PCSAO Weekly Update - Public Children Services Association of Ohio

510 East Mound Street • Suite 200
Columbus, Ohio 43215
Phone 614-224-5802 • Fax 614-228-5150
Website: www.pcsao.org
PCSAO Weekly Update
November 28th, 2012
IN THIS ISSUE:
• PCSAO Thanksgiving Progress Report
• K-GAP Removed from PCSAO Biennial Budget
• Announcing Nicole Harper, New PCSAO Legislative
Director
• Kasich Administration Goes to Bat for Food Stamp
Recipients
• PCSAO Behavioral Health Leadership Group Meeting,
Nov. 26 2012
• Northwest District Meeting
• National Adoption Day
• Sandi Priestino Retires from OCWT
• HeartBeat "Special 2012 Conference Edition"
• Child Welfare in the News
• Upcoming Meetings
• Employment Opportunities
• Family Film Festival, Thu, Nov 29–Sun, Dec 2, 2012
• World Prematurity Day
• Quote of the Day
PCSAO Staff
Crystal Ward Allen
Executive Director
Gayle Channing Tenenbaum
Director of Policy and Governmental
Affairs
Scott Britton
Assistant Director
Jeed Jitprasert
Operations Manager
Matt Bird
Special Projects Manager
Mark Watson
The Ohio State University, College of
Social Work
Yiwen Cao
The Ohio State University, College of
Social Work
Editor: Yiwen Cao
E-mail: cao.225@buckeyemail.osu.edu
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PCSAO Executive Membership Meeting
December 6 & 7, 2012 (Thursday & Friday)
Location - Quest Business Center, 8405 Pulsar Place, Cols 43240 (I 71 Polaris Exit, just north of I 270)
Hotel Reservations - Hampton Inn (located directly behind Quest) Call 614-885-8400, Group Code: PCS
Please RSVP your attendance with Jeed@pcsao.org no later than noon on Monday, Dec. 3, 2012.
PCSAO THANKSGIVING PROGRESS REPORT - It is that time of year to take stock and review our blessings and
progress. PCSAO is once again reminded of just how complex our work is, how much progress has been made to uplift our
work. We work each day for positive policies, effective practice and tools, and adequate resources and supports. Nevertheless,
we will NEVER be able to predict human behavior and anticipate each and every event. PCSAO is grateful for your work,
every day, for child safety and permanency, for your support of Ohio’s families – birth, kin, foster and adoptive, and for
your dedication for child and youth well-being despite the trauma they have experienced.
Please link here for 2012 PCSAO Thanksgiving Progress Report. We appreciate your membership, participation and fiscal
contributions.
PCSAO Weekly Update November 28th, 2012 page 1/5

K-GAP REMOVED FROM PCSAO BIENNIAL BUDGET AGENDA – discussion to adopt the Title IV-E Guardianship
Subsidy is being removed from our budget advocacy agenda, as PCSAO membership is not in consensus as to the costs, benefits
and best policy for considering KGAP here in Ohio. We are very appreciative of all the discussion, calls and dialogue on this
policy. We shall continue to work closely with our membership on the other PCSAO 2014-15 Budget Initiatives including child
welfare funding, funding equity, trauma screening/assessment/services, substance abuse treatment, and others, as agreed upon
at our Dec. 6 Executive Strategic Planning meeting.
Ohio child welfare professionals and their practice show strong use of safe relatives and other kin when children are unable to
be safely cared for by their parent(s). We know from research that this strategy is good for kids – compared to placement with
unrelated foster families, these children have better outcomes - they are in familiar homes, they move less frequently, their
academic attendance and performance is better, and they have fewer school and community behavior issues.
Ohio has evolved a continuum of support for children fortunate enough to be cared for in kin homes, including the following:
• Child Only TANF/OWF cash assistance for relatives that care for kin.
• Prevention / diversion / exit strategies for families that can manage without child welfare intrusion - Kinship Navigator
Services
• Legal documentation for informal kin families - Grandparent Power of Attorney and Caregiver Authorization Affidavits
• Focused practice for open child welfare cases of children living with kin caregivers irregardless of custody status –
Relative / Non-Relative Approval Process; ProtectOhio IV-E Waiver Kinship Strategy
• Permanency strategies for kin families when reunification is not appropriate – Kinship Permanency Incentive Program;
work by the Ohio Supreme Court on streamlining strategies for legal guardianship / custody.
