You're welcome. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Brown.
Thank you, Madam President. Good afternoon. I would like to first follow-up on Council Lady Marian Tasco's questions regarding diversity amongst your direct service providers, and I need to make sure I heard it correctly in that at some point instituted the new policy where you no 17 longer certify non-profits. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: That is correct. And I'm asking Cheryl Ransom, Deputy Commissioner Ransom to assist in answering this question.
Good afternoon. Cheryl Ransom, Deputy Commissioner for DHS. I guess they stopped it about two years ago. DHS had contracts with a majority of 216 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 non-profits. They would allow the non-profits to receive affidavits rather than be certified. And the affidavit had to confirm three things. One is that their board had to be composed of 51 plus percent either women or minority. They had to serve a majority of minorities clients. And third, they would have to serve those minority clients in their communities. And many of our providers received the affidavits and we were able to count that participation. About two years ago, they stopped that. We advocate that it be reinstated.
That's important information for us to have at this juncture in MBEC's development. Absent that procedure, what impact has that had?
Well, we continue to advocate to have diversity in minority providers. The impact is that we are not able to count the participation. So if you looked at our record in MBEC, the reports that are done, you would also see 2 percent. And 217 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 that's because that 2 percent is with the for-profits.
I see. Of your direct service, 71 percent minority community-based organizations provide direct services. Is that accurate? Did I take that down correctly?
Is it possible for you to break down that further? Let me just tell you where I'm headed. When we know what's happening with African-American men and we know the value, connect to have African-American male role models participating in a leadership capacity with programs that are making a difference for African-American men or women, in that mix, I'd be curious to know how many of those direct service programs actually have an African-American man in leadership heading it up. So if you don't have that information today, if you could provide that to the Chair, because if we want to preach nurturing among 218 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 African-American men, young people need to see African-American men in leadership in those kinds of programs in their community to foster all of what that means. So I'd be curious to know what the yield of that is.
There is also the question regarding this intermediary organization. What's the name of it? Help me out. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: We use a number of intermediary organizations. North City Congress, Philadelphia Health management Corporation --
That one in particular. There's a commitment where you sit with regard to diversity. What type of, for lack of a better word, stick can you hold over the head of intermediaries to ensure that they are honoring your commitment to diversity? Do you have one? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: We 219 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 participate in the decision-making about who receives the subcontract.
Oh, you do? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, because these are initiatives that the Department sets up based on research and best practice and we know the targeted neighborhoods we want to go into and we have more expertise than almost anyone in this City collectively. I'm not speaking personally here. The Department of Human Services has more expertise than almost anyone in the City about who's doing social work in the City because of our history and the scale of our contracts. So we would know who we want, who we need, not particularly but in terms of the traits of a provider. So we dictate that and then the intermediary carries our dictate. They do not have that much discretion.
All right then. On the issue of recruitment, the direct question is, help me understand why you were budgeted for 2,013 positions in FY '04 yet about 1800 were filled and put that in the 220 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 context of the work you've been doing around recruitment and where you were when you came on board and where you are now. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, Councilwoman, as you know, there is a hiring freeze in the City, and so the department is subject to that hiring freeze. However, the Administration has been very clear that we will not compromise on safety of children. And so the exception for that hiring freeze is the position of social worker and any position that is legally required, for example, social work supervisor, you need to have a ratio under state Rules, and also youth detention counselors. Those positions that are critical to health and safety are exempt. So as a result, the Department has taken full advantage of that exemption and we hire social workers and youth detention counselors aggressively. And we do have 120, or maybe more right now, more social workers than four years ago, but the point I made is we have hired almost 450 to get to that 118 increase. So it's just a lesson learned about the 221 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 incredible challenge to hire and retain social workers in you child welfare. It's incredibly hard.
Let me just say on a personal note, one of my forward jobs out of school was with Slaten Farms School when it was still servicing all girls. I lasted seven months because the burnout just came that quickly. So of the positions that you have, most of those employees are social workers and -- most of them, professional positions? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: The majority of our staff are in the social work profession or related. For example, we have approximately 40 program analysts, maybe between 40 and 50, and those program analysts do work related to social work. They do policy and planning and contract management and evaluation, and that's a promotional opportunity from social work. So that's really the overwhelming majority of the department. On the juvenile justice side, we 222 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 have a substantial number of employees, I believe around 300, in juvenile justice working in the Youth Study Center, which is a 24/7 facility. So that really constitutes the bulk of our employees.
Well, that's a perfect segue to my next line of questioning around Youth Study Center. Speak to some of the changes that have happened since you were last with us. And to the extent it's possible, knowing that there is still a lot of sensitive information around the new building site location possibly, give us some up-to-date on where you ever with that. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, with the leadership of the Managing Director's Office and the Law Department, we are closer to an outcome on the issue of a site. The negotiations are very close to completion for a particular site in West Philadelphia, and we are hopeful that by the end of this week we will have some sort of resolution. 223 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
Any systemic changes you've made at the Youth Study Center under your leadership? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, many. Our population used to be on the average 150 children a day. And the average daily population now is approximately 105 or 100. And we have done that through managing our staff differently. We have reduced overtime by millions of dollars. The place is safer. It's actually now certified at a national level. We have state certification or national certification as a juvenile correctional facility. And certainly, the programmatic improvements are significant, and I believe that the physical improvement, a new facility, will allow us to do even better programming. We have a great school, great health services and great support services for children of families inside the Youth Study Center.
So acknowledging the fact that you're now able to redirect young people before they come through 224 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 those doors, is there adequate staffing for those professionals who are involved in the preventive or intervention, I should say, before they have to go through the juvenile justice system? Are you adequately staffed that way? Because my understand, based on some homework, that those dollars were actually -- the dollars for those staff was being handled by another revenue stream. Am I correct? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Can you clarify?
I'll try. I did a tour with Judge Myrna Field, and I was struck by the decrease in number and there is some procedural program step that has to be taken before making a determination that that child should go through the criminal justice system. And what I learned in the discussion was, if we had more staff, then more young people could be redirected and not end up in a juvenile justice system. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, I believe that when it has been brought to my 225 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 attention that there's a gap in staff that I have aggressively filling that gap. And I'm not sure that there's -- I mean, there's a lot of areas, as Mr. Fair mention, where we would love to have more so we can do that. That being said, I don't believe that we have any major gap in staffing right now in the Youth Study Center. However, we have Deputy Commissioner Ambrose from Juvenile Justice right here to help expand on this answer.
AnnMarie Ambrose from DHS, Deputy Commissioner for Juvenile Justice. Councilwoman Brown, I think you're referring to the diversion program that is actually run by David Fair's prevention division which prior to Alba's leadership there were about 150 kids that went through the juvenile justice system who were diverted through a process called the Informal Adjustment Section of the Juvenile Act. Because of the David's work and the court's commitment, we've now diverted 700 kids from the juvenile justice system directly into community-based programs. Those programs 226 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 include the Functional Family Therapy, lots of good community-based work so that those kids are not coming into the system in the first place and also they're not getting re-arrested. The overall recidivism rate for kids in juvenile justice returning from delinquent placement is around 30 percent. For the child who go through diversion programs in community-based the recidivism rate is about percent. So that program has 12 been very successful. It's not necessarily a staffing issue that I'm aware of, but David and the Court have done a tremendous job of increasing the number of kids who don't need to come into the juvenile justice, just need some services in the community and in the family that are going to prevent them from deeper re-entry. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: To clarify, I was speaking to direct DHS City of Philadelphia staff, and I think that that issue is one about additional resources for contracts to serve those children out in the community. And as I mentioned earlier, we 227 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 have over $450 million contracts with providers so that would be that issue. And in that sense, Councilwoman, absolutely, the more this City can invest in community-based services that are able to handle high-risk and high-end families, the less we would have to rely on institutions and foster care. And that is the system we are building. And, yes, if we had more, we could do more; but I will say that I am very proud of what we have been able to do in terms of building a community-based service prevention division that has almost $70 million today, but we will keep trying to expand on that.
