May 28, 2025
Senator Ben Gilmore Members, if you would go ahead and take your seats. We're going to go ahead and get started. So with that, I'm going to call the committee to order. Chair sees a quorum. Let's go ahead and start with the consideration of the minutes. So, members, we're going to have to do this a little bit differently. Exhibit B1 of your packet, or Senate minutes, committee minutes only. So only the members of the Senate will be able to vote on those. So with that, I will entertain a motion from the Senate to approve the minutes for Exhibit B1. I have a motion. I have second. Any discussion on those? Wait a second. You're not on the committee, Senator Flippo.
So I have motion and I have a second. Yes, so with that, any discussions? Senator Flippo, would you like to have discussion? Okay. Seeing no discussion, all in favor say aye. All right, not hearing any opposed, thank you, members. Going to exhibit B2. This is the Joint Committee, so I can entertain motions from either side. I have a motion. I have a second. Any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all in favor, say aye. Thank you. None opposed. All right. Exhibit B3, this is for the Senate only. Senator Filippo, I appreciate your effort, but I'll ask you not to make this motion.
It's exhibit B3, minutes for the December 4th meeting. I'll entertain a motion. I have a motion, have a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Any opposed? All right. And then exhibit B4. This is for the Friday, December 6, meeting. Senate only. I will entertain a motion from the Senate. Have a motion. I have a second. Any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. All right, thank you.
I would ask the committee to to wake up on my side a little bit. I see the House is here all bright-eyed. So, members, with that, we're going to move to item C, Department of Human Services Division of Children and Family Services. And this is rules pertaining to safety and risk management and technical revisions. Do we have-- there she is. If you would, please come to the table, recognize yourself for the record, and you may proceed.
Amber Sartain Good morning. I'm Amber Sartain. I'm an assistant director with the Division of Children and Family Services. Up today for review this morning, the rule packet that we have reflects current practice in DCFS as it relates to safety and risk management. This rule also reflects language changes as a result of Act 364 of the 94th General Assembly, such as replacing the terms 'protection plan' with 'immediate safety plan.' There are also some technical changes throughout the packet as well to note operational changes within the division. Some removal of internal procedures, and some general formatting purposes are also included. There is no fiscal impact. We didn't receive any public comments during the public comment period, and I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you.
Senator Ben Gilmore Members, you've heard the presentation. Any questions? Seeing no questions, then I will entertain a motion to review the rule. I have a motion. I have a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Any opposed? Thank you. The rules are reviewed. Let's go down to item D, Department of Human Services, Division of Children and Family Services. And this would be the quarterly performance reports. Let's just hear the most recent report, if you would, director. Thank you. And if you would recognize yourself for the record, you may proceed.
Tiffany Wright Good morning. I'm Tiffany Wright. I'm the Director for the Division of Children and Family Services. And so if you'll go to the book that you have that says third quarter, which will be January 1 through March 31, that is the book that I'll be reviewing this morning with you all. And then just as a reminder, if you want to know about your specific county or area in the state, the map on the front provides the outline for those specific counties and areas and how we break them up at DCFS.
On page one, during this quarter, there were a total of 8,154 child maltreatment reports accepted at the child abuse hotline. 6,677 of those were accepted and assigned to DCFS. 5,090 of those were accepted for investigation, and 1,587 of those were assigned to differential response. On page two, at the top of the page two, you'll see the chart around the percentage of investigations that were found true during this quarter. And you can also see the first and second quarter, which are separate books that you have in front of you today. At the bottom of page two, you can see what the number one, a breakdown of the allegation types and what we were finding true for.
So 62% of our maltreatment reports were found true for neglect, followed by 24% of physical abuse. If you go to page four, you will find the chart around the timeliness of initiating investigations, as well as the bottom of that page, you'll find the timeliness of closure. For both of these graphics, we continue to monitor and watch these. Both initiations and timely closure are important to ensuring safety of children. We've been working with drilling down into specific areas of the state to drill down and determine exactly what we're finding related to initiations.
And what we are seeing is while we got better for a little bit on timeliness of initiation, we are still seeing continued turnover, as well as-- when staff are turning over, then old reports are not the priority. The new reports are the priority so that we can ensure safety of kids. And so we're continuing to focus on this with our staff across the state. Recently convened our investigations team and reviewed some of this data with them and had conversations about what they're seeing across the State.
If you go to page six, at the top of page six, this is recurrence of maltreatment within six and 12 months. And so right now, 6 percent, we're seeing a recurrence of maltreatment within 6 percent of our cases, but we do remain below the national standard. At the top of page seven for in-home cases, you will see that we currently or at the end of the quarter had 1,512 in-home cases. As a reminder, in-home cases are those cases where we are serving children and families in the home with their parents and providing services to ensure safety and monitoring. That does involve 3,500 children.
On page eight, at the bottom, you'll see the monthly home visits. So that's DCFS staff going out and visiting. This is actually the highest in fourth quarters. We have been working on this as a team across the state, and so we're continuing to make progress on that. At the top of page nine, you will see the victimization rate amongst children who have received protective and supportive services cases. Again, this is a number that we monitor to ensure and follow that the services we're providing, the families that we're providing support to, that we are providing the right services and ensuring that kids are safe and really monitoring when we're making decisions.
At the top of page 10, moving into foster care, you'll see the continued decline in kids in foster care. And the bottom will show you entries and discharges. So we have just almost the same amount of kids entering as exiting. Permanency is important across the state for kids who enter, ensuring timely permanency. So we follow that pretty closely. At the top page 11, you will see the entries into foster care and those entry reasons. And as a reminder, a child could enter foster care for more than one reason.
