By Cathy Candisky for the Public Children Services Association of Ohio.
Broadcast version by Nadia Ramlagan reporting for the Public Children Services Association of Ohio-Ohio News Connection Collaboration.

Twice in the last year, Zoey, a 16-year-old in foster care, had to spend the night in the Franklin County Children Services office.

She had nowhere else to go.

"It was bad," recalled the soft-spoken Zoey, a stuffed bunny clutched under her arm. "It wasn't scary. It was just uncomfortable."

Zoey, who asked to be identified by only her first name, ate canned ravioli and camped out on a sofa in a windowless visitation room she shared with another girl.

"We didn't watch TV. We just sat here staring at each other," Zoey said. "How do you sleep on this hard couch and a pillow that was flat?

"We stayed in here and we did nothing."

Across Ohio, a shortage of foster families, group homes, residential treatment facilities and other placements has overwhelmed child welfare agencies. Frequently, it means youth in their custody are housed in offices, hospital emergency rooms and other ill-suited places for days, weeks and sometimes longer.

In the year ending June 2022, 503 children in foster care spent at least one night in county government offices across Ohio, according to a state report. Dozens more youth stayed in hospitals even though they weren't sick and there was no medical reason for them being there.

Child welfare officials say it's the last option for already traumatized kids with severe behavioral health issues and developmental disabilities. There simply are not enough places offering the treatment they need.

"Residential facilities have been serving children with less significant needs and the children that we are left placing are those that have very deep-end type of issues and significant traumas that have been repeatedly occurring throughout their lives," said Donna Seed, director of social services at Lucas County Children Services.

"They [have] issues that can range from delinquency to gang issues to significant developmental delays to ranges on the autism spectrum, or even medical issues."

Kellijo Jeffries, director of Portage County Job and Family Services, recently was unable to find placement for an 11-year-old girl with developmental disabilities who sometimes was aggressive as well as two youth who had attempted suicide.

Foster families, group homes and treatment facilities commonly share when they deny placement that the youth's needs are too great, or they don't have appropriate services or enough staff to meet the child's need, Jeffries said. "Until we have capacity and the right facilities and options for these kids, we're going to continue to spin."

In the case of the youth with developmental disabilities, her placement provider took the child to the hospital when she wouldn't go to sleep, started banging her head and refused her medication. The placement provider then notified the agency that it could not take her back because of insufficient staff and her aggressive behavior.

The two youth who had recently attempted suicide were discharged from a Northeast Ohio hospital, but because the agency could not secure immediate placement, despite collaborative efforts with county and state agencies, both children remained in the hospital for days after discharge.

The system not only is failing these youth, it's compounding their problems, said Angela Sausser, executive director of the Public Children Services Association of Ohio.

"This kid is being told essentially that you're not wanted. No one wants you. You can't be with your family. They may not want you because of your behaviors, or can't take care of you because of your behaviors, and now nobody else wants you and you're stuck in this cold government agency eating takeout and showering at the YMCA. Children experience trauma from being removed from their own homes. By not having a placement option readily available, we are just adding to the child's trauma."

Nearly 15,000 youth are in state custody and about a fourth of them have complex issues including mental illness, developmental disabilities, and kids from the juvenile justice system, some involved in felony-level crimes.

Approximately 1 in 4 of youth in state custody are there for these other reasons, with no history of abuse and neglect. Sausser said it's time to ask why children services has become the "system of last resort" when other systems cannot meet the needs of these youth.

Foster children's health care is covered by Medicaid while they are in custody. Medicaid is required to meet their physical, developmental, and mental health needs, but while screening and diagnosis for behavioral health conditions is common among foster youth, appropriate and available treatment for those with aggressive behaviors resulting from mental illness, developmental disabilities or trauma is in short supply.

Caseworkers say the number of youth needing intensive, long-term treatment has grown, making it harder to find a foster family or group home to take them. The longer kids wait for placement, the longer they wait for treatment, and for many youth their conditions worsen.

"It is truly additional trauma. It can worsen acute symptoms," Dr. Katherine Junger, associate medical director of mental and behavioral health for Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, said of kids stuck at the hospital.

"It leaves them feeling helpless and hopeless and, quite frankly, rejected and removed from society."

The nation's largest pediatric psychiatric unit with 100 inpatient beds, Cincinnati Children's had 22 youth in its emergency room waiting for placement in April. Another 22 children remained in inpatient beds because appropriate home- or community-based treatment was unavailable.

The inpatient unit is designed for short-term crisis stabilization where youth stay five to seven days before they are discharged and moved to long-term care.

When forced to stay longer, Junger said, "they can actually get sicker while they're in the hospital because they're at this level of care that is inappropriate for their needs but it's where they can be safe until we can find a better place for them to be."

