By Helen Altonn
Star-Bulletin
By Helen Altonn
Star-Bulletin
People trying to keep Hawaii's children from being maimed and murdered by those closest to them shatter the "health state" image with grisly facts.
Obstacles in nearly every direction frustrate state efforts to protect children from harm by those who supposedly love them. Child abuse death figures are incomplete, so officials don't know how bad the situation actually is.The state Department of Human Services doesn't count cases where a child dies and there are no siblings to intervene for, said Deborah Lee, assistant program administrator for Child Protective Services (CPS) intake, abuse and neglect units.
Also, some children likely are slipping through the CPS net because of sheer volume of cases and lack of resources, she said. Intake workers last year received 15,000 to 20,000 calls from people reporting something wrong, Lee said. "It may not necessarily be abuse or neglect, but I think people are desperate, wanting some kind of assistance or support, and they don't know where else to call."
Priority goes to the most vulnerable kids, those under 5, who are nonverbal or handicapped, workers say. Cases that aren't serious but need help are channeled to community programs.
"It's rough because the staff is pretty much new staff," said Johnny Papa, CPS intake division supervisor. "The phone keeps ringing and you do what you gotta do. As everyone else's doors close, families don't get picked up on the front end for supportive services. Families sit, stew and fester. When they come to us, they're in crisis already."
As a result, Lee said, the staff is taxed with tougher cases needing more specialized services, and most require court intervention.
More than 900 kids are in foster care or other out-of-home arrangements. The Legislature allocated $17 million for foster care for 1995-96, which wasn't enough. An additional $880,000 was requested through June.
Lee would rather see resources going into preserving family homes for children. The department is working with nonprofit agencies to try to keep families intact, but resources are drying up with budget cuts, she said.
Human Services Director Susan Chandler said CPS frontline workers have been protected from position cuts and no vacancies have been frozen. Even so, CPS units totaled about 185 staff members in September - 85 short to handle 3,876 cases at that time, based on Child Welfare League of America standards.
"For us, it's a question of how you're going to be able to respond and how much," said John Walters, a DHS assistant program administrator. "As caseloads go up, it's inevitable that your quality of work is going to suffer."
While an estimated 80 percent of the cases involve substance abuse, he said, drug programs still lost funding.
"Any cuts in services to this population result in people just being essentially untreated. And a high caseload probably means children stay in foster care longer because a worker has less time to spend with the family," Walters said.
The DHS asked for aides in 1992 to help child welfare teams with non-social work. Most were cut last year, Lee said. "Now we're back to where we started . . . That's been very frustrating and demoralizing."
Family Court Judge Bode A. Uale, who handled the child abuse and neglect calendar until recently, said, "It's been terrible with this budget situation. It makes it hard to try to reunite families because of a lack of aides to facilitate visits."
Although abuse and neglect statistics have been steady, he noted a surge in cases from the neighbor islands. Also, he said, more cases involve women on drugs.
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