At the bottom, you'll see the discharge reasons for children exiting foster care. 40% this quarter were reunification, followed by 25% adoption. And you can see the rest of the chart there. On page 12, you will see that over 78% of the children in foster care are in a family-like setting. So this could be with a relative, with a fictive kin, in a foster home, or in a therapeutic foster home on a child home visit or in a pre-adoptive placement. And at the bottom, the number one permanency goal for kids in foster remains 48%.
At the top of page 13, monthly visits to children in foster care were 85% at the end of third quarter. Again, this has been another priority for the division ensuring that we're seeing kids in foster care. And we're continuing to trend up. And then at the bottom of that chart in the middle of the page, you'll see 93% of those children were seen by any member of DCFS. On page 14, siblings placed together, 75% of the kids in the state are placed together with their siblings.
At the top of page 15, you will see permanency within 12 months, because we know permanency has to be a priority for the division, ensuring that as children are in our care, we can safely and swiftly move them to permanency. And so we are starting to trend up on timely permanency as well. Bottom of page 15 is related to preventing re-entries into foster care. So are the kids that were reunifying remaining at home when the decision is made to reunify? And currently at the end of third quarter, we were at 5.9%, which remains below the national standard.
On page 16 at the top, the number of children available for adoption at the end of the quarter was 197 total kids. That also includes children who may be adopted by their relatives. And then at the top of page 18, we finalized 121 adoptions. 40% of those were with relatives this quarter, and 34% of children were over the age of 10, which shows that the work that together that we've been doing is working related to moving our older children and youth to permanency. And that is all I have on this report.
Senator Ben Gilmore Okay. So I have a question before we go to questions from members. Thank you for the report. Thank you for being here. So I was looking through all the different reports on page 24 of that where it shows caseload average by county. I was just looking through there and so maybe you can help me figure out the rhyme or reason as to the fluctuation we see in some of these counties. Like, for instance, Bradley County in March 31, 2025, has 17. But then you go back, and last year in December 31 there was 22. And then if you go back September 30, 2024, there's zero. And that's just one example. Is there any particular reason why you see that fluctuation amongst counties?
Tiffany Wright Yes. So, it's all dependent upon turnover that we have within the workforce. So if there are staff in that county and then if there's not, we can move cases to other counties so that they can be worked. Also this is all cases. So when you have investigations, a lot of investigations, more maltreatment reports are coming in, caseloads go up. If kids are not discharging from foster care, caseloads go up. And so it just moves. But also as we have workforce struggles, we have to move cases to ensure that they're being worked so kids are safe. And so we do that. We do that pretty frequently.
Senator Ben Gilmore So on the September 30, 2024, report, where it says zero, that just means that we did not have a caseworker there, someone who's working that case?
Tiffany Wright That's right. That case was probably moved to a neighboring county, which is why, like, so in the area, it could have went down to Cleveland. It could've went over to Dallas. It just depends upon where the staff are in relation to what we have going on in those cases.
Senator Ben Gilmore Okay. And I may have a couple of follow ups, but I want to get to members. Representative Wardlaw, you're recognized for a question.
Representative Jeffrey Wardlaw Thank you, Mr. Chair. You kind of hit on most of my questioning. But recently we've had an influx in cases in Bradley County. And some of them have been really complex. And I know you can't talk about the cases. We're not going to ask those questions. But what I am going to ask is, UAMS called me for the last six months about a particular case in Bradley county.
And they said that in all the schools that they work in, when they see a case, they call in and it's worked ASAP, and you guys do a good job. But in Bradley County, for some reason, those cases never get worked. And that's a neglect to the constituency that I serve and the folks of Bradley County. And I want to know why. And when you look at these case numbers, you look back to September and it's at zero. And then it goes to 22.75, which I'm guessing is an average because I've never seen a 0.75 of a case. And then it goes to 17.
So kind of walk me through how many staff are located there at that DHS office under your direction. And walk me through why that complaint was made about our particular area in South Arkansas. We understand that y'all forget that we're still in Arkansas, but we are. And we need our people taken care of just as well as anybody else in the state of Arkansas.
Tiffany Wright So we don't forget about Bradley County at DCFS. They're important to us, too. I don't have the number of staff in that county, but I can give you a breakdown of the number of staff.
Representative Jeffrey Wardlaw You came here today to talk about staff in the counties and you don't have the numbers?
Tiffany Wright I don't have it broken down by a worker with me. I could probably pull it up on my computer, but I don't have the number of staff in that county right now today.
Representative Jeffrey Wardlaw Before you leave this building today, we need to sit down.
Senator Ben Gilmore I think great minds think alike in that. I just saw those numbers and it struck me. All right. Representative McClure, you're recognized for a question.
Representative Rick McClure Yes, you've answered most of my questions. But I want to bring your attention to Hot Spring and Grant County, which is on the opposite end of the spectrum with extremely high numbers. And I'm assuming you're going to reply that it's staffing, and you're in the process of staffing. Where are we in that? And then how far are we going to get behind on all the services while we're waiting?
Tiffany Wright So I would say we're not necessarily getting behind on services, but we are having to pull staff from multiple counties over to help cover those cases and work the cases, as well as we've had staff from other areas of the state come in and help out in different counties when we are navigating what's happening with the turnover. We are hiring people as quickly as we can get them hired. DHS did a hiring event. DCFS was able to get six people hired. I'm not sure if those were exactly a part of that county or not, but I could give that to you. And then we always have to monitor the workloads and what's going on with the turnover.
Representative Rick McClure Yes, being around this foster care thing for a long time, I understand that the caseload in the workers is a consistent turnover rate. It's always a challenge. But when I see 47 versus 21 being maybe a national average, with the people that you're pulling in, is that getting it back down closer to the 21 on the temporary place? Or are those case workers that are coming in from different counties now overloaded on both sides and only these two counties reflect it?