Next: "Someone is going to end up very hurt and [my child] is going to be scarred for life by something she can't come back from."


Cathy Candisky wrote this article for the Public Children Services Association of Ohio.


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Advocates for working families in New York say they want less talk and more action to improve child care in the state.

Gov. Kathy Hochul has proposed a child-care construction fund and a task force to address the issue - which advocates say will make a dent in the child-care shortage, but doesn't do enough.

Estimates show New Yorkers spend a grand total of $14 billion a year on child care, or about $22,000 per year, per child. High child-care costs also are cited as a major reason young families leave the state.

Rebecca Bailin, executive director of New Yorkers United for Childcare, said universal child care is possible if the state will fund plans to implement it.

"That child care would be free, easy to apply, nearby and accessible to all families," she said. "There's no reason, with a budget of $237 billion, she cannot start to implement universal public child care now."

Bailin said a lack of political will has been the biggest hurdle for universal public child care, since 74% of New Yorkers say they want it. Feedback from some state lawmakers is positive, although enacting a universal plan could cost $12 billion a year - 6% of the state's current budget.

A Cornell University poll found high child-care costs are one reason some people can't join the workforce, while other reasons are lack of accessible child care that keeps people from working.

Bailin said a universal public system could counteract these economic harms.

"It's a $10 to $13 return on investment for every dollar spent," she said. "Making New York an affordable place for families will help to stop the exodus of families, make it possible for us to grow our workforce and our tax base."

Although New York offers child-care programs, some families earn too much to qualify for them, or have issues with immigration status that keep parents from reaching out. Bailin said expanding New York's Child Tax Credit and Working Families Tax Credit could help the system, as well as investing in the child-care workforce.


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January is National Mentoring Month and in Minnesota, program leaders report waiting lists for kids to be matched up with an adult willing to spend some valuable time with them.

Calls are being renewed for volunteers. Community-based mentoring programs connect youths who do not have many role models in their lives with adults for a range of activities. It could include attending sporting events, museums, or doing arts and crafts together.

Jill Hinners, executive director of Mentor North in Duluth, said it is all about helping children develop new skills and confidence.

"We definitely see kids that are introverts, shy, anxious," Hinners explained. "Where maybe they just have a little bit of difficulty putting themselves out there to form a large network of friends."

She suggested a mentor might put them more at ease in making connections as they grow. Her group pointed to research showing mentored kids are 22% more likely to have felt a strong sense of belonging. Hinners noted even though Minnesota has a good track record for volunteer work, her office reports a waitlist of between 50 and 60 kids.

Other data show kids who have a mentor are 55% more likely to enroll in college and are 78% more likely to volunteer regularly. Hinners stressed the outcomes can be traced back to a sense of belonging.

"We want youths to feel that they are developing their voice," Hinners emphasized. "To be able to make themselves heard in their community and courageous enough to take leadership positions in their community."

Hinners pointed out even though they have a backlog, volunteer levels have rebounded from a pandemic dip. She added they are trying to be more accommodating in certain ways, including making sure kids with disabilities have a good experience.

Adults who want to become mentors are put through a screening process before they are matched with a youth who has similar interests.


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Nearly 9,000 families are on the wait list for the Oregon Employment Related Day Care program, and family advocates are calling on lawmakers to ramp up funding to meet the growing need. Child-care prices in Oregon can exceed college tuition and have outpaced growth in household incomes, according to research by Oregon State University.

Dana Hepper, director of policy and advocacy with the Children's Institute, said most families, even if they don't qualify for the ERDC, cannot afford child care.

"And most child-care providers do not make living wages. So we can't rely on just parents paying tuition to solve this child-care crisis," she insisted.

Hepper added that the state needs to spend at least $500-million more on the ERDC program this year. This would serve the families that are on the wait list, as well as those who have vouchers for the program but cannot find a child-care provider.

All but one county in Oregon is considered a child-care desert for infants and toddlers, according to Hepper. A child-care desert is defined as having only one licensed child-care slot for every three or more children. She added that there has been more funding for preschools, such as Head Start and Multnomah County's "Preschool For All" which has expanded access. But even if they are not deserts, Hepper added, every county in the state has a shortage of preschool care.

"I think there's a dearth of child-care because there's a lack of public investment in child-care. And the data bears that out," she continued.

Hepper highlights Gilliam County as the only Oregon county that is not a desert for infant child care because it has invested public funds. She added that the ERDC program alone will not solve the child-care crisis; the state also suffers from a shortage of child-care workers.

"We need strategies that support the workforce and invest in pathways to enter this workforce with the skills that you need," she concluded.