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Athens County Children Services asks voters to renew its levy amid ballooning child placement costs
By: Theo Peck-Suzuki | Report for America
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ATHENS, Ohio (WOUB/Report for America) — Athens County Children Services is seeking voter approval of a renewal levy in November supporting the placement of children in foster care.
The 3 mill levy was last passed in 2015. Since then, the costs of care and placement have risen from $1.77 million to $4.5 million, according to Executive Director Otis Crockron. He attributed the dramatic change to a scarcity of beds for children with acute behavioral and psychiatric needs, coupled with recent regulations that make it harder for new facilities to open.
“You’ve got all these counties that are really trying to go after the same beds as we have an increase of children coming into care,” Crockron said. He added that caseworkers may call between 70 and 150 facilities for a single child before finding a bed.
At that point, Crockron said, the cost becomes a matter of supply and demand. It’s not unusual for a provider to charge Children Services $800 to $1,000 per child per night. In some cases, Crockron said, that number may go as high as $2,000.
“It’s not just finding a bed. We’re trying to match the proper bed with the level of care that that child needs,” Crockron explained.
“I mean, we had one place that was in Utah. That was the only place we could find. Then fortunately, at the last minute, we found someone else. But that happens a lot,” Crockron said.
Had that last-minute placement not worked out, Crockron affirmed, the child in question would likely have been put on a plane and flown out West.
The renewal levy would maintain Children Services’ current level of funding for putting children in these kinds of placements. Public information officer Matt Starkey said that by doing so, the levy indirectly helps with “prevention work” — that is, programs designed to keep families from reaching the point where child removal is on the table.
That includes the popular school outreach program, which places caseworkers in schools throughout Athens County, and the summer PB&J distributions that provide food to low-income households.
“Just last year, 5,346 children received peanut butter and jelly throughout the summer,” Starkey said.
These programs are not a state-mandated part of what Children Services does, but foster care placement is. Without the levy, Starkey said, the agency would have to make some tough decisions about what to cut in order to keep fulfilling its primary purpose.