Tiffany Wright So we try, when we do bring in staff, we try not to bring them in to overload their county, right? So we have to be very strategic about that, which is why we try not to do that all the time. Like that's not a common practice. We have sent staff from our central office, program managers out to help as well. But also this is where we rely heavily with our community partners who are out in the community supporting some of the work and working with parents as well, because they're seeing families too and can help us navigate referrals for services and that kind of thing. So I don't know if I really answered the question. But we wait until the very last minute before we start pulling staff from other states because we know historically over the years that that doesn't always solve the problem, because then you send other counties down into crisis as well.
Representative Rick McClure Okay. One quick comment. As you project out, I don't know that you're aware or possibly you are. There is a population growth, especially in the northeast part of Grant County and in northwest Grant County and northeast Hot Spring County. So the number of people that you have traditionally served in those two counties are going up, and we anticipate it to go up for the next few years. So just keep that in mind as you plan out.
Tiffany Wright Yeah, we try to do a workload analysis every quarter to balance out staffing, supervision ratio to make sure that we're looking at the workloads, to make sure we have the right people in the right spot, and the number of people in the right county.
Representative Rick McClure Thank you.
Tiffany Wright You're welcome.
Senator Ben Gilmore I have a question. I'll go to Representative Tosh here in just one second. The pay plan that was recently passed, do we anticipate that helping with the shortage?
Tiffany Wright Yes, I hope so. We looked at our retention. I pulled it at the end of April, and we have actually-- it's getting better. It's improving again, meaning that we're turning over from 60 to 48 percent, which is much better. And so I'm hoping that with the pay plan going into effect, we'll be able to recruit people as well as maintain people who may be holding on.
Senator Ben Gilmore I know that's not Senator Hester, but it is Representative Tosh. So Representative Tosh, you're recognized.
Representative Dwight Tosh Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you. I know I'm not a member of the committee. And thank you for allowing me to ask this question. I just want to make sure that I understand who's conducting the investigations. And I was listening a while ago when you gave your report back on page two, the number of sexual abuse investigations that's being conducted, I'm assuming the way you explained that was by the investigators with DHS is the way I took that. So what I'm trying to be sure of, on a sexual abuse case, are y'all conducting those investigations? Are you turning those over to CACD, Crimes Against Children's Division with Arkansas State Police? I thought that's the type of cases they investigated. So I was just trying to make sure I understood. Who's the lead agency is when it comes to these types of sexual abuse investigations? How do y'all handle that?
Tiffany Wright So your more severe maltreatment, which would include some sexual abuse, it does go to crimes against children division. And then if CACD requests DCFS complete a health and safety assessment, at hat point we would become involved with the investigation. So most, I would say most, are going to CACD.
Representative Dwight Tosh Okay, that's what I wanted to be sure of. Your agency is not investing those types of serious crimes. You are actually, when you get that call, you're turning those over to CACD. Is that what you just said?
Tiffany Wright They're assigned at the hotline. So when the call comes in from the child abuse hotline, it is assigned either to DCFS or CACD.
Senator Ben Gilmore Representative Gramlich, you are recognized.
Representative Zack Gramlich Thank you, Mr. Chair. Really, I've had people contact me in the last few days talking about a lot of our foster care workers and stuff like that. My big question is, you talked a little bit about retention and there's the monetary component. Is there anything else we're doing specifically that we're actively trying to increase retention in our people. Because I know it's a revolving door. If I talk to anyone who's been in the department for a while, that's the constant issue. So besides us increasing pay, what are other things that you all are doing specifically to increase your retention among these workers?
Tiffany Wright So over the course of the last several years, we've done other monetary things to support their work, as well as we've been exploring ways that we support them through, for example, secondary trauma. And we implemented and have trained some of our workforce in something called CSERT, which is a secondary trauma. They have enjoyed that training. The feedback we've gotten is they have enjoyed and learned something from that.
So we're discussing ways that we do enhance that and provide that to all staff. We also are starting to explore, we've heard from our frontline staff about new staff training and what that looks like and how that, if it was different, it may be able to help them more so that they can build longevity. And so we're exploring ways that new staff training is more appropriate for them. Right now it is a long training. And the feedback we're getting is they would like something different that sets them up for more success. And so that, and then just being-- as well as when I say new staff I'm also talking about the supervisors as well because supervisors are critical to the work that those frontline staff are doing and so how do we support supervisors and give them the skills that they need to support the frontline workforce.
So we're talking about training. We're talking the mental health components, then the monetary is coming and then just being present and remembering what the work is like. So we visit county offices, my team visits to see what's going on. How can we support them, hear systems barriers they might be having, things that we can change.
Senator Ben Gilmore All right, Vice Chair Bentley, you're recognized.
Representative Mary Bentley Thank you, Chairman. Representative Gramlich asked pretty much what I was wanting to ask, but do we know what other states are, as far as retention goes, if they're where we are at 48 to 60 percent? Do you know that?
Tiffany Wright Not off the top of my head. I know there are some states that are doing much better than we are, 25, 30 percent. And there are states who are experiencing the same things that we are related to high amount of turnover. It is different depending on where you're at.
Representative Mary Bentley So those states that are doing well at 25 percent, do we know what they're doing that we're not doing that we might be able to implement.
Tiffany Wright Some of them have very small caseloads. They're able to retain staff. Things that we've been doing related to permanency and prevention and those different efforts within the whole scope of the work, not just focused on the workloads, but like changing the value of the word, those things. It's kind of all the things that we've been doing, it's just we need to keep doing the things that we've been working on in our state and keep moving forward. I think you see more turnover with your foster care staff because those cases are harder, and it's much more to navigate. And so you see turnover with them. And so how do we keep that effort moving forward and wrapping around them and giving them the support that they need?