Councilwoman, do you mind holding on some of your questions for the second go around?
Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, Commissioner Martinez. Good to see you. 228 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 On September 16, 1997, before your stewardship of DHS, the police found the body of the 6-year-old child. She died of starvation up in Brewerytown section of Philadelphia. Her name was Charnay Wise. A state review of a DHS internal investigation found a serious lapses in which the agency had not followed its own policies for child safety. There were, according to the information that was provided, no times when no social workers were assigned to the family, that required risk assessments were not conducted, no record keeping during crucial periods of the child's life, and long-term family plans were not made, and that the case was arbitrarily closed. Again, I remind you, this is before your stewardship and back quite a few years in 1997. We fast forward to August of 2003 and the tragic death of 3-year-old Porsche Bennett. Similar circumstances but the same end result, the death of a young child. What practices are in place in your 229 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 stewardship, given the 1997 case and the Porsche Bennett case of last year? What practices are in place to make sure that this never happens again to the extent possible? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, let me speak to the Porsche Bennett tragedy which deeply, deeply affected the Department. And since that point also, we have been working diligently to address some issues that were identified as a result of that. The situation in the Porsche Bennett tragedy is that the child was not born when we last served the family. The family was last served by the Department in the year 2000, and the mother was transient, she was in shelter and she left the shelter in 2000. After some time searching, the court allowed us to discharge the case because the family could not be located. Three years later, Porsche Bennett and her two sisters are living with her aunt and the boyfriend and they are being severely abused. They are not known to the Department at that point. Two days before her death, we 230 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 received a call to the hotline where there are allegations of abuse, but the caller does not know the names of the children. The allegations pretty serious, but we don't have the names of the children so we really can't trace back, which is a standard procedure. You always clear the case and find out if it's an active case or what we know. So a social worker went out the next day and could not get into the home. The day after when the social worker went out, the police was there and the child had died. So one of the issue that became clear to us that we needed to tackle was the policy that the Department follows with regard to locating missing families, because it is not uncommon that families who do not welcome services or who are transient try to avoid the Department's oversight and our social workers are not investigators. So in looking at our internal practices, we found that, number one, we could have a tighter policy but also that we did not have enough tools in place for our staff to look for families. 231 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 So right now, Councilman, we have established an electronic search unit where we have right now numerous databases that allow our social workers to immediately search in multiple places for or social workers when they can't track down a family. And since that was instituted -- it took us a long time and some money to do it. Since that was instituted, we have had approximately a hundred requests for help and over 80 of them have resulted in additional leads and information. In addition, we have contracted with a private investigator to help back out staff up when after they try they can't find a family. We've been consulting with the police, and they have given us guidance.
They're the ones, frankly, that recommended that hire a private investigator because they did not see themselves in the position of helping us go out and find families because of that limited resources. That was hope originally. In addition, we are tightening our 232 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 policy and we have added four more units to our intake department so that we can reduce the number of investigations that we give our workers so they can do a better job and spend more time doing it. In response to the questions about the 1997 case, since that time, the Department has really revolutionized many of its practices. For example, we have a visitation tracking system now that --
I'm sorry, Commissioner. What kind of system was that? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: A visitation tracking system. So the Department now electronically tracks any visit, any visit that we do for a child, and it also is a system that lets us know when a visit is due and it has not been made.
And that was in place before your tenure, and as a result of the 1997 -- COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: That was part of the response of that 1997 tragedy. I would love to take the credit for it, however, 233 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 it was already underway in planning when I got there. But I will take the credit for it. So since I'm there, we have a new visitation tracking system. But we also have added a lot of staff. As I mentioned, we have 120 more social workers. And the fact of the matter is in child welfare, the higher your case loads, the more limited your ability to do a good job. It doesn't matter if you are a social worker. So lowering cases and increasing staff has been part of our building of quality system. We've added a staff training and development division to the Department to make sure that our staff are continuously trained. We have enforced strictly our evaluation procedures. When I got to DHS, 50 percent of evaluations of employees were not completed. Now, over 95 percent of evaluations are completed on our staff. We reward our staff for good performance and hold them accountable when their performance is substandard. We've enriched our provider 234 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 contracts so that they can help our staff do the work. One last thing, however. There's much more work to be done. And unfortunately, Councilman, children die of abuse and neglect nationally every year. Children die throughout Pennsylvania every year. And every death is a horrible tragedy but every death is also an opportunity to look at our system and continuously improve it. So the job of child welfare will never be done until no child dies of abuse and neglect.
Very good. Now, when you took office in 2000, you took a look at what was in place to prevent what is probably -- correct me if I'm wrong -- what your main mission is as head of DHS, and that's the protection of children that in some kind of way are under your custody. So you go into your job in the year 2000 and you see there has been some other things that have been put in place to try to prevent to the extent possible -- and I agree 235 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 with you that there is no way of making this a perfect system because of human frailties. But then this Porsche Bennett case occurs, and you're pained by it; I heard your pain during that time and you have then tightened your policies, you've gone into numerous databases, contracted investigators, more staff. At some point as we do our job, and sometimes I do this, I just put on the brakes and go back to what's my real job here, what's my principal responsibility? Do you do that occasionally and say, "Let me get away from this whole budget stuff here and let me double-check my system to make sure that the children under our custody in whatever way that happens are being protected and how do you do it? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, child welfare systems are subject to annual inspections by the State. This a county-run but state-supervised system. So we have continuous reporting that we do to the State, not only financially but programatically. In addition to that, we are subject 236 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 to federal outcomes. And while we receive 93 percent of our funding from state and federal sources, that means that those sources expect something from us, just like City Council expects something from us and the Administration doing something from us. And Administration we are reviewed and I believe that's actually a good thing. Last year we had a child in Family Service Review by the government. It was a state review, however, because Philadelphia is so large we were 50 percent of the cases reviewed. Ad out of that review came a report about qualitative and quantitative performance. And they found that the Department does really well in safety compared to other systems but needs to do a better job around permanency. So that's why a lot of our work is around improving the number of children that achieve permanency meaning that they won't languish in foster care, will not grow up in foster care, and will not further injured by a system that does not give them a permanent answer regarding who their family is going to be until they reach 237 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 adulthood. That does not mean, however, that we turn our backs on the safety issue because safety is front and center what child welfare is about. I work in a system you have to have your eye on everything all the time. And what we have done build an incredible executive leadership team that works very, very hard and does everything they can to keep their eye on the present as they keep another eye on the future, because we are subject to federal penalties a few years down the road if we do not improve our permanency outcomes.