Ohio will have the benefit of really examining the implementation and experience of the other 29 states that have adopted the
Title IV-E Guardianship Subsidy, also known as K-GAP. Experience so far shows this is applicable to a very narrow population
(waiting children in custody, for whom neither reunification or adoption is appropriate.) Thank you all for your dialogue at this
time.
ANNOUNCING NICOLE HARPER, NEW PCSAO LEGISLATIVE DIRECTOR – we are very pleased to introduce
PCSAO’s new Legislative Director, Nicole Harper, MPA. Nicole has a rich background of community work with children and
families – working as a teacher and educational program manager, as a job coach for teens, also several years in
communications and most recently as a Legislative Aide to Senator Charleta Tavares. For those of you who don’t know –
Senator Tavares was the Associate Director at PCSAO, working along with Gayle Channing Tenenbaum, when Crystal started
as a student intern, in 1991! What goes around comes around. Nicole’s official start date is Monday, Dec. 17, but she is
arranging to attend our Dec. 6 & 7 Executive Membership Meeting, to be part of the two year Strategic Planning session. Join us
and meet her!
KASICH ADMINISTRATION GOES TO BAT FOR FOOD STAMP RECIPIENTS–In this time when many families are
still struggling to put food on the table as Ohio moves out of the recession, the Kasich Administration, through the leadership of
the Governor and ODJFS Director Michael Colbert, fought against a proposed $50.00 food stamp cut to families by the Federal
Department of Agriculture. This proposal was based on the warm winter experienced in 2012 and predicted lower energy and
heating bills. Director Colbert was able to convince the Agriculture Department to figure Ohio’s energy costs with a different
formula that allowed the cut to be reduced to only $23.00 per family. This will still be a hardship for many families, but at least
not as severe as $50.00 would have been. PCSAO thanks Governor Kasich, Director Colbert and Lisa Hamler Fugitt of Second
Harvest Food Banks for their leadership in quickly finding a way to alleviate some of the pain this decision would cost many
families in our state.
PCSAO BEHAVIORAL HEALTH LEADERSHIP GROUP MEETING, NOVEMBER 26, 2012–The PCSAO Behavioral
Health Leadership Group met on November 26, 2012 at PCSAO and welcomed new members: Sue Zake, Office for Exceptional
Children, ODE; Sayeh Shirvani, Office of Children and Families, ODJFS; Patti Clements, Child Health Policy Analyst,
Director’s Office, ODJFS; Johanna Pearce, Fairfield County.
• Draft Psychotropic Toolkit Discussion – Crystal Allen and Tim Schaeffer, Director of Trumbull County CSB
presented the latest draft of a toolkit county directors and clinical staff could use in making decisions about the use of
psychotropic drugs. They both had reviewed policies from different states as well as from different counties within Ohio
and integrated them into the draft. The paper is organized to allow counties a spectrum of abilities to adopt (e.g., basic,
recommended, ideal).Goal of the worksheet is to address “how to manage meds”. Since the material was new to the
Committee members they have until December 3, 2012 to send in responses to Crystal and Tim. A new draft will then
PCSAO Weekly Update November 28th, 2012 page 2/5

e sent to the Executive Committee of BEACON to be reviewed and prepared for presentation at the December 12,
2012 meeting of the full BEACON group. There was a great deal of support for this work from the PCSA County
Representatives at the table. Yiwen CAO, our PHD, student intern at PCSAO, is also contributing to this work.
• IHBT Update – Patrick Kanary, Director of The Center for Innovative Practice at the Begun Center, Case Western
University, joined us to discuss the progress of IHBT. ODMH plans to file the SPA by January 2013 in order to begin
the program in Ohio by April 1, 2013. Revised rules have been released; public comment through 12/10/2012; must be
filed by 1/15/13 (If anyone would like a copy of the rules please email Gayle at Gtenenb@aol.com).
Three issues still to be addressed with ODMH: (1) Expectations of what kind of level of training and support the IHBT
teams will get upon their request or need (particularly new teams) and (2) requirement related to collecting outcomes
and (3) rate setting.
Both Patrick Kanary and Teresa Lampl will be surveying their respective members or groups they work with to
ascertain how many are actually doing IHBT or plan to after it becomes a Medicaid covered service.
For those of us who have worked on this program for somewhere between 6 and 12 years we are very grateful to the
leadership at ODMH under Director Tracy Plouck, at Medicaid under the Director, John McCarthy and the Governor’s
Office of Health Care Transformation, Greg Moody, to finally making this a high priority for children, youth and their
families in the Kasich Administration.