Representative Mary Bentley Okay, thank you. I think we need to continue to pursue that. Thank you.
Senator Ben Gilmore All right. Majority Leader Beaty, you're recognized.
Representative Howard Beaty Thank you Mr. Chair. I guess my question is, do you conduct exit interviews with all your employees when they leave?
Tiffany Wright DHS does exit surveys with them, yes.
Representative Howard Beaty And I heard you talk about the staff telling you that the training you have currently, they're not happy with.
Tiffany Wright That's right.
Representative Howard Beaty But I heard you also say, we're talking about it. Can you provide this committee, and because it's going to be asked later in another committee, more definitive information on what you're doing other than talking about it and what steps you're taking?
Tiffany Wright Yes. So we are working with our partnership at the U of A. And we've started some work groups with staff to-- We've started work groups to explore what is working well, what's not working well. We're listening. We're putting workers on those work groups, and we started that at the beginning of April. And so the work groups are working. We've been exploring curriculum in other states, what they use. So Utah uses some virtual trainings. They use like on the ground where they go to certain locations and see what it's like when they're going to be responding. So we have been exploring what's been going on around in other states to enhance our training.
Representative Howard Beaty Well, I just think it's important that the staff you have, you have a turnover issue and retention of employees. And if they're telling you they're not happy, then you probably need to tune in and listen to exactly what they're saying and take some steps. And I think just the attention and knowing that you're actually listening should help in that area. But I'm going to want to see more definitive information on what you're doing. So word to the wise.
Tiffany Wright Okay, thank you.
Senator Ben Gilmore Representative Henley, you're recognized.
Representative Dolly Henley Thank you, Mr. Chair. Do you have a chart or percentages on the increase in juvenile crime, particularly in Southwest Arkansas, based on the caseload that's not being worked?
Tiffany Wright I don't.
Representative Dolly Henley Do you think that would be something good to look into?
Tiffany Wright Probably in partnership with the Division of Youth Services. So my peer, we do work several, we have some cases that cross over, and so we could look at that. I'm sorry, I can't see you. But yeah, I don't have that data.
Senator Ben Gilmore Yeah, I think that would be interesting data to look at, the correlation between the two for sure. I don't know how that would be tracked now if it is. But there's probably a way to look at that. So if you would look at that, that'd be great. Great question, representative. Members, any other questions? Seeing noone else in the queue, director, thank you for being here. Thanks for taking the questions.
Tiffany Wright I have one more report, I think.
Senator Ben Gilmore Oh, you're right. I'm sorry. I completely overlooked the biennial report. Thank you for being on point today.
Tiffany Wright So the other document you have is called Overturned Investigations Report. It's from December. It says submitted December 1st, 2024. And this report came from Act 1025 in 2017. And I'm just going to walk you just through what this is. But this is basically the number of reports we found true on and what the percentages of those being overturned. So I'll just take Benton County and go through each. But 5,349 reports received by the hotline, 2,124 of them were accepted for investigation, 312 were found true. That's 14%. 29 investigations were appealed, percentage of true investigations appealed would be 9.3. Two of those were overturned, which was about 6.9%. And then that percentage of overall investigations overturned in that county was .1. And it's broken down like that for each county in the state. And there will actually be another one of these coming for 2025 next month.
Senator Ben Gilmore Any questions? Seeing none, bit premature earlier when I was thanking you. So I think we're done at this point. Seeing no other questions.
Tiffany Wright Thank you. And I'm staying up for the next presenter. So I'll just slide over.
Senator Ben Gilmore I'm not trying to run you off, just for the record. I just was trying to give you a break. Okay. So with that, let's move to item E. Paul Chapman with Restore Hope.
Tiffany Wright Oh, and I'm sorry. I forgot one other important thing. Now I'm interrupting. Please next Saturday, June 7, is Project Zero's Disney extravaganza. Project Zero does host events for waiting kids in foster care to potentially meet their forever family. But also, it's just a day of building hope in those waiting kids. If you're interested in coming and seeing what that is like, I would invite you to be there. And if you want to let me know, I'll be there as well.
Senator Ben Gilmore Would you mind sending something to staff to disseminate?
Tiffany Wright Yes, yes, I will.
Senator Ben Gilmore Representative Beaty, did you have a question for that?
Representative Howard Beaty Just one quick question on consistency. Looking through the reports, Clay County and their average caseload and issues there, can you provide some information on Clay County? You can do that offline and not at the table, but I'd like to know how many case workers and staff that you have in Clay County, because it seems that they're consistent throughout all three of these reports as being a higher area. Some of these counties change, but it looks like Clay is consistent. So I'd just like to know what's going on in Clay County.
Tiffany Wright I can do that.
Senator Ben Gilmore All right. Thank you, Representative. All right, Mr. Chapman, if you would introduce yourself for the record and then y'all may proceed.
Paul Chapman Thank you. I'm Paul Chapman. I am the executive director of a nonprofit that was founded here in Arkansas about nine years ago. It's called Restore Hope. And Restore Hope is a software and services company that partners with the state agencies and local communities to bring a tool set that allows all the different professional providers in the community to get better outcomes and become more efficient. And in the past 12 months, there are 19 counties in Arkansas that are using this tool set. These almost 1,400 professional providers in Arkansas collaborated to serve just over 3,500 Arkansans. And the goal in this service is to get them from crisis to career. So many of the individuals are in multiple areas of crisis. They could be homeless. They could be fleeing domestic violence. They could be involved in courts, whether that be misdemeanor or felony. They could have child welfare cases, and often do.
