By Lindsey Petitt, JD MPA, CIP Administrator | Office of Court Services
What is the Court Improvement Program?
The Court Improvement Program—federally funded and operated within the highest court of each state—assesses the role, responsibilities, and effectiveness of state courts in carrying out state laws governing child welfare proceedings. The program implements improvements based on these assessments. Responsibilities include promoting the safety, well-being, and timely permanency of children in foster care; supporting engagement of families in child welfare cases; improving collaboration between the courts and the child welfare agency around data collection and analysis; providing training; and assisting with the Child and Family Services Review and Title IV-E Foster Care Eligibility Reviews.
The Child and Family Services Review
Indiana recently completed round four of the Child and Family Services Review. The goals of the CFSR are to ensure conformity with federal child welfare requirements, to determine what is happening to children and families engaged in child welfare services, and assist states in helping children and families achieve positive outcomes. After a CFSR is completed, states develop a Program Improvement Plan to address any areas that were found to need improvement.
The Department of Child Services, Indiana Office of Court Services, CIP, and various judicial and child welfare stakeholders came together to form workgroups to address the results of the CFSR. Through the workgroups, four cross-cutting themes were identified for the PIP:
- workforce development
- foster parent recruitment and retention
- service array and development
- cross collaboration with courts
The CIP presented the findings of the CFSR to the Child Welfare Improvement Committee and the Juvenile Justice Improvement Committee. Committee members shared the following barriers to collaboration with courts and timely achievement of permanency:
- Lack of effort to locate missing parties
- Failure to follow procedure for publication of unknown or missing parties
- Not utilizing parent or family members as sources of information
- Missing affidavits of service or diligent inquiries to locate missing parties
- Not making the record for later trials or appeals
- Not focusing on elements of the petition and burden of proof
- Timeliness of order completion (both court and DCS drafted)
- Overcrowding of the dockets
- Scheduling difficulties due to shortage of available public defenders
- Mediation program availability
- Availability of senior judges and an unwillingness to hear CHINS cases
- Lack of uniformity across counties
- Turnover (DCS, courts, attorneys, and providers)
- Lack of provider availability (service deserts)
- Lack of placements for children with high acuity needs
- Lack of concurrent planning
Current CIP Initiatives
Currently, the Court Improvement Program is working with courts to help overcome some of these barriers with sub-grants. Courts can apply year-round to receive grants to help implement or fund projects or initiatives designed to decrease the time to permanency for families involved in the child welfare system. Program sub-grants have been used to pay for mediation, permanency facilitations, project coordinators, and other innovative projects. Grants are awarded based on available funding, and courts are encouraged to reach out to the program staff to discuss options.
The program also offers professional development scholarships for judicial members wanting to attend training or join organizations focusing on child welfare. These applications are available year-round and can be found on the CIP website. The scholarship will award up to $3,000 in expenses and requires a 25% match (cash or in-kind).
The program also aids counties with projects and initiatives through the use of Jurists in Residence. The JIRs are senior judges with background knowledge and practice in child welfare cases. They can assist courts by covering dockets and advising judges on proposed projects and initiatives that may benefit their county.
Court Performance Measures
The Court Performance Measures were established by Indiana Administrative Rule 1(F) in 2013 to track and measure court performance in Child in Need of Services and Termination of Parental Rights cases. These measures allow courts to assess compliance with national standards, recognize strengths and areas of improvement, enhance the quality and timeliness of hearings, and improve outcomes for children and families. In 2015, these measures were compiled in a public-facing dashboard.
The Child Welfare Court Performance Measures Dashboard provides performance measures data across multiple pages. The main tab displays five permanency types followed by the seven key measures of timeliness. It also includes an interactive map showing median days to permanency by court. The tab labeled “Permanency” displays time to permanency by “permanency type” as well as five-year historical data. This data can be filtered by year, county, or permanency type. The “County Snapshot” tab displays graphs for eight performance measures in historical view over time by selected county.
The CIP is available to give technical assistance and support to courts as they review the data and implement plans to address any areas of concern. For more information, please reach out to the CIP Administrator, Lindsey Petitt, at [email protected].