• Building Mental Wellness (BMW) – Karen Hughes, explained the BMW, program to the Committee. It is a program,
headed up by Doctor John Duby of Akron Children’s Hospital, to train pediatric practices in basic primary prevention
and to promote mental wellness, teach parents to be positive parents and to screen for social emotional and autism. They
have just begun work with a second group of pediatricians and are looking for groups particularly in South East and
North West Ohio. A number of the pediatricians in the two groups already participating have talked about serving
children in foster care and their serious needs particularly for behavioral health care. They are now going to survey all
of the doctors participating to learn exactly how many children they are seeing are in foster care and if their needs and
background of what brings children to foster care needs to be part of the training for these pediatricians. The BMW staff
will share the list of participating practices with PCSAO so the counties will be able to give the lists to foster parents
who may be looking for a pediatrician for a child in their care who is participating in this project. Foster parents could
also encourage pediatricians they are already using to participate in the project.
• ODMH Update – Terry Jones gave the ODMH and Children’s Deputies Committee Update. The Internal OHT
Children’s Committee has been divided into three work groups: Infant Mortality; 3 rd Grade Reading Guarantee and
Services to High Risk Children and Adolescence. This group of child serving cabinet directors and their deputies has
submitted a list of all programs in their respective department they fund under these priorities and at what level.
Recommendations will then go to the Cabinet and then to the Governor. The Unified Screening Tool for Trauma is on
the list as are some behavioral health treatment dollars but at this point these are only recommendations at the first level.
It is long way before they can end up in the Administration’s Budget when it is introduced in February 2013. The
Cabinet Directors meeting is being held on Weds. December 28, 2012
• Gateway CALL Grant Update – Kythryn Hurd explained the $3.6 million grant Franklin County Children’s Services
has received with partners such as ODJFS, PCSAO, Nationwide Children’s Hospital and Center for Innovative Practice
from HHs, to understand how behavioral health needs are assessed in children in the child welfare system and then
implementation of a screening and assessment tool. Originally it will be a pilot but then will expand to all children in the
county and will measure child, provider and system level outcomes.
• ODE Update – Sue Zake shared that there is an inter-department group working on a report that is due out by
December 1,2012 that focuses on children in the education system but who are more complex with behavioral
,academic, and complex disabilities looking across all agencies. She is very interested in learning how Education can
coordinate with child welfare at the County level.
NORTHWEST DISTRICT–Kelly Hickle-Lentz (Wood CDJFS) continues to offer informative presenters at the quarterly
Northwest District meetings. The Nov. 13 meeting featured information about the Ohio Benefit Bank Youth Transition
Program, the Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP), Peer-to-Peer Partnership Council, and human trafficking,
among updates from statewide partners. The 2013 calendar was set, with meetings scheduled for Feb. 12, May 14, Aug. 13, and
Nov. 12 (likely alternating between Hancock and Wood counties). Many thanks to Kelly and all who attend in this district for
making it a great year!
PCSAO Weekly Update November 28th, 2012 page 3/5

NATIONAL ADOPTION DAY–Scott represented PCSAO at a Franklin County Children Services National Adoption Day
event Nov. 16 at the Franklin County Courthouse in Columbus. A number of families appeared in court that day to finalize their
adoptions. Nationwide and the National Center for Adoption Law and Policy helped sponsor the event along with Wendy’s
Wonderful Kids (complete with a giant, walking Wendy’s Frosty!).
SANDI PRIESTINO RETIRES FROM OCWT - Dr. Sandi Priestino retired from the Ohio
Child Welfare Training Program after 25 years of training in mid November 2012. Her first
day of recorded training for the program was in January 1987. Our two data systems captured
that she trained at least 37,000 OCWTP participants, I'm sure we missed counting a few. . .
We had a celebration lunch with her and her husband Ray (see photo) sponsored by the
WORTC and SWORTC. It was on Sandi's last day of training on November 15, 2012 at
Madison Lakes in Dayton. On that date she trained "Understanding Co-Workers from Different
Generations" which seemed very appropriate for a swan song.
HEARTBEAT “SPECIAL 2012 CONFERENCE EDITION”–This edition of
The HeartBeat will help you catch up on anything you missed and celebrate this
year’s amazing award winners.