And the goal is to put the service providers that are already existing in communities and on a collaborative team in this software to allow that individual not only to get out of trouble, but to make it ultimately to where they're in a situation that would drastically reduce the odds of them falling back or recidivating into any of that trouble that we found them in. I'd like to tell you a little bit about how this occurred, because it was Arkansas grown. I was working for Fellowship Bible Church, making grants and doing direct service.
And over that time, we were heavily involved in reentry, after school programs, in foster care, in partnership with both the Department of Corrections and with DCFS and other agencies. But we had a kind of a catalytic event. 2012, an Arkansan got out of prison again, killed an 18 year old young boy. That was one of a string of pretty gruesome murders at the time. And so we started some reform, which led to a drastic increase in incarceration.
These charts, the one on the left here, came from a report in 2015, I think, by the Council of State Governments submitted to the committee meeting that showed the rise in the projected, if we didn't do something, the projected rise in prison population. What that had, this rise in incarceration, was an impact on the number of children entering foster care, which we really hadn't planned for. So what that told us at the time was that we have a set of complex issues that if we are unable to start to coordinate our responses, both at a local level and a state level, then we're not going to see the outcomes that we want.
And so what we ended up doing was going first to Fort Smith, Arkansas, which was hardest hit, both in percent of population incarcerated and the number of children in foster care. One in 34 kids in Sebastian County back in 2017 were in foster-care. It was about 28 per 1,000. National average is 5. It's kind of a story of globalization. A lot of jobs moved out. There was a lot of desperation and a lot of people committing crimes against others and children. And so it was a community really in distress. And so we started to work there with many of the community leaders to put together this collective impact idea. How do we actually put a coalition together that can execute, not just think about what the future could look like.
And so in 2018, we were able to acquire a software program that we call Hope Hub that is available to all of you now. There are some dashboards on it if you create a account that you'll have access to that you can see down to your county level. You can see the impact of what's going on for your constituents who are receiving this collaborative care. And it's drastically increasing outcomes. For instance, if we take a child into foster care with the goal of reunification, that reunification usually does not occur given the set of complex situations that that parent is in.
43% of the time we are successfully able to reunify the child with the parent that they were taken from when reunification is the goal. But over the last 12 months, for any parent that chose to work with the 100 families is what the initiative is called in these communities. Any parent that chose to have a team put around them, then it's over a 70% chance of reunification.
So we're seeing 25% swings in reunification rates. Most of the families that are receiving this help actually are prevention. So something's going on. They've become homeless. They've got substance abuse issues. Over half of the clients that we met, over 3,500 clients in the past year, when we met them had no source of income. About 40% didn't have a GED or high school diploma. And so what essentially this does, and I'll show you the software program for a kind of concrete representation.
This is a software program that exists as a part of the model in these 19 counties so far in Arkansas that allows-- every one of these circles would be a professional that's in the county that's going to serve on Ms. Susie Test case. And Miss Test has said, yes, I consent to you sharing my information with these people, which could be behavioral health or the church that runs the clothes closet down the street. It could be the child welfare office. It could be the community college that's going to help them get into truck driving school so that they go on and have a full time job and earn a living wage.
And so Miss Susie has consented to build this care team of professionals in that community. There is an assessment, a common assessment. No matter who is onboarding the participant, there is a common assessment, very thorough assessment that's done collecting all manner of information, including there are 13 areas in which there are very strong definitions of the situation that the client is currently in from one to five. That assessment is updated monthly.
So what that gives you is the ability to track. One, it gives you the ability to kind of triage, what are we going to do first? You're unemployed, but you're also homeless and can't pass a drug test. So we're not going to go down to the workforce center office now. What we're going to do is try to get you sheltered, you and your kids sheltered. We're going to try to you into treatment so that you can become sober so that then we can continue on with you into figuring out what type of work is suitable and that you want to do, and then try to navigate the helps that already exist in every one of our communities right now. So I wanted to flip through a few of these dashboards and then I'd be more than happy to take any questions.
This is a dashboard, again, if you create an account. And if you go to hopehub.io, you can create an account. Just make it a stakeholder account and you'll have access to all of these dashboards, many of which are now live. So they're updated every 15 minutes and you can see exactly what's occurring. But this dashboard is from 2024. It shows a summary of who did what to whom where and what happened? 706 of the just over 3,300 Arkansans served in that year, 706 of them had completed their journey from crisis to career.
That's full-time work and out of crisis. The number of care team members or professionals on average on someone's account was nine. And you can see every one of these bubbles is an organization in a community. And you could actually drill down to the local community or even the provider level to find out exactly what occurred and how many clients that they were on care team numbers for. And then it shows also, in those 13 areas that we have one to five scales for that's updated every month, then you can actually see in aggregate right now across the state, you can see it recovery, exactly what happened at intake and as of the last assessment, the snapshot, most recent snapshot what's occurring here.
So left is bad, right is good. Left is crisis. For housing, that means that you're homeless. A number two here means that you're at great risk. You've received an eviction notice. You know that you are going to be homeless unless something occurs here. And then you can see housing stability move here. At an individual level, for a provider that's on the system, you actually have a set of dashboards that actually show you when someone is in crisis so that it helps you with workflow. We need to address this now. Collaborative action plans are kept inside the system.
We call them a family advocate or a navigator. That's a particular role that funds, both grant funds and private funds are going to pay for in each individual community running this model. It helps them understand what they need to address now and help them connect to the appropriate service provider that exists in their community. There's also dashboards here on foster care and PS cases over time in each community. And the number of beds, this helps organizations like Every Child Arkansas, who are trying to close this gap between beds available and kids that are in care and need those beds. And then here are some real-time dashboards here that give you information on child welfare. Preservation, prevention and reunification data are kind of broken down. So with that I'll stop and see if there are any questions
Senator Ben Gilmore Thank you for the presentation. If you don't mind, would you formulate this in an email, send it to staff so that members have it? We can disseminate that. That would be helpful. I think it's a great tool. Senator Johnson, you're recognized for a question.