Not to mention the wrath of the public every time that we have the misfortune of having a tragedy occur. What I'm hearing is that you don't see it just as your responsibility, although you're primarily responsible, as stated you've stated, but you that have a team that you hold responsible within DHS to make sure they continue to stay focused on the principal mission of your Department.
We hold each other collectively responsible. 238 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
All right. Can you tell me the status of Riverview Home?
Good afternoon. Councilman, many of us will recall reading about the possible closing of Riverview Home in last year's five-year plan. Subsequent to that, we've had a lot --
Excuse me. Mr. Hess, you'll have to pull the microphone closer to you. You cannot be heard.
Subsequent to that, we've had a lot of internal discussion, a lot of discussion with a variety of stakeholders. And I think there's really two issues. First, this year's Five-Year Plan does not call for the closing of Riverview 239 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Home. That's Number 1. Number 2, what we are doing at Riverview --
Correct. Where we are is where we describe here last year at Councilwoman Tasco's questioning which is that we do philosophically believe that the best placement for people who currently reside at Riverview would be high quality supportive living arrangements in the community. The problem with that is that those placements do not currently exist. And we do not have an expectation that they will exist certainly shortly in the short run. And therefore, Riverview Home continues to be a placement opportunity of last resort for poor folks in the City that are aging. 240 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 And so we think it's an incredibly valuable resource that needs to continue.
Now, that's not to say that we shouldn't continue to explore community-based options, and we will continue to do that.
What are the problems? You don't seem too optimistic at this point that you can place them in the community. Why? What were the obstacles?
Well, I guess the biggest obstacle is there's not available funding sources that allow you to do that development in a way that gets you to the scale that you need. In other words, for Riverview Home, we spend about 5 and a half million dollars a year. About $2 million of that we recover from fees from residents. That leaves you $3 million a year to place at the moment about 220 residents. And so the math just doesn't work. We're looking at other options, 241 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 we'll continue to do that. Philosophically, we would agree that Riverview looks like an institution in some ways. It is a facility of last resort. It is very important to us in the City and to the residents that live there. And so although we will continue to explore those community-based options, there is no 9 plan in the Five-Year Plan at this time to close Riverview.
Thank you. I want to just chime in on this issue because I've had this discussion with Mr. Hess and we've even had people on the other end who are interested in the Riverview facility. We've been associated with Riverview for a very long time, from the old days when we were feeding in the subway. And you get some seniors who needed help and even though many of them would rather to have been closer to the City and neighborhoods, they had 242 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 no place for them to go. And these were also some seniors who really didn't their income intact, so they had to have someplace to stay. And over the years, and Mr. Hess can correct me if I'm wrong and Commissioner Martinez, over the years we've had various people -- it served various uses for this aging population, but we haven't been able to pull closer in the neighborhoods for this reasons he described. So it gives us an option. You don't get many out there on the streets, but you always get some in addition to other people in neighborhoods who have to end of having someplace to go and who don't quite fit or have family or other places where they can go. So we've got to have some kind of facility like this even if it's not as modern and up-to-date as we like it in how we deal with senior care today. We've got to have some facility for seniors who need it. And so I've never gotten any complaints. We talk about it more in our level than -- I've never had anybody stays there complaining. We always talk about it ourselves and we talk about how 243 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 we care for seniors, what works best and what are modern methods. I've never had a person complain about it. And they have open house, as you know, every year and invite us. So thank you very much. Thank you, Madam President.
Thank you, Madam President. Good afternoon. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Good afternoon.
How are you? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Fine, thank you.
I have a couple questions. With your goal of children achieving permanency and you had a record number of 654 adoptions last year, I guess? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes. 244 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
How many children are actually in need of being adopted? And are the older ones harder to place? That must have been very difficult. What were the numbers the year before last? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: I will need the assistance of my staff to give me the exact number of children going in the pipeline. I don't want to misspeak, but I will say that there is approximately 150 children in Philadelphia who need an adoptive resource. There can be 800 children at any one time moving through the process. The key for us is, obviously, to accelerate the process to achieve that adoption as quickly as possible, and that is what those numbers reflect. But I also want to point out our remarkable progress in that when I became Commissioner, there were approximately 300 children with no adoptive resources. That number conservatively is 150. It might be lower. It might be down to 100. So I would say that at any one time, Councilwoman, we need to find families for 150 children. The 245 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 demographics of those children is that they are older. Some might be teens, but I'm saying 7, 8, years old, children often who 5 are in sibling groups, and the reason why they 6 are at that stage and don't have an adoptive 7 resource is because perhaps they were living 8 with a relative who has now determined that 9 they can't keep them permanently or perhaps they were in a home that wasn't a permanent resource because we planned to reunify them with their family, however, that did not work out. The law and best practice now requires the Department to do concurrent planning. So a department that does the job right, I hope is ours most of the time, receives a child into placement and immediately places him in a home from which they can return but a home also that can become their permanent home. And that is called concurrent planning. The number exactly is 800 children who are freed for adoption which means they are eligible for adoption. 246 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 The other thing we've done this year which is really historic is that we now have third permanency option. Before we had reunification with a family, adoption or long-term foster care. Now we have permanent legal custody. That means that in cases where adoption is not possible because the child doesn't want to be adopted or because a grandmother doesn't want to terminate their child's parental rights, they can accept permanent legal custody. They're entitled to the same subsidies as an adoptive parent. They have the same legal rights over the child and authority, but the biological parents can maintain ties and connections which is really healthy in many cases and can have visitation. So we started this year and so far we have close 200 of these permanent legal custodies. And I will say that all my staff say all the social workers, all the lawyers, that one of most the beautiful things in child welfare is when those to say in child welfare when those families are created right at the bar of the court. And, of course, it's good 247 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 for us because we get out of the business of parenting children, which I don't think government should be in that business at all.
How long is the actual adoption process when you fast track it? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, I believe that once a child gets freed for adoption, the process should not take longer than a year. That being said, though, to be very direct and candid, there is work to be done in our system to reduce delays. And part of our performance-based contracting methodology and contracting approach and part of our adding lawyers was to cut through unnecessary delays, delays in getting clearances, delays in getting petitions filed, delays in getting hearings. And Family Court has been really cooperative with us. They are holding special listings now for us when we have list some children that need to be adopted. This City making progress in the right direction. 248 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
Tell me when is the goal to open the Achieving Independence Center? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: It's open. I'm pleased to say that it is open. It's been open for a year. And the reports back are very, very favorable. We had a goal of enrolling 500 youth, and those youth are youth that have been in the foster care system or are in the foster care system at the age of 12 or older. Our goal was to enroll 500; we 13 enrolled close to 600. Those children are 14 receiving support from Temple University, 15 Community College, Planned Parenthood, and a 16 number of other providers right there and we're getting them placed in jobs, helping them get scholarships for school and helping them transition to adulthood. It's open extended hours, and it's at Seventh and Market Street in the Mellon Independence Building. And it's also a joint venture with the Workforce Development System, so there's very, very strong and education focus in that center. 249 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
That's really good, because I worry about the young people transiting from foster care to adulthood, particularly after I met with Wanda and she told me that many of those young people end up homeless or incarcerated. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: It's a huge, huge problem. We're collaborating with Rob Hess' department and with the Workforce Development system to see what we can do around housing, subsidized housing for those young people and also with the Philadelphia Housing authority, because it is very tragic that the children who have been with the City a long time in DHS would exit that system and end up in the street. We are not legally able to provide services to those children pass the age of 21, so at the age of they will be independent, 21 ready or not, and that's why we've created this Achieving Independence Center. But that's also why, Councilwoman, this focus on permanency is so important because if we build homes for those children before they're 16 and 250 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 17, then we wouldn't even face that situation.
