory never presented by plaintiffs.
From a study of the complaint and amended complaint, it is indisputable that these pleadings never identified the regulation in question as arbitrary or invalid, or suggested that the regulation in any way adversely impacted on the plaintiff families or upon other families alleged to have been similarly situated. An examination of the factual submissions introduced by, and on behalf of, the family plaintiffs, discloses no claim that they were deprived of services because of the regulation, nor the suggestion of any factual basis for the conclusion that the regulation in question affected in the slightest degree the services which they received. Indeed, as to two of the plaintiff families who were never the subject of reports of child abuse, and as to one which was the subject of such reports at times not relevant to the issues in this case, the irrelevancy of the regulation is apparent. As to the three families in which there was such a report, the record is conclusive that the regulation alleged to be invalid in no way affected the response of the social services officials to their needs.
By any standard it would be unusual behavior for an appellate court to reach and determine an issue never presented in a litigation, and to do so without providing an opportunity for the adversely affected parties to be heard on a question which they had no reason to believe was part of the litigation. (See, Collucci v Collucci, 58 NY2d 834, 837.) In this case, the suggested departure from the normal rules governing appellate courts is singularly unwarranted.
This lawsuit is obviously the highly professional result of a cooperative effort involving lawyers of outstanding ability, respected advocates for the homeless, and the trained personnel of major organizations with large and extensive experience in addressing the problems of abused and maltreated children and their families. It is not easy to believe that in their extensive experience with such children and their families the skilled personnel of the organizational plaintiffs would not have observed, if it were the fact, that the families had been deprived of needed services because of an invalid regulation, and that the lives of children had been put in jeopardy, if not in fact lost, as a result of that regulation. Nor is it easy to believe that if any of the several studies of the response of government agencies to the problems of abused children had disclosed the pernicious effect of the regulation discovered on this appeal by our dissenting colleagues, a challenge to the regulation would not have been part of this lawsuit.
The reason that the regulation was not part of the case presented by plaintiffs' skilled counsel is readily apparent from an examination of the regulation together with the entire body of regulations and the statutes that the regulations were intended to implement.
The regulation is one of a group which sets forth the responsibilities and powers of the child protective service. That service is vested with the sole responsibility for receiving and investigating reports of child abuse, and is the sole entity responsible for providing and coordinating services necessary to safeguard the child's well-being and to preserve and stabi lize family life when appropriate. The particular regulation in issue was concerned with defining the circumstances under which child protective service caseworkers, exclusively authorized and empowered to provide protective and rehabilitative services to children who were the subject of reports of abuse or maltreatment, should also be permitted to provide preventive services of the kind normally furnished by other social services workers for the purpose of preventing family disruption. The regulation states that child protective workers should be permitted to provide preventive services only where the family was eligible for mandated services and where the protective service caseworker was directly providing other services to the subjects of indicated abuse and/or maltreatment reports. As the dissenting opinion acknowledges, nothing in this section diminished, or purported to diminish, in any way the existing discretionary power of other social services workers to provide preventive services.
Manifestly, the regulation which our colleagues would strike down as arbitrary, in the absence of any presentation on the issue by the parties before us, is concerned with the allocation of functions between social services workers authorized in the normal course of their duties to provide preventive services and child protective caseworkers who have the sole responsibility for investigating reports of child abuse and maltreatment, and the sole responsibility for providing a broad plenitude of protective and rehabilitative services in the discharge of their duties. The central thesis of this aspect of the dissenting opinion is that, in ways not easy to understand and for which no shred of support exists in this record, the limitation on the power of child protective caseworkers to provide nonmandated preventive services in some way impairs significantly their ability to discharge their functions.
We are told that this limitation on the power of child protective services caseworkers to provide preventive services, although they have broad power to provide rehabilitative and protective services, in part duplicative of preventive services and in some respects probably more extensive, somehow impedes their ability "to gather evidence 'swiftly and competently' ". In the absence of any support in this record that any of the plaintiff families were adversely impacted by this limitation, and in the absence of any suggestion in the extensive literature on the subject that this limitation has the consequences attributed to it, the sweeping conclusion drawn by our colleagues rests on a very tenuous foundation indeed.
What is presented is a professional disagreement between our colleagues and the New York State Department of Social Services as to the proper allocation of functions under the statutes with which we are concerned, between social services workers authorized in the course of their duties to provide preventive services and child protective caseworkers. In a lawsuit that fairly presented the issue, in which the facts provided some color of support for the conclusion reached by the dissenters, and in which the New York State Department of Social Services had an opportunity to respond, the issue of the reasonableness of the regulation might well be appropriate for judicial consideration. That issue has no appropriate place in this lawsuit.
In reaching the above-described legal conclusions, we do not intend to suggest that all is well with the provision of preventive services. The record includes studies by qualified professionals—studies for the most part sponsored and authorized by one or more of the defendant agencies—in which it was found that there have been severe deficiencies by the several defendants in discharging their statutory obligations to provide preventive services.
In particular, it has been found that the city defendants have frequently failed to provide two important core preventive services in circumstances in which such services were indicated—homemaker services and day-care services. In addition, it has been found that many children, notwithstanding the statute with which we are concerned, have been placed in foster care where, in the opinion of those conducting the studies, preventive services might have avoided that result.
Assuming the essential correctness of the conclusions reached in the several studies, and that the conditions described in them have not significantly changed since the studies were conducted, it would seem clear that a radical improvement in the response of the several defendants to their obligations to provide needed preventive services is a matter of large and urgent public importance.
Accordingly, the order of the Supreme Court, New York County (Edward H. Lehner, J.), entered August 7, 1986, which granted defendants' motion to renew and thereupon adhered to the court's original order dated May 27, 1986, which, inter alia, (1) granted the motion of intervenors-plaintiffs for a preliminary injunction requiring the city defendants to prepare service plans within 30 days, and thereafter to provide all services recommended therein; (2) granted the motion of the organizational plaintiffs for a preliminary injunction requiring the city defendants to commence investigations of reports of suspected child abuse or neglect within 24 hours of receipt of such reports; and (3) denied the city defendants' motion for summary judgment should be modified, on the law, without costs, to deny the motion of intervenors-plaintiffs for a preliminary injunction requiring the city defendants to prepare service plans within 30 days and to provide all services recommended in such plans; to declare that the findings set forth in Social Services Law § 409-a (1) (a) involve the exercise of discretion and judgment; to declare that a child's service plan prepared in accordance with Social Services Law § 409-e does not constitute a contract enforceable as such by the court; and to dismiss as otherwise nonjusticiable plaintiffs' claim for system-wide declaratory relief with regard to preventive services, and otherwise affirmed.