Senator Mark Johnson Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Ms. Wright and Mr. Chapman, thank you for this work on this. I did not know, Paul, that y'all were as integrated into the agency as you are. Of course, as you know, I'm a big supporter of your program. But I did not see how you were working with Ms. Wright and her staff. That encourages me very much.
When I look at the map, though, and you have your areas where you're able to get to your 100 families program targeted, and then you have the rest of the state. And I'm wondering, is this a capacity limitation, or is this a lack of, I'm going to say, partnering opportunities within those? And if so, how can we help you meet whatever challenge? I mean, I look at those counties, and I'm not saying that they don't need help, I'm just saying, I see a lot of them around them that aren't colored in and they obviously are not immune from these problems. Could you elaborate on that?
Paul Chapman Yes, sir. It's a funding problem. So what needs to exist in every community is to be able to put together what we call an alliance. It's a coalition of those professionals. And so to be to able to manage that alliance following this collective impact approach, you need a coordinator. And that coordinator needs to work for the right organization. Like in Hot Springs, it's Ouachita Behavioral Health. The community selected them as the backbone organization. And so we were able to partner with DHS and get a TANF grant. And then we passed that grant along to Ouachita Behavioral Health.
They hire a coordinator and a family advocate. And they start to put that alliance together where they're working out how do we actually work together as if we all were in the same organization? So I'm answering long, but shortly it's money. It always comes down to money. How do we pay for these people that don't exist currently and have very unique roles. So it's not like someone who's currently in the business could also do the coordinator role or the family advocate role.
And so we seek grants and private funding to be able to pass along to the right agencies in those communities. Our strategic goal has been to get first to the 25 most populated counties because 75 percent of Arkansans live there. And our approach, this collective impact approach, is really one of being able to coordinate the help that already exists in those communities. And as you can see on the map, there are some communities like Woodruff, which is one of the least populated communities. But there was a private funder who grew up there who said, I'm going to pay for it to come to my hometown.
But Woodruff has 3,000-4,000 people in the county. But you can see what they've done. They have 26-- currently as of 15 minutes ago, there are 26 families in Woodruff County that their care is being coordinated by that community, which is just amazing. So I guess the shortest answer is it's money. You know, how do we get more money to pass along to these communities so that they could hire as many advocates as demand presents? And we've got to have a coordinator to keep that alliance together.
Senator Mark Johnson And at this moment, I'm presuming that TANF is your primary source of this funding.
Paul Chapman In Arkansas. Yes, sir. Yeah, TANF has been the primary source.
Senator Mark Johnson And that's good, but it also is limited. And I pledge, Mr. Chapman, to try to work with y'all on future opportunities here. Mr. Chairman, I would be amiss if I didn't say that your work on the Department of Corrections side of things would be a lot easier if these folks are successful in what they're trying to do because these things are not isolated problems. They're all facets of the same problem. So thank you very much for your answers. And thank you, Mr. Chair.
Paul Chapman Thank you, Senator. On Department of Corrections, about 25% of all the clients in the last 12 months had a felony. About 30% had a child welfare case. And sometimes that was overlapped. They had a child warfare case and they had a felony. So you're right, we think about these things in silos or situations, but the people come to us in whole people.
Senator Ben Gilmore Yeah, that sort of speaks to Representative Henley's question from earlier. But I appreciate that. Thank you, Senator. Let's go back to Representative Bentley. You're recognized.
Representative Mary Bentley Thank you, Chairman. Thank you. Right here in the center. So looking at your map, can you give us the definitions of what the differences are between pre-launch discovery in a targeted community there?
Paul Chapman Yes. And so there is a discovery as we're talking with the community, trying to help that community decide who the backbone organization would be, if we can figure out how to pay for the coordinator and a case manager. And so it's these communities here in the gray are part of those 25 most populated counties where 75% of Arkansans live. The pre-launch is that organization has been found and they're starting.
We have a hundred and some odd page playbook on how to put the alliance together. And they have to hit certain gates before they can fully launch. And so there is activity, like Woodruff County right now is in pre- launch, and they're serving 26 clients. One of the hurdles that they have pass before they can fully launch is they are serving 20 clients actively.
Because that allows you to figure out exactly who the organizations are and what they need to be able to work together in this new way. So let's say that Ms. Wright worked for the behavioral health organization and I was going to refer a client to her that needed both substance abuse and mental health treatment, but she would only accept a couple of insurances.
And so now we have to work out exactly what would we do if she didn't accept an insurance that the participant currently had. And so that's what you're doing in prelaunch, is you're kind of shaking down exactly how that collaboration needs to work, contextualize to that particular community.
Representative Mary Bentley Follow-up, Mr. Chairman, if that's okay. So are the advocates, are they as a similar background to each one? Or they may be different in the counties that you're working with right now? Is there a person we're looking for? Are they all being funded the same way? Are there differences in the counties that are actively operating right now?
Paul Chapman That's a great question. So the background of the advocate, you're looking for someone who can personally relate to someone who may be having the worst day of their life. But they've got kind of that social worker instinct whether they've been formally trained or not as a social worker. And so we end up having Bachelors in social work. We have individuals who have worked in other social service agencies and we have folks who once were participants and have a year or two of sobriety and stability. Those individuals who have that lived experience, they're actually very, very good at meeting a client where they are.