That's correct. I had a young woman -- actually a young cousin of mine who came to live with me last year who had been foster care. When she came to live with me she was turning 18, 9 and we were trying to do a whole lot to help 10 figure out what we would do with her, get her 11 in Cheney and some other things. So I'm glad 12 to hear -- I don't think the center was open 13 then, but that would have been a good -- 14 actually, I think she may have off the rolls 15 for about a year, so I don't know whether she 16 could have gone to that center or not. 17 COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: We are definitely committed to expanding our resources and programs for older youth. It's a very, very important population for the City to pay attention to. And the profile of children in placement is changing. We have older youth more and more and more, and we can't turn our back on that population. It's very 251 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 challenging to serve, but we have to confront that and so we've expanding that array. We've expanded our mother/baby programs, so that mothers who are teenagers don't have to be separated from their children if the only barrier is housing and economic. So we're expanding that with the help of Catholic Social Service.
When I was downstairs, I was actually listening to the testimony over the TV. And I believe Councilman Kelly may have asked a question regarding reimbursements. Did he ask that question? Do you remember if you were asked a question regarding state and federal reimbursements? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, Councilwoman.
I didn't quite catch the answer. Can you tell me -- can you answer again what would happen if the reimbursements that you anticipate don't happen? I'm little worried about whether the state and the federal government are going to 252 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 do adequate reimbursements. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, we are worried, too. And I will restate the Department and Administrative's position on this matter. The State, under the law, provides for a needs-based planning process, and that process requires the Department to submit a plan to the State for the State Department of Public Welfare to certify our need in terms of dollars and then to allocate the appropriate level of federal, state, and city revenue. Those numbers have been certified, and we expect that the State will fill its commitment to this county and every other county regarding giving us what we need. We cannot compromise on what children need. And our position is that we will work with the State through appeal and communication and dialog to get the revenue that we need to do the job right. And if we don't receive what we need, then the Mayor is committed to continue fighting and also to make sure that children do not suffer, abused and neglected children do not suffer further because of bad 253 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 policy or political or financial decisions that are made at higher levels. So at this point, we're not prepared to concede that we have to cut back. But I did also mention that one area where we would obviously immediately look is in our desire to grow some programs. Obviously, that would be the first thing to be looked at, expansion.
I had someone from a community-based program mention that prevention funds, some of the programs dealing with prevention may be cut with youth, youth at risk, prevention programs for youth at risk. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, we do not have any plans to cut our investment, to cut back our investment in programs for high-risk children. What you may have heard, Councilwoman, is that we do reprogram money. And I believe that in doing so, we are fulfilling the mandates of Council and the Administration that periodically we review is our money being spent efficiently. Not so 254 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 much that the agency is not doing a good job, but in the right kind of strategies. So periodically, we do issue new RFPs and we ask for providers to compete again because we changed the design of the program in order to meet the needs of today, not of yesterday. So we have issued a number of RFPs, including some for youth development programs and some for parenting programs. But we have not cut back on our commitment to high-risk youth.
Do you mind holding your other questions until the next go-around? Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman Rizzo.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Commissioner, your comments about adoption -- and I don't want you to misinterpret my question. I'm not a professional, I don't know a whole lot about 255 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 what you do. But I just have a basic question. When you talk about adoptions and other relationships where biological parents still have access to those children, is that good in all cases or are they exceptions where biological parents are not allowed to have a relationship? Because I just can imagine -- and I'm not sure what the ramification or the effect that has on young people, this bouncing back and forth. Could you describe how -- maybe it's politically correct to do that, but is it the right thing to be doing? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, I think that that's a really important question. And I will say that it took me a while to learn the system, and I'm still learning it. In adoption, all legal rights terminated. It's as if the relationship never existed, and the adoptive family becomes the full legal family of the child, legally, on paper, a new birth certificate, the whole thing, and the biological family of origin has absolutely no 24 right and there's no right to sibling continuity. The adoptive parent determines 256 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 whether there can be some contact in the future or not. The government doesn't determine it, the court cannot determine it, no one can but that legal family. In permanent legal custody, the legal rights are not terminated, however, legal custody is in the hands of the new family. So while the biological parent may have visitation rights, it's not shared custody. The child does not go back and forth from one home to another, because we have ruled out when we apply permanent legal custody -- and I also want to say the Court makes that decision, it's an adversarial process where the Court makes a decision based on the evidence. We don't make that decision and implement it with court approval. But reunification has to be ruled out by law. In other word, a decision has to be made that child cannot return home. Adoption has to be ruled out by law, because adoption would be better than legal custody. And then legal custody becomes the third best option because of the next alternative is long-term foster 257 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 care where the child has no status of permanency.
Commissioner, at what point does the Court stay involved? I can't prove the statement that I'm about to make, but I have heard that in some of these relationships where the biological parents have access to the children, the parents with custody, for lack of a better word, the people that have custody of the child sometimes have days and days and days of problems associated with that contact that they have to deal with at after the fact. If are you observe that, do you have a way to go back to the court and say that this is not good for this child? Because I hear that this is a bit more common than we know, that it is very difficult sometimes because those visits create a lot of problems. And I don't know whether they're true or created just to avoid the visit. Could you comment on your experience with that. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes. In 258 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 permanent legal custody, the biological parent does not a right to visitation, first of all. It's something that the Court can provide if it's in the best interest in the child. It's not a guarantee, and often in cases it's not given. The reason why adoption may be ruled out is simply because a child is over 14, doesn't want to be adopted or the grandmother doesn't want to terminate the child's parental rights, so visitation is just something that can be added if it's the right thing in that particular set of circumstances. Second of all, anticipating that, of course, change is the constant and relationships can change, we made arrangements when we set the system this system up with the Domestic Relations Court, and the Department working with the Domestic Relations Court to resource this function where if a custodian has permanent legal custody and wants to alter a visitation agreement, they can go straight to Domestic Relations Court, file a request for an amendment to the custody order, and they will have access to all of the 259 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 information. In other words, they can get the file, read the circumstances, and alter the order.
So you do monitor these types of situations, or are you out of it until you get a phone call? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: When permanency is achieved, the Department is available to support the family on a voluntary basis. However, if somebody calls us back and asks us for help, we will never turn them away. We will connect them to the services that they need. But the whole point of achieving permanency is that government gets out of the life of the family. However, it's not automatic. There's a process that is gone through and it's done with careful court approval.
My next question. Is foster -- and again, help me with the language here. Foster care, has that become a business? Are there people who do this for a business? 260 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 I had someone tell me a story about this one particular family that has -- and I don't know what the max is, five, six, seven. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Six, by law.