In This Edition:
• Outstanding Child Advocate of the Year
• Rising Up and Moving On Awards
• Family of the Year Awards
• Outstanding Journalist of the Year
• Dan Schneider Leadership in Training
• Outstanding Legislators of the Year
• PCSAO Staff Farewell
• Outstanding Child Protection Supervisor of the Year
• Outstanding Child Protection Caseworker of the Year
• Outstanding Child Protection Support Staff of the Year
• Thank you
Click here for a full article or download.
CHILD WELFARE IN THE NEWS
• Trojan Sexual Health Report Card Sparks Action, the Huff Post, 11/7/2012
• Ohio to Review How Social Workers Handled Case of Family Whose Young Son Died of Malnutrition, the Washington
Post, 11/15/2012
• Ohio AG Wants to Make it Easier for Foster Children to Make it On their Own, 10TV.com, 11/19/2012
• Scott Ferris: Children Benefit when Loving Families Adopt, LimaOhio.com, 11/23/2012
• A Thanksgiving Progress Report on Child Welfare in Ohio, Public News Services, 11/23/2012
• Abandoned Newborn Baby May be Getting Foster Home Soon, Springfield News-Sun, 11/24/2012
• Cuyahoga County Children and Family Services Workers Strive to Save Kids (Gallery), Cleveland.Com, 11/24/2012
• Look Deeper into Foster Care & Adoption this Holiday Season, LoveLand Magazine, 11/26/2012
PCSAO Weekly Update November 28th, 2012 page 4/5

UPCOMING MEETINGS – For full 2012 calendar, click here!
When What Where
December 5 Human Resources/Safety Committee TBA
December 6 Board of Trustees PCSAO Office
December 6-7 Executive Membership Committee Quest Conference Center, Columbus
November 13 NW / Findlay Contact Scott for Location
December 14 Conference Committee PCSAO
December 17 Legislative Committee FCCS
December 25 Christmas Day Office Closed
December 19 SW / Cincinnati Contact Scott for Location
December 25 Christmas PCSAO is Closed.
EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES – For more information, please visit our website. For PCSA agencies – if you’re
looking at hiring graduates from the University Partnership Program (UPP), please visit the UPP graduates list.
Date Organization Available Position
11/26/2012 Pickaway County DJFS Social Service Worker 2
11/26/2012 The Ohio Alliance of YMCAs Director of Youth in Government
11/26/2012 Portage County DJFS Quality Review Specialist, and Public Assistance Secretary
11/20/2012 Greene County DJFS Children Services Program Administrator
11/20/2012 Allen County CS Child Welfare Caseworker
11/15/2012 Washington County CS Executive Director
11/14/2012 Fairfield County DJFS Protective Services Program Administrator
11/8/2012 Knox County DJFS Employment opportunity
10/31/2012 Hamilton County DJFS Kinship Supervisor
10/30/2012 Geauga County DJFS Child Protective Social Worker
10/29/2012 Clermont County DJFS Social Service Worker 3
10/29/2012 Lorain County CS Child Welfare Worker 3
FAMILY FILM FESTIVAL – Thu, Nov 29–Sun, Dec 2, 2012 - Zoom brings you terrific allages
films at incredibly affordable prices, free family activities, and much more. This year’s
assortment of entertaining and acclaimed movies ranges from a classic comedy to a wide variety of
beautiful animated films. In addition to the great films, kids and families can enjoy Asianinfluenced
hands-on crafts, our free Saturday morning cereal and pajama party, and a Saturday
afternoon ice cream social. Please click here for more info.
WORLD PREMATURITY DAY – Nov. 17th 2012 – Newborn deaths account for 43 percent of
all deaths of children under 5. Accelerating progress in newborn survival is key to achieving
Millennium Development Goal 4 of reducing child mortality, and to addressing preventable child
deaths beyond 2015 as part of the global campaign committing to Child Survival: A Promise
Renewed. Although preterm birth rates continue to rise in most countries, high impact, feasible
interventions for prevention and care of preterm birth, such as kangaroo mother care and antenatal
corticosteroids, are underused. These interventions could save 450,000 and 400,000 lives each
year, respectively.
Learn more:
• View the World Health Organization’s Born Too Soon report.
• Learn more about the global campaign Committing to Child Survival: A Promise Renewed.
• Visit the Helping Babies Breathe website.
QUOTE OF THE DAY – "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." ~ Martin Luther King
PCSAO Weekly Update November 28th, 2012 page 5/5