For instance, if a client doesn't have transportation and they're currently living in a hotel, they'll actually drive to a fast food restaurant close to the hotel, have their meeting there and not think. They'll go above and beyond. In fact, this happened just last week. While they're there, they're meeting with a client and the client says, I really need a job, I don't have a job. They're like, well, I bought you a taco and we're going to go up there and talk to the manager about getting you a job. And they submit the application right there, let's take care of that right now. And so, that's something that individuals with lived experience, I'd say that they're going really above and beyond for the individual clients who are currently where they once were.
Representative Mary Bentley So if we're looking at these, when they enter all that information into this dashboard, is that transferable to DHS that they can get-- are they have to again enter all the information if they need SNAP or whatever or workforce or any of those things? Is that transferable at this point for them to be able to get the assistance they need?
Paul Chapman It is. We share a lot of information. In fact, the Hope Hub system is hooked up to the DHS system for eligibility determination on things like TANF. It's very difficult on some monies, like TANF is very difficult to prove. You've got to prove that the individual is eligible. And so what that makes it very difficult for is if we're paying for an organization, we give them a grant for TANF to provide services at TANF eligible individuals.
The individual that comes to you is maybe this mother fleeing domestic violence living in her car. She didn't think to grab her file folder when she left the house. But she comes to you for help because she's desperate. And we send her on kind of this scavenger hunt to find her birth certificates for kids and all the documentations you need to know that you are who you say you are and that you're eligible for the funds that we're going to use. What we've been able to do now for several years through our partnership with DHS is we can determine that eligibility within one week for 90% of everyone onboarded into Hope Hub. And that's available to all Arkansans.
And so if you do have a TANF grant, you're a service provider with a TANF grant, you can use this system, and it immediately will reduce. It's saving a lot of that TANF dollar, you know, if you're burning up 20, 25 cents of the dollar in kind of administrative tasks now. That reduces that greatly. So yes, we've even gone so far as to, y'all are making changes, I think in the Chris system, so that we're sinking more and more data up. And then in this dashboard, we'd even gone to, let's see if I can find it here. Here it is right here.
So we know that outcomes are better for families if they can get this team of, on average, nine different providers around them. So outcomes will go from 43% to over 70% reunification rates. And so now what we're doing in partnership with DCFS is county by county-- and this took a lot of work on the back end to be able to true up the clients here. But now we have some tools in place that we can push down to the county level to see what percentage of removals actually have a 100 families team around them, knowing that that improves outcomes for everyone.
It's more efficient for the individual organizations, and it's better for the person. And so now we're working logistically. How do we get in front of, ultimately it would be, how do we in front 100% of the families? Now they can say, no, I don't want your help, and that's fine. But that's what we're working to now, is using data to be able to help operationalize these improved deficiencies and better outcomes.
Representative Mary Bentley Thank you. I know I have heard nothing but positive about what all that you're doing so we will see what we can do to improve it across the whole state. So thank you.
Senator Ben Gilmore Thank you. Representative Duffield.
Representative Matt Duffield Thank you, Mr. Chair. What metrics are used to assess the success of the 100 Families Initiative, and how are these metrics tracked and reported?
Paul Chapman These dashboards. That's a great question. These dashboards are available. And for those that don't have an account, you could go to our website and every month we send out an email with the statistics in them along with stories. Here are the statistics. So here's the email from the last month that we put out, said total active parents currently at the time that we sent the email is 1,726 were in this collaborative care across Arkansas, the number of kids in those families, number of parents in the month, new clients this month, parents served in the past year.
And then ultimately what our goal is, is how do we actually get someone not only just out of crisis? Success is not closing the case. That's part of it. Success is how do we actually get the person to a situation, assuming that they want that, that they don't need the assistance any longer, that they're self-sufficient. That's ultimately the goal. And we have all kinds of markers along the way, and report that through these dashboards. Here's where the individual was at intake, here's where they are currently. Is that better or worse? And if it's worse, how do we shore up for that? Like transportation is a problem in most of our counties. And so we take action within that alliance to be able to address those issues.
Senator Ben Gilmore You're recognized for a follow-up.
Representative Matt Duffield Thank you, Mr. Chair. So what measurable outcomes do you guys have? Is it on the site, as far as reduced foster care rates or reduced incarcerations? I mean, is that on the site? Or incarceration rates, have they dropped? Do you guys have this data on the site or available for us to see?
Paul Chapman We've got all the dashboards on the site. We don't have any recidivism data. We haven't done a recidivism study yet for participants, but all the foster care data is there, as well as the prevention data. And we've just recently been selected DCFS and Restore Hope by the lab for economic opportunity at Notre Dame for a particular study on what's the return on investment in these situations. So that was really an honor to be selected by them at really no cost. And so we're in that process now of working through with their economics department on getting that study done. We estimate that to be probably be about a $400,000 study that they're giving to us in the state of Arkansas.
Senator Ben Gilmore Representative, you're recognized for follow up. You can keep your mic on if you'd like.
Representative Matt Duffield I guess one more. Could you just give the committee an example of just some hard data where 100 Families has made a difference, a tangible difference? Can you tell us in the committee? Just pick a county in Arkansas, whatever it is, but show us where you guys have made a real impact and a real result in reducing the kids that need the foster care or something of that nature.
Paul Chapman Yes, sir. Sebastian County, where we first started. Actually this model was created in Sebastian County by the leaders of Sebastian County. And there were 800 children in foster care at the time that this model started. And the last time I looked last week, there were 359 children in foster care in Sebastian County. So we went from 28 per 1,000 to 12 per 1,000.
The crime is down in Sebastian County. Adult crime has been down five or six years in a row, and incarceration in their local jail for local participants was down by about 20%. I'm sorry, that was 30% incarceration, 20% in crime there. I think if you would talk to any of the leaders, law enforcement and the judges, what this approach has allowed them to do is it's provided an environment in which instead of being fearful of bad data or feeling overwhelmed that you don't have the tools to address some of these complex problems, but maybe being held responsible for the results of them, as many of our law enforcement officers do feel, instead they feel like they have a community that if we can bring them good data that they will work on it together.