And the neighbors refer to this as this lady's business. She does it because it's very lucrative. Is that so? Are there people who do this for a business? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, of course, my position would be that it's very lucrative, but everybody else's position in the system is that it's not. It's really not a lucrative service, first of all. We do per diem per child. And the per diem at this point is $20.23 a day. And with this $20.23 a day, that family has to provide for the needs of that child. In addition, we give a per diem to the provider agency to provide case management and social services. And then more other, the Department has its own staff providing support and services. So it's not a lucrative business. I would say, Councilman, that I have 261 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 heard that too, and I'm sure -- it's a large system, I can't tell you that no there aren't people who wouldn't enter into this service for perhaps economic reasons, but I will tell you that in four years that I've been Commissioner, I have seen a huge amount of love and passion and commitment on the part of the people who do foster care. And I need to say that the Department of Human Services is a complex bureaucracy. It is not fun to deal with. On a good day it's not fun to deal with. So people have to really love this work to stay committed to being a foster parent for a long time. So I will tell you overwhelmingly that it's not a concern, but we also have mechanisms to audit and monitor foster parents. If we believe that a foster parent is not taking care of a child properly, that foster parent will lose that child immediately.
Could you provide to the Chair -- just a curiosity question -- how many of your foster parents are maxed out, that have six children? 262 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: That would be interesting data to look at. I'm not sure how quickly we can get it, but we will certainly work on getting that for you as quickly as possible.
Because, just to finish this conversation. I've been told there are certain families that always have six, it seems. When one goes on, bingo, another one. And that's why they refer to it as being a business. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, Councilman, there are requirements about how much space there has to be per child and there are large families absolutely and there are people who want large families. I have met incredible people who have adopted six, seven, eight children. So some people have large families because they love large families, they come from large families. That may be possible, too. However, we will look for that information for you. I will tell you that --
Not that that 263 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 means anything negative. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: It's a good question. But I will tell you that while it is, of course, an imperfect system, there is a lot of love and passion and commitment that you see. And the other interesting point is that children that are adopted out of the child welfare system, 90 percent of them are adopted by their foster parents. So that's an interesting statistic also.
There was a lot of love in my family, but there were a lot of days that my father or mother wanted me to go out to adoption. (Laughter.)
Thank you. I just have a couple questions. Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown asked you about what programs for men are 264 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 headed by men. I'd like to ask that question in a different way but will achieve the same end. What programs provide services to African-American men and who are the providers? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Well, I will ask David Fair, Director of Community Based Prevention, to speak to programs that respond to need.
This is David Fair, I'm Director of Community Based Services at DHS. In terms of adult men, we have a limited number of programs. Starting in July we will be taking responsibility for the fatherhood initiative program at the Mayor's Office of Community Services so that we can better integrate it into our community-based parenting collaborative. And we have a few other programs, the Fathers Day Rally Committee, Men United for a Better Philadelphia is a major contract for us. But in the big picture, we have two big challenges in terms of targeting services specifically to African-American men. One is the difficulty 265 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 in targeting our resources that way within the regulations that we have to follow with our money, because most of the families that involved in the child welfare system is headed by women, and it's the women who are looking for the legal custody and it's not always directly available, a father who's even involved in the situation. The second problem is to be truthful is that there are very true community agencies that want to do this work. We put out our first parenting RFP about three years ago. We had $6 million available through that RFP. We funded 70 organizations, and two of them, 2 of the 300 or so applicants mentioned fathers as their target population even though our RFP emphasized that. I think there's the perception that that's a harder population to work with, especially men who are no longer connected to their children tend to have heavier burdens, they tend to have an incarceration history or a drug problem or a mental health issue or unemployment or whatever. I don't know whether that's true, 266 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 but that is the perception of what happens. This past year we did enter into a contract with an organization called "Menergy" to work with the batterers of women coming into the court system or the justice systems because of domestic violence. The majority of those men are also African-American men. That program has been very effective in helping to not only address the particular sort of counseling those men have, but also connecting them to a variety of social services. I think you're at the question of where men in our system work. I mean, how many African-American men are in leadership positions in our system, I think is really a fascinating one to me because even in our division the overwhelming majority of the organizations we work with are organizations that target lower income, primarily minority communities and are run by people who live in those communities, overwhelmingly it's women who are running those organizations and working in those organizations. We do have some programs like the 267 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Imachi (ph) Project that we work with Reverend Good on where just yesterday he and I were meeting to talk about recruiting mentors for young men in the delinquent system, young African-American men in the delinquent system. And what we were talking about was how hard it is to recruit a mentor for that function when he's standing at the pulpit at the church and says, "I need mentors for kids who are in the delinquent system and I need men for that," it's very hard in that context to get men to step forward. But when we started jumping on the band wagon for his other recruitment efforts for mentors and made sure we had quality mentors in a pool, it was easier then to approach the men who were already volunteering to be mentors to connect with these kids. It is a very complicated issue, obviously, I could talk to you for hours for about it. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: And what I want to add is that this is an area where the Department is, obviously, investing resources. 268 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 But it is also, quite frankly, an area for improvement.
And when the federal government came in and did our child and family service review, they complimented us in some areas, but their purpose was also to tell us areas where we are weak, and one of things they told us is engaging fathers is an area where the Department has to do better in foster care side, because obviously children can return not to one parent or not to one family but to two. So I think it's clear that more needs to be done. This is a national problem, not a city problem. But in this City, we want to take leadership around it. We funded and hosted a fatherhood conference an engaging fathers conference last year that was really successful. And out of that came a couple of good initiatives. And one of them in one of our family service regions where we have approximately 200 workers, they're doing family trees when a child comes into care to force ourselves to find out who are these children's families up front, not just filling 269 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 out the record but really using a tool to do that. We've also talked to the Police Commissioner to add the lock and track system into our electronic search database. Because, unfortunately, a substantial number of children who come into care have parents who have addiction problems and who go in and out of prison or who may be hard to reach. Sometimes their families don't know where they are. So by having the lock and track system accessible to us, we would be able to work with the prison to look on a periodic basis for the parents. And when they're in prison, that's actually an opportunity to intervene and get them clean and sober and start engaging them. So there are some opportunities there and some ground to be covered. And I believe and I hope that it's a question that Council asks us about on a yearly basis to hold us accountable on making progress.
Well, I don't want to dredge up old history, but I do know a 270 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 couple of years ago there was an effort to do a program and Warren E. Smith had put the pieces in place to provide the service to the men and the contract was never awarded to them. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Can you tell me what program that was? The Delinquent Day Treatment Program was for teens. And I do remember the case and I remember Warren E. Smith's complaints about the outcome of that RFP. And at that, Estelle Richman was the Director of Social Services, and I believe that their concerns were addressed by her but, frankly, Councilwoman, I don't remember the details of it, but I can look that up in answer to you. You'd like to know about it.
I just want to say that it's an organization, it's in the community, it provides mental health services, it provides community services. And wherever they turn to get a project from the City, whether it's DHS and they do exist or whether it's the Health Department, they get turned 271 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 down for every project. And it just boggles my mind that while it happens, but then you'll say, "We've got to find people to do the project," but there are people who do the projects but they never get funded. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: I understand your concern.
One other question. You provide funding to Safe and Sound for community-based programs? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: For after school and youth development programs.
Do they then contract out with providers for that service? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, they do.
