Plaintiffs attorney in Olivia Y foster care case says the state will be in violation of settlement agreement if agency delays reforms.
Marcia Lowry of New York-based A Better Childhood said Friday she has requested a meeting with Gov. Phil Bryant and Attorney General Jim Hood.
"If they go ahead with adoption of this plan, they will be in contempt of a court order," said Lowry, attorney for the plaintiffs in the case initially filed in 2004. "We don't understand what is happening with the agency."
Lowry said Friday by telephone that she hadn't received a response from Bryant or Hood to her meeting request.
"Gov. Bryant is confident in the leadership at CPS and does not believe the agency’s budgetary plan violates the settlement agreement. He has no plans to meet with Ms. Lowry," Bryant spokesman Clay Chandler said Friday.
CPS Commissioner Jess Dickinson said last week the agency has a $49 million deficit, but it has a plan to wipe it out with a $12 million deficit appropriation from lawmakers, $12 million in federal matching money and other financial help from the Mississippi Department of Human Services.
But the plan also includes a hiring freeze and the delay of a software update at the agency that oversees about 5,800 abused or neglected children in the care and custody of the state.
Dickinson said he was certain the attorney for the plaintiffs wouldn't be happy about a delay in implementing reforms, but he hopes the federal judge on the case would understand the state's situation.
In December 2016, U.S. District Judge Tom Lee agreed to the latest settlement agreement in which the state admitted it hadn't complied fully with previous agreements.
The new agreement set timetables for the state to obtain reforms over a three-year period.
Part of the agreement says the state would complete the creation and implementation of a fully functional child welfare agency, independent of, although housed within, the Mississippi Department of Human Services, no later than July 1, 2018. The agreement also calls for adequate staffing and other remedies.
Dickinson said last week CPS is short by about 240 caseworkers and about 60 supervisors.
Bryant took on the effort to reform the foster care system in the state. He made CPS an agency independent of DHS and appointed a commissioner to oversee it.
One of the problems of separating CPS has been less federal money because of the way federal matching funds must flow through DHS.
Now there is legislation to return CPS as a sub-agency of DHS, which would allow federal money to flow to the agency.
The bill would keep CPS independent with its own department head, but it would once again be under DHS for budgetary purposes.