First, finding permanent placements for children removed from their families is critical to ensure their overall well-being. Statutory and Policy Changes Require States to Hold First Permanency Hearing Sooner

The prolonged stays of children in foster care have prompted states to enact laws or policies to shorten to less than the federally allowed 18 months the time between entry into foster care and the first permanency hearing at which permanent placement is considered. As shown in figure 1, 23 states have enacted such laws, with a majority of these requiring the hearing to be held within 12 months. An additional three states, while not enacting such statutes, have policies requiring permanency hearings earlier than 18 months. According to officials in Ohio’s Office of Child Care and Family Services, this requirement was included in an effort to expedite the permanency planning process and reduce the time children spend in foster care. States Make Changes in Permanency Planning Process With Some Positive Results for Foster Care Children

Although the states we reviewed did not systematically evaluate the impact of their initiatives, they implemented a variety of operational and procedural changes to expedite and improve the permanency process. These states reported that these actions have improved the lives of some children by (1) reuniting them with their families more quickly, (2) expediting the termination of parental rights when reunification efforts were determined to be unfeasible—thus making it possible for child welfare agencies to begin looking for an adoptive home sooner—or (3) reducing the number of different foster care placements in which they lived. The final 25 percent will not be paid until reunification or a permanent placement is achieved. This record methodically guides caseworkers through all the steps necessary to make a permanent placement decision. When contemplating changes, state officials had to take into consideration the intricacies of the foster care process; the inherent difficulty that caseworkers and court officials face when deciding if a child should be returned home; and the need in some cases to change the culture of caseworkers and judges to recognize that, in certain cases, termination of parental rights should be pursued. These included (1) long-term involvement of officials in leadership positions; (2) involvement of key stakeholders in developing consensus and obtaining buy-in concerning the nature of the problem and the solution; and (3) the availability of resources to plan, implement, and sustain the project. We also found that a critical feature of these initiatives was often absent: Many of them lacked evaluations designed to assess the impact of the effort. Efforts are under way, however, to improve the availability of information on foster children. Scope and Methodology

To identify states that have enacted laws or implemented policies establishing requirements regarding the timing of the first permanency hearing that are more stringent than those under federal law, we reviewed pertinent state legislation and policies of 50 states and the District of Columbia. To determine what changes states and localities have made to achieve more timely permanent placements and factors that contributed to their success, we first reviewed literature on foster care and permanency planning.
Why GAO Did This Study

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed states efforts to improve the permanency planning process and reduce the time a child spends in foster care, focusing on what: (1) statutory and policy changes states have made to limit the time allowed to determine permanent placements for foster children; (2) changes states or localities have made in their operations in an attempt to achieve more timely permanent placements and what the impact of those changes has been; and (3) factors officials believe helped them meet the challenges of achieving more timely permanent placements.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) signaling the importance of a permanent placement to the well-being of children, 23 states have enacted laws establishing requirements regarding the timing of the permanency hearing that are more stringent than those under federal law; (2) federal law requires a hearing within 18 months after the child's entry into foster care; (3) an additional three states, while not enacting such statutes, have imposed similar requirements as a matter of policy; (4) statutory or policy changes alone, however, are not sufficient to resolve the final placement of foster children more quickly; (5) the states GAO reviewed have made changes in their operations to facilitate reunifying children with their families, expedite terminating parental rights when reunification efforts have failed, or modify the role and operations of the court both to streamline the process and to make well-informed permanent placement decisions; (6) while these initiatives focus on certain stages of the permanency planning process, such as when a child first enters foster care, two states are implementing major changes to their overall foster care systems; (7) although initiatives are in place, most of these states have not systematically evaluated the impact of them, and data concerning these efforts were limited; (8) however, most states did report that many of these initiatives contributed to reducing the time spent in foster care or decreasing the total number of placement changes while a child is in foster care; (9) state officials identified a number of factors that helped them meet the challenges involved in making changes; (10) in some cases, child welfare officials and staff had to undergo significant culture change, modifying long-held views about the merits of pursuing termination of parental rights versus family reunification; (11) they found that changing the way they approached making decisions about the well-being of children and their families was a lengthy process; (12) to implement these initiatives successfully, program officials believed that it was necessary to have the long-term and active involvement of key officials at all levels, including the governor, legislators, and agency officials as well as caseworkers, service providers, attorneys, and judges; (13) this participation was essential to define the problem and reach consensus; and (14) doing so required considerable coordination efforts and an extended commitment of resources.