Do you monitor who these groups are who provide the services, and what is the diversity among those groups? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: They actually have a sophisticated monitoring service in place. I believe that the technical assistance and oversight is with the 272 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 United Way and also with Philadelphia Health Management Corporation. They have two entities that assist them in the technical assistance and monitoring and training. But for more detail on that, I would defer to Deputy Managing Steiker since I frankly don't have more much more detail than that. But they do have evaluation systems in place.
Who do they contract what? Providers do they contract with to provide the service? You may want to give me later: Who are the providers of these after school programs? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: I will ensure that that information is made available, both on the contracting and evaluation aspect and the service delivery.
You're welcome. Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds 273 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Brown.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I would like to go back if we could, Commissioner, to the new information you provided to us with regard to MBEC. MBEC certifies only for-profits. If not today, can you provide for us an accounting of the dollars in terms of percentage across the board, what percentage of what you do are for-profits and what percentage are non-profits and then break that down in terms of dollars. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, we will.
And then for the for-profits, if you can provide the breakdown of minority, women, and disadvantaged-own businesses. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: We will.
Second question. Since MBEC only deals with for-profit dollars in contracting and procurement, what has been the level of 274 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 interface with your department and MBEC for the for-profit agencies. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Because Deputy Commissioner Ransom interacts with MBEC most frequently, I'm asking her to assist in answering.
Cheryl Ransom, Deputy Commissioner for DHS. One thing we've done on all of our RFPs, we stipulate that the MBE participation is mandatory so that we can find what -- MBEC normally sets the ranges. They look at our RFPs and decide what the range should be. And we issue that range to the providers. We've also worked with them with our IT contracts to look at how they could get participation, and we've done that through their staff. And I said earlier that we also worked with MBEC. They identified minority firms in the IT business who were certified, and we went to those firms and explained the type of work we were doing, and they offered resumes to us. 275 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
And then MBEC has the responsibility to share with you what the numbers are in those areas, correct?
They give us a range to reach in terms of what our goals should be for the Department.
For the for-profit, do you know what those current numbers are?
They actually look at -- for example, if we're doing an RFP, they will review the RFP and determine what the range should be based on the type of program, who's going to be served and the funding level.
Okay. I'm trying to follow you. And so of the 2 percent, have they recently given you the number that speak to total number of minority, total number of women-owned? Have you received those numbers at all from MBEC?
DHS. We indicate who's certified. That's really where the number comes from. It's the actual number of contracts that you let and the total money spent on a for-profit who is certified. That's where the 2 percent comes from. That's not a number that has been given by MBEC, that's a number that we calculate based on certified for-profits that we can count the participation.
That's it for now. I'm still just trying to get a handle on not just DHS but all City departments where and how MBEC does what they are prescribed to do. Thank you for your testimony. Clarity. Did Councilman Juan Ramos pose the question regarding how you may have adjusted your system with regards to the loss of the little girl last year? Was that your question, Councilman Ramos?
Thank you very 277 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 much.
Thank you. And on that, let me just say in closing with regards to your performance measures, I did look hard and I found nothing which suggests to me that DHS does enormously important work, period, and you're to be commended for the work we knew you were doing when you first sat with us in January 2000 and how far that agency has come with regards to systemic change and not just tinkering with reform around the margins. So I congratulate you. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Thank you. Our Department is grateful for your recognition. Thank you.
Are there further questions? I believe OESS, you're next. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Thank you very much.
One moment, please. 278 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Councilman Ramos.
Just one last question, Commissioner. Back in March, the City Council presented a resolution urging the Pennsylvania House of Representatives to oppose Representative Jerry Birmelin. It was a bill 9 which we considered discriminatory under City's Fair Practice Code which undermines the core value of the original bill to improve the Adoption Assistance Program as reported by the House Children and Youth Committee. It was a bill essentially that was trying to prevent non-traditional families or same-sex couples the right to adopt. And you gave a report about your adoption rate. Are we now making adoptions available to non-traditional families or same-sex couples? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes. Philadelphia and the court system has been actually on the leading edge, along with other major cities in defining family as broadly as possible in the best interest of children. 279 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 And so it is a City that has been in a tradition of doing that and supporting same-sex couples or gay and lesbian individuals being foster or adoptive parents long before I became Commissioner. The amendments that Representative Birmelin proposed were withdrawn and the legislation moved forward as originally planned. However, this is an issue, as we all know, that is hot nationally and we have not heard of end of the debate.
Have any same-sex couples or gay or lesbian individuals applied or have adopted children in our system? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: While we do not track that particular aspect of our foster and adoptive parents identity, I know anecdotally that they have because they come up to me and say that they've adopted. The question is not asked about their sexual preference and that's perhaps what makes our system so progressive and so open-minded that what the system looks for is the qualifications and the background and the 280 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 ability of that individual and that family to provide a loving home for a child. So we don't keep those statistics but, yes, there is a history of it being done through the child welfare system.
A loving home is the gauge we should use. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Thank you.
Good afternoon, Commissioner. Just curious about the issue Procurement opportunities even within non-profit contracts. In terms of your non-profit contracts, are there opportunities or cases where there is either subcontracting or materials that are borrowed under those non-profit contracts? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, there are opportunities. And I believe that the department has made a lot of effort and a lot of progress in getting our own providers, if I 281 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 understand the correctly, our own providers to use minority providers in their own operations. But I will ask Deputy Commissioner Ransom to assist in answering that.
Let me just advance the question then. So even within the non-profit contracts, there are opportunities to set goals for minority participation in terms of subcontracting opportunities and in terms of the purchasing of services?
Yes. We often recommend to our providers -- we have the MBEC book of certified vendors. They often approach us and ask us about the services, and we in turn give them information about the certified vendors.
So MBEC does not set goals for your non-profit contracts?
No. We had an arrangement with MBEC around affidavits and having the non-profits --
Can you explain to me, although they do not certify 282 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 non-profits for obvious reasons, why they still wouldn't be setting goals for non-profit contracts? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Why they would not?
Yes. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: We believe that they should.
Can you request that they set goals for your non-profit contracts as well? As long as you're going to have subcontractors and you're purchasing services and there are still for-profit companies that are going to benefit from that non-profit contract, there's no reason why you can't meet as many goals and even exceed goals under non-profit contracts. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Yes, Councilman. We have requested it and we will request it again. And I am aware that this is an issue that Council is going to be discussing with MBEC also, but we will definitely make that request. There's opportunities for the City to get recognition 283 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 and also opportunities to promote that principle and non-profit community because their business is just like any other business, they just happen to be tax exempt. In other way, they are a business.
Absolutely. Thank you, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ: Thank you.
Thank you, Councilman. Are there further questions? (No response.)
Thank you again. Mr. Hess and OESS. Good afternoon. We thank you for your patience. Certainly, we do have your testimony. You can present any part of it or make reference to it if you would like. And we would like you to introduce the folks with you and make your comment.