And that's exactly what occurred when we first went. In fact, Director Wright and I were on the first trip with the Department of Corrections. We took a Department of Corrections van on a trip to start launching this process back then. And that community was so embattled by all their various issues that everyone was stressed out. And you couldn't keep staff. And largely the leaders had lost hope that effort was going to result in any difference because they had been in it for so long. And now if you go and talk to them, in their own words, they will tell you it's night and day difference.
They don't like it when they're looking at increased juvenile crime, which has occurred in Sebastian County and many other places. But their first reaction then, a year and a half ago, was for the police chief to call a community meeting and to detail to that community exactly what the statistics were believing that that community was going to rally to come up with some new solutions. That's exactly what they're doing is they've launched a new program in partnership with law enforcement called Shield Our Youth.
So I don't know. There's kind of the science part of it with the data, 50% less, over 50% less foster care in Sebastian County. You have dropping foster care rates in other counties that are in year two of implementing this model. And then you've got the leaders, the judges and the law enforcement and the other community providers who will tell you that it's a new way of dealing with very complex hard situations.
Senator Ben Gilmore All right. Representative Eaton, you're recognized.
Representative James Eaton Thank you, Mr. Chair. As you're talking about this, you've touched on it some, can you tell us what role and specifically how do you recruit them, your local nonprofits, your educational institutions, and your government? How do you recruit them and what role do they play?
Paul Chapman All right, that's a great question. They're absolutely essential. And so if we were to go into a new community, we start talking to standard community providers. We'll talk with DCFS. We'll talk to Probation and Parole. We'll look for, are there any current coalitions that are meeting to deal with parts of these problems?
In Paragould, the backbone organization is a substance abuse coalition that had been meeting for years. And they were the right backbone for Greene County. And so we just start looking for the organization and then we start asking that community, the organizations, we'll have a juvenile judge or a law enforcement officer, invite people into these community meetings and we'll start talking about this collective impact approach or the 100 Families approach.
And then ultimately we want that community to select the backbone organization. We want them to say, you know what, yes, it's going to be Harding University in White County. And they will host.
Tiffany Wright And then the Alliance meetings are happening every month. And so you keep inviting new people from the community to join the Alliance Meetings. And then as time goes on, more and more people want to be involved with what's happening and plugging in. So the Alliance meetings are kind of used as a time to collaborate and communicate about what's going on, but also get education, right.
So you might invite somebody from the community who says, I have this resource, but I don't know how to plug in. And so it's like, oh, well, come and talk to a whole bunch of people who would love to use your resource that you might have. And then you start plugging in and eventually the Alliance keeps growing and the members in the community want to plug in. So you'll have your core, but then you have all the additional people who want to volunteer or do the other work alongside this initiative.
Senator Ben Gilmore Thank you for that. Seeing no other questions, director, you're welcome to stay at the table. But I'll let you leave this time.
Tiffany Wright Paul didn't tell you all but there's a road show going on in August where you can actually see this work in motion. I mean, it's yours. But if you want to tell everyone how, we can email out an invite to everyone if that's okay If you want to join in to see this work in motion.
Senator Ben Gilmore Please send that information to us. Thank you. Mr. Chapman, thank you for being here. Thanks for your work. I look forward to the followup emails about all of this. Let's move on to item F. And we're going to hear the annual report from 2024. Ms. Rogers, if you would, please introduce yourself when you get seated and you may proceed. If you would, there we go.
Kalika Rogers Good morning, chair and members. My name is Kalika Rogers. I am the investigations administrator for the State Police crimes against children division. And today we're going to be going over the 2024 annual report. On page two, it will show the comparisons for the previous five years, 2020 through 2024. The child abuse hotline received 64,956 contacts in 2024, which is a decrease of 2,684 calls from the previous year.
There were a total of 34,402 contacts accepted for investigation for CACD and for DCFS, which was a decrease of 1,352 reports. On page four, it compares 2023 and 2024, the breakdown by month for contacts received, accepted, and those that were sent in by fax or in our MRP. Page five has an additional breakdown of those contact numbers. On page six, it will break down the documented and the miscellaneous categories and for those types on page five.
On page seven is the hotline referral statistics by the priority level. And then on page eight, it covers the priority one and the priority two allegations by month and the allegation type with the totals for each category that is listed. Page 10 reflects the quarterly breakdown for CACD investigations. Our investigations unit was assigned 6,179 investigations. We closed 5,974, with 1,755 of those being found true, which gave us a 29% substantiation rate for the year. That's the end of our report. You have any questions?
Senator Ben Gilmore Thank you for the report. So on, I guess that would be page two of that report where it shows the 2020 through 24 breakdown there, so I see where there's a significant increase from 2020 to 21. Any thoughts as to why we saw that jump? I understand that, I see that's COVID years. So I don't know if that was part of the COVID everything, but...
Kalika Rogers I do not know. I know over the past several years, since COVID, we have tried to get mandated reporter education out for people to report. So that could be a reason for the increase. I'm not sure for the specific number though.
Senator Ben Gilmore And then of course in 23 to 24, there was a decrease. Any ideas?
Kalika Rogers Also, I do not know.
Senator Ben Gilmore Members, any other questions? Seeing none, so members, the last item is item G, consideration of special expenses. I will entertain a motion to authorize the chairs to approve special expenses incurred by the committee. So with that, do I have a motion? I have motion, I have second. Any discussion on that? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Any opposed? Thank you. Ayes have it. Okay, members, seeing no other business, we are adjourned. Thank you so much for your time and being here.
