Appeal Process or Lack Thereof When a kinship caregiver indicates a willingness to be a resource for a child in need of out-of-home placement, the county agency must provide notification of the decision to approve, conditionally approve or deny the caregiver for placement and licensure. This notification must be in writing and inform the caregiver of their right to appeal. From there, the responsibility lies with the caregiver to respond within 30 days of notification, in writing, to the agency with their intention to appeal. Under regulation, the agency then has 15 days to determine if it can resolve the appeal independently, and if not, it will then be sent to the Office of Hearing and Appeals. Far too often, kinship caregivers are not provided written documentation of the denial to be a licensed caregiver. Kin are often disqualified by the agency without being formally considered. Many kin are not told why they have been denied. There is no process for kin to request a review of the agency’s denial other than to try to contact the agency’s complaint line, which kin often find futile. Very few kin are granted review by the court, as dependency proceedings are commonly closed to the public. Some grandparents can file a motion to intervene, but few have the know-how to do so effectively without the assistance of counsel, and even then, might not have the means to obtain it. Disqualification Case Studies Darcy Darcy was caring for her grandchild prior to the child welfare agency becoming involved. In fact, Darcy was the one to make the referral due to the concerns for her grandchild. What she did not know is that a GPS report on her from 10 years ago, related to her daughter’s delinquency as a teen, would result in her disqualification for kinship and the removal of her grandchild from her care. Mary Mary was disqualified by a child welfare agency for a GPS report from 9 years ago when she placed her daughter in a facility for mental illness – despite her daughter being released from the facility back to her care, Mary was classified as an inappropriate caregiver for her grandchild.
County agencies should not automatically disqualify kin but should work with them to provide needed support to alleviate non- safety related barriers. One of the leading disqualifiers reported by kin caregivers is their prior history of child welfare involvement. Prior history of GPS referrals, which are often due to neglect or poverty, are not legal or regulatory barriers to kinship approval. However, counties are given great latitude in identifying a family’s prior history and determining if they are appropriate to care for other children. While only safety-related reasons should be indicators of disqualification, counties can refuse to license a kinship home based on that family’s history of child welfare system involvement. For example, counties can refuse to proceed with a kinship home placement for reasons such as truancy of prior children and homelessness. This should not be the case if the individual is able to provide care for a child presently. Similarly, nothing requires the agency to consider if the previous child welfare involvement resulted in the reunification of an individual with their children who were removed. If we believe that people can change or that their history is not representative of their current situation, we should not hold earlier situations against them when deciding future placement decisions. It is also critical to understand a history of GPS reports in the context of the historic and ongoing surveillance and over-reporting of families of color. Within the regulations, non-safety factors can be waived by the state to allow child placement. For example, the regulations call for a maximum number of children allowable to be in the home when considering placing additional children. County agencies can request a waiver to that maximum if, for example, it will allow a sibling group to remain together. Waiver processes can be a conduit to eliminating barriers to kinship placement. The state issued a formal written waiver process and posted it publicly in 2020. xvi The challenge with this waiver process is there is no guidance for county agencies on what substantively should or should not be presented in a waiver, nor is there any identification of a process for kin to be notified or how to appeal a decision.
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Kinship Care in Pennsylvania: Creating an Equitable System for Families – January 2021
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