Thank you, Madam Chair. To my right I have the Director of OESS, Letty Hinton; behind her, our Administrative 284 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Services Director, Richard Shaeffer. And then the balance of the team is spread throughout the gallery and employees to assist as necessary. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for being offer testimony today on behalf of the Office of Emergency Shelter and Services for Fiscal Year 2005, as well as to have an opportunity to discuss the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. I will touch on just a couple of specific areas that I think are particularly important to share with Council this afternoon. First, I think it's important to state that in the area of demand for emergency shelter, the upward trend that I reported in last year's testimony has continued, unfortunately, into this fiscal year. The overall number of people staying in emergency shelter so far this year is on average 8 percent greater than last year and 15 percent more than two years ago. The month of April, we're currently running about 11 percent ahead 285 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 of last year in demand for emergency shelter. So this trend, which we view as a result of the long economic slump that communities across the country has experienced and although there have been some recent encouraging signs for the economy and the creation of jobs nationwide, we have not yet seen the trend extend to Philadelphia. Furthermore, homeless people living in our shelters are often excluded from realizing the benefits of a rising economy by being the last hired, first fired. Because of these combined factors, we do expect the higher demand for shelter will remain steady for the remainder of this fiscal year and in the next fiscal year. I think with that said, I think the testimony addresses a lot of the programatic improvements that we've been able to make over this past year. It does point out that we've made some great inroads on the Parkway with respect to being able to relocate some feeding operations indoors. And I'd like to publicly thank you, Councilwoman Blackwell, for your 286 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 leadership and support that assisted us in working with Chosen 300 and Reverend Brian Jenkins to be able effect that change, which we view as incredibly important. You know, it wasn't that long ago that there were several hundred folks at night standing in line out on the Parkway no matter what the weather in order to enjoy the good meal that Chosen 300 provided. Now those folks are able to go indoors, sit down with the kind of dignity and respect that we all deserve to be able to enjoy a meal and it's because of your leadership and the Mayor's and others that allowed us to make that happen. So I would like to publicly thank you for that. I'd also like to publicly recognize the great work being done by City employees, by our non-profit partners, by the Mayor's task force on the issue of chronic homelessness where we've now seen the street numbers drop from kind of a high watermark of 824 to 133, as counted by the Police Department and Center City Philadelphia just this past week. Still a lot of work to be 287 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 done. Still incredibly tragic for the 133 folks who still call our streets home, but we have made a lot of progress in this area, and it's been because of great leadership and partnership with members of this Council, the Administration, the non-profit community, and City workforce that's helped us immensely in this area. With that, Madam Chair, I'd be happy to entertain any questions you have.
Thank you very much. We would certainly like to thank you and your Department for all that you do as well. And if I did not respect you and like you, which I do, I'd still find a way to get along with you because this is my area. This is part of my mission and what I'm meant to do. In your testimony, you refer to about 2200 people at night on an average night. I know in past year we've had and 24 and 2700 people who are in shelter and 25 people who need shelter. 288 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Will you still be able to absorb people above 2200 who could be on the street at any given time?
Madam Chair, the commitment of this Administration is to provide as many beds as necessary to meet the demand. We have been as high as about 2700 beds in the midst of this past winter, which I must say was incredibly difficult. So far this winter, we've had 72 Code Blue days and, hopefully, we've put the last one behind us, but who can tell. Last year, we set a record with 73 Code Blue days. So as you know, we have developed a system of sort of a just in time delivery system for beds to be able to expand to meet the need, and you have our commitment to continue to do that. And if that strains our budget as we go along, then, of course, I'm confident we'll be having those conversations.
Thank you. You mentioned outside feeding, and we are doing better. As you know, I'm always one of those people who believes we have to do 289 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 it one place or another. And as we push for people without lodging or the homeless to go inside, we just hope that those in Center City -- we know it's tough on some of the businesses who complain, but I hope that they will continue to understand that we've really come a long way and we're working very, very hard to certainly make sure that people are inside and that they're not outside. As you know, the Mayor made a commitment, I don't know, maybe about four years ago to end homelessness in 10 years. And I continue to hope that, while I'm still working, before I retire that we won't have any homeless people on the streets in this City and certainly not in this country, but here in this City because I do believe that we have the wherewithal, we have the capacity to take care of people. And that it's a moral commitment on the part of you, me, and every elected official in our City and every elected official in our country. People in America shouldn't have to sleep on streets. And I will say that as long as I see one person out 290 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 there because it's what we have to do.
Madam Chair, I absolutely share those views and absolutely believe with a firmest of commitment that Philadelphia is capable of becoming the first City in America to end the need for any of our citizens to sleep on our streets. We've made tremendous progress in this area so far, but the work is not yet done. I'm so encouraged, though, by the help and support of my fellow commissioners, John Domzalski, Alba Martinez, Mike Covone and others have been incredibly supportive as we've gone to them for additional resources to be able to provide those resources to those folks sleeping on our streets. It has been an incredible team effort with your office and others in the Administration and in the community that have really achieved phenomenal results, but we still have a long way to go to become that first City in America which I believe we can become that ends the need for any of its citizens to sleep on the streets.
Thank you. 291 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 What you might also remark about is the fact that your Department -- we do a lot more with case workers because we know that people need training. People can't go from shelters to self-sufficiency without training of various sorts, without job readiness, without case management to deal with whatever their situations are, and that you are working and that you've moved forward in that arena as well.
We are so fortunate to have the leadership of Letty Hinton as Director at OESS that is retooling business practices, creating systemic change in a way that we could have only envisioned a couple of years ago, being able to position ourselves to lower the case loads of our social workers, remove some of the administrative impediments and duties from our case workers so that they can really focus in on working with the clients and on the clients' needs to help them move back into the community and to be self-sufficient in the community with appropriate supports attached to them. We've 292 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 come so far under her leadership and that of her team. I'm also extraordinarily proud of the work that we're doing to implement the new HMIS system that will help us from a management perspective better track, better coordinate with the services of other departments and better serve the clients that come in our front door. So I believe that we are well positioned to continue to make those systemic changes necessary to better serve our clients moving forward.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hess. Questions? Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown.
Thank you, Madam Chair. First let me say thank you for the new initiate for little people on front end of their lives, the Bright Spaces Program at our shelters. It's a wonderful idea. And I'm 293 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 curious to know how many are up and running as we speak.
Thank you for that question, Councilwoman. We have at the moment six Bright Spaces that have opened and an additional planning eight planning to open in 2005. This is just an incredible program, as you point out. We're so fortunate to have the Bright Horizons Foundation and McNeal Pharmaceuticals that came to the table to be able to provide us the funding to enlighten the lives of women and children and men in shelter.
That was my next question. Who's paying for it? How did it come to be?
The way this worked is Bright Horizons Foundation came to us and said they would like to add a couple of these play spaces to our family shelters. And we said, "Oh, no, this is a tremendous opportunity. We shouldn't limit ourselves two shielders. We should be the forward city in America to have 294 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Bright Spaces in all of our family facilities." They agreed. It was a little beyond the scope of what they could do internally, so they reached out to McNeal Pharmaceuticals who enthusiastically who embraced the idea and have been working closely with us to make this dream a reality for all of our children, the 900 now plus children that reside in our shelter system on any given night.
Because that was one of our questions too. How many children are currently in our homeless shelters?
Currently six and adding two more essentially for FY '05, correct?
Out of a total 295 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 of how many shelters?
