The embattled Lackawanna County Office of Youth and Family Services has a full state operating license again, but only because of a settlement meant to lock in further improvement in managing cases.
County officials celebrated the restored full license during a news conference Monday at the Government Center in Scranton.
The state Department of Human Services downgraded the agency on June 23, 2023, to a provisional license that required strong improvement and issued two more provisional licenses since.
The department issued a fourth provisional license Nov. 26, the most allowed under state law before revocation, but the county appealed, and the two sides agreed the next day on an already negotiated reprieve — the settlement — to end the appeal.
The full license is for nine months.
Surrounded by office caseworkers and other staff, including acting office director Kerry Browning, county commissioners Bill Gaughan and Matt McGloin credited their hard work for the improved performance. The commissioners inherited the downgraded agency when they took office in January.
"Since day one, we have worked diligently to rectify problems in the office, especially inadequate staffing that led ... (to) those provisional licenses," Gaughan said. "And the people that you see standing behind me — and there's some in the audience today, and there's some who are, I'm sure, out in the field doing the work -- these are the people that we have to thank.”
Investigation, legal proceedings
By the time the state downgraded the agency’s license, city police were investigating the agency’s handling of abuse cases. In November 2022, police seized a hard drive from the county after finding a woman dead in her apartment and three children living in squalor.
County officials attributed any problems to staffing shortages that worsened as police investigated the conduct of agency caseworkers and supervisors.
Bill Browning, the former head of the county’s Department of Health and Human Services and Kerry Browning’s husband, called the police investigation “ethically challenged” and “legally questionable.” He declined to elaborate.
District Attorney Mark Powell accused the county of shifting blame for the agency’s “outrageous conduct.”
Days after the license downgrade, city police charged two caseworkers, two supervisors and a former caseworker with endangering children.
In January, a county judge ruled the five people charged have immunity and dismissed the charges.
Powell appealed and the appeal remains pending.
New administration takes office
After taking office, Gaughan and McGloin fired Bill Browning, but kept his wife as acting director. They also hired consultant Beverly Mackereth, a former state secretary of health and human services with roots in child-protective casework, to study the agency.
Mackereth recommended the commissioners adopt strategies to find more help to deal with the case backlog and perform various elements of the agency’s mission until things improved.
McGloin said the settlement followed the fourth provisional license by a day, but improvement took a lot longer.
“That was not the result of a miraculous 24 hours, but a year-long, all-hands-on-deck effort,” McGloin said.
He outlined the county’s measures aimed at improvement. Among them were the hiring of Mackereth and Myers, Brier & Kelly, the law firm that helped deal with legal and regulatory issues.
Mackereth recommended temporary measures to find more staff. The county contracted with about a dozen child welfare workers from outside the county to help with case backlog and allowed other county employees to help with that, too.
The commissioners also shut down a planned Department of Health with plans to shift its workers to a proposed Family First Community Pathways Project.
The project’s aim is to help families before they require Office of Youth and Family Services intervention. Gaughan said the county expects state approval of the idea before this year ends.
McGloin said the office’s entire staff totaled 60 people when he and McGloin took over control of the county.
“Today, that number is 82, a 36% increase, including 14 new full time case workers (who have) produced substantial progress in reducing the case referral backlog that was at the heart of the state license restrictions,” McGloin said.
In January, the backlog stood at more than 900 cases, McGloin said.
“As of Dec. 3, it was at 688 and trending downward,” he said.
Settlement goals
The settlement says one of its goals is to eliminate the backlog of certain cases by the end of the full license. It requires the county to “have job openings for at least 12 part-time caseworkers whose sole responsibility is to work on backlog cases.”
Kerry Browning said the hiring of new staff has led to a mix of older and younger caseworkers that has changed the agency’s culture “for the better.”
“Morale is increasing ... but there is still work to be done,” Browning said. “The Office of Youth and Family Services can now write its own narrative, which is one of hope and excellence for the future.”
That future will require complying with the settlement, which says the county must, among other things:
- Implement all corrective measures already promised.
- Expanding two other consultants’ roles within 45 days to improve case screening and investigations and training, coaching and mentoring of caseworkers; monitor supervisors’ performance, caeworkers to ensure regulatory compliance.
- Reduce the number of general protective service cases by 14% in each of the next three quarters. Such cases center on getting people access to medical care, adequate child care, drug and alcohol treatment and other services that could reduce conditions that lead to child abuse.
- Reduce average caseload size for caseworkers and staff by 15% by the end of three quarters.
Failure to comply risks licensing sanctions.