It looks like we have -- the future projects beyond these include 5 four more facilities and so that would be 18 6 total family facilities. 7
And how many 8 shelters in total does the City have in 9 operation? 10
So that's 18 12 out of 29. Okay, so that is useful and 13 important and a new phenomenon for little 14 people on the front end of their life. Let's look to those on the back end of their lives who met bumps and they're looking for a second chance. Under professional services in your budget for FY '03 there are eight non-profits that are providing, I would imagine, education training services to individuals. And then in FY '04, there are three. In FY '05, there's one. And the reason why I'm troubled by that when I look at those numbers and stack that against your opening comments which were that 296 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 homelessness is going from to percent and we're 11 percent ahead in the demand for emergency shelters this year than we were last year, help me recon with the reality and where you're moving with regards to fewer programs, fewer educational and training programs.
This is an area where I 12 have to take you back a couple of years. 13 We're now in the fifth year of a six-year 14 cycle on employment training programs. OESS 15 historically was a system to try to provide all of its own services and, frankly, was inadequately funded to do so. And so employment training programs like clean and sober programs and mental health services, they tried to fund internal tot he agency and they weren't a sufficient capacity to be able to do that work effectively; effectively being meeting the demand within the system. So we had to reach out -- we recognized that had began to reach out to the mainstream systems, 297 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 if you will. For example, we could spend a couple hundred thousand dollars on drug and alcohol treatment. Well, CODAAP is a much bigger system and has much greater resources, so if we can tap into that system more effectively, then our clients would be better served. And so we have done that. On the employment training side, clearly there's two ways for folks to leave our shelter system and not come back. One is to have sufficient income to be able to afford market rate housing. Or two is to have some sort of housing subsidy. And so we try to work that on both ends. We have been blessed with a variety of good employment training providers. I think it was seven or eight to begin with. That funding came from HUD. It came from PWDC and came from a City match. The City overextended its match in the early years, the first three years. So we got into the second round of a three-year renewal and the final renewal. At that point, we had PWDC back out of the picture and so we were left 298 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 with HUD funding and some general funds.
Okay, pause there. Define "back out." Does that mean they were approached and they said no?
You approached the leadership at PWDC, Ernest Jones, to ask them to continue to offer their share of funding for training programs when PWDC is in the business of training programs; is that what I'm hearing?
A couple reasons. They have a threshold what they call success requirement -- and if I get any of this wrong, somebody speak up so we can get it exactly right for you -- of about 75 percent success rate is what they need.
I think this is '04. Our programs -- obviously, we have a challenging 299 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 clientele and our programs have historically not been achieve to level of success that PWDC asked us for.
My immediate reaction to that is PWDC is in the business of providing training across the board, including hard to reach or difficult to manage populations.
And that was our feeling as well. So what we recognized is we need to find other ways to be able to have our clients access mainstream employment programs that PWDC already funds and offers as opposed to long-term trying to fill that void with our own internal programs.
I cut you off. So as of FY '04, you no longer had the match with PWDC which is the reason why we only three here for FY '04?
I actually see three -- no, that's not true; it's four.
I think you're just 300 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 looking at General Funded programs. I think there may have been actually four. I'll ask Richard Shaeffer to check me on that.
Good afternoon. My name is Richard |Shaeffer, Administrative Services Director. In this fiscal year, if you want to count the Ready, Willing and Able Program, there are actually five funded programs.
How many of them are Philadelphia based? And I know that for myself that Ready, Willing and Able is not from out of the City, it may be New York because I clearly remember former Commissioner Estelle Richman telling us about that program and I know clearly of their value and their worth. So the other four are located where?
And so with the cutback in the funding, the total pot of funding, we 301 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 reduced the number from eight to four this current year. We're now approaching the final year of funding from HUD, which was the big piece that got this program started to begin with.
Okay, you'll have to help me understand that in terms of the actual dollars. You say "the big piece," I need to know what that means in terms of actual numbers.
HUD provides, I think, about $400,000 a year, and we have one year of HUD funding left. That will be for Fiscal Year '05. We have already met all of our match requirements for general funds for this cycle of funding. So we're not required to put any additional general funds into this employment and training pot for Fiscal Year '05, it will be strictly HUD funded.
So the Ready, Willing and Able which did not get axed is funded by whom?
Ready, Willing and Able is funded largely from general funds. It's 302 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 outside this program mix. Ready, Willing and Able was never funded from HUD.
There's one year left of HUD funding; that will go to support what?
That would fully support three of the four programs that remain.
Yes, ma'am. That's encouraging, stacking that against this 11 percent increase and the need for emergency shelter, but they're not listed in this document. So there's been some development since this paper was produced in today's hearing?
Councilwoman, if you look at , there's a grant information summary form. Even though it doesn't show the detail, that shows the funding that is set aside for the three remaining employment and training programs.
I need Councilman Nutter over here. You said ? 303 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
Councilwoman, about in the middle of the page in the second column from the right, it says "Fiscal Year 2005 obligation level," that's Column 6. If you follow that down about halfway, there's $493,352 under purchases of service line 200.
I'm going to be quite honest with you, I'm struggling with trying to find it in the book. But if you're telling me it's on --
I got it. So repeat what you said. For FY '05, I see $493,000.
Right. And that money will be used to fund three of the Philadelphia-based employment training programs for FY '05.
That will cover the three. Is one of them Ready, Willing and 304 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 Able?
So these three are for Philadelphia-based organizations?
Do providers provide a written -- so you're saying funding is driving this, not insufficient or ineffective program performance?
We have analysts that do regular monitoring. Each of the agencies we have contracts with also is required to provide us regular data on their program results.
So if you're going from eight to three, then it's ultimately the information retrieved from the program evaluations that move you to the lucky three that benefit from the remaining HUD dollars? 305 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255
For the five that aren't lucky and continue to provide the service and deal with this issue of homelessness and getting folk where they need to be so they can become self-sufficient, what provisions are made for them in terms of awareness and letting them know criteria -- typically at the end, my experience is, a program evaluation -- let me not answer the question. What does OESS do when you make a determination that an agency is not meeting the criteria and therefore don't warrant consideration for continued funding?
And that's done how, written or a meeting or a conference call or what?
It could be any combination of those, depending upon the circumstances. In the case of a program where we were terminating funding, of course, that 306 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 would be in writing.
Final question. Given the high percentages of homelessness, knowing that PWDC is in the business of moving individuals to self-sufficiency, does OESS do anything to aid the agencies to move them to a place where they can meet the criteria to benefit from PWDC funding?
Councilwoman, we view this money that remains for employment and training as being simply a final year phase-out. We know that we will not be able to fund any of these programs beyond Fiscal Year 2005 because there will be no more HUD funding. And, therefore, we recognize that we need to be working very closely with PWDC. And we've already had a number of meetings and conversations to be able to get better access to all of the PWDC array of training programs for our clients. We also recognize that given PWDC's --
Yes. We also recognize 307 04/21/04 - WHOLE - BILL 040255 that five PWDC's wide array and large budget, they ought to be able to kind of spread our folks across their programs and not hurt any of the programs total numbers. In some ways, the way we have provided employment and training programs to date has been unfair to the providers because we've given the providers all complicated folks. And maybe the results would have been better had they had more of a mix of clients in those programs. Maybe at that point, the percentages would have been at the 75 percent or better and PWDC would be in a better position to be able to report to the State rather than viewing our programs as kind of holding them back.