Want to fix child welfare in Kansas? There’s a name that needs to be said out loud

 

It sure sounded like his unfortunate influence kept coming up at a recent legislative hearing, but no one would say the name.

The Secretary of the Kansas Department of Children and Families, Laura Howard, didn’t say it. Instead, when discussing dumping children into makeshift placements, she just said that, as the Kansas Reflector reported: 

The state should be “laser focused” on Wichita to improve a youth placement measure that has consistently fallen short of court-ordered standards. … “I think it’s a larger issue than the case management provider and DCF,” she said. 

Well then what – or who – might it be? Is Wichita, Kansas really a cesspool of depravity, with vastly more child abuse than anywhere else in the state (Or given the incredibly high rate of removal in Kansas, almost anywhere else in the nation)?  

The private agency overseeing foster care in metropolitan Wichita doesn’t think so. Again, from the story: 

Erica Case, an attorney for EmberHope, said Thursday that Kansas can improve its foster care system by [among other things] limiting entry to children experiencing abuse, neglect or immediate safety concerns … 

“I understand that Sedgwick County is risk averse, and I’m fine with that,” Case said, “but we have to reimagine those prevention pathways to make sure that we truly are reserving out-of-home care for those that have been abused, neglected or are in immediate danger.” 

But she never said who was preventing this. 

To be clear, by risk-averse, she must mean averse to the risk of bad press and the wrath of politicians if they leave a child home and something goes wrong. Because the Wichita approach is enormously risky to the children, given the high rate of abuse in foster care, and the vast numbers of studies showing the enormous inherent harm of foster care placement in typical cases – including a greater likelihood of early death. 

But Kansas is, theoretically, at least, a state-run system. Why is the state’s largest county so different? 

Could it have something to do with a name neither Howard nor Case dared to speak? Could it have something to do with someone who genuinely wants to do good, but is doing enormous harm? Could it have something to do with Ron Paschal? 

Here’s what I wrote about Paschal last year, slightly updated: 

In Kansas child welfare, caseworkers come and go, private contractors come and go, commissioners come and go, even agency names come and go (DCF used to be SRS - the Department of Social and Rehabilitative Services). But for decades, there has been one constant: Ron Paschal, the deputy district attorney in charge of the Juvenile Division in Sedgwick County (metropolitan Wichita). 

Based on what I am sure is a sincere belief he is protecting children, there is no stronger advocate for a take-the-child-and-run approach to “child welfare” – and no stronger defender of Kansas’ unique, ugly form of hidden foster care known as “police protective custody placements” – than Paschal.

Eighteen years ago, his office was accused of bullying caseworkers into including things in sworn affidavits that the workers didn't actually believe. Paschal’s staff also was accused of cussing at, screaming at, yelling at and threatening the caseworkers. 

The accusations came from none other than the head of SRS at the time – Don Jordan. Paschal strongly denied the accusations and, ultimately, so did Jordan. When Jordan found out his comments had been taped and would be made public, he reacted like a Republican caught criticizing Trump. He groveled. He called Paschal and apologized. He didn’t mean it, he said; he was merely “pandering” to the family advocates with whom he was meeting. (Details on all this are in the report on Kansas child welfare that we released at the time.) 

But there is no doubt that Paschal has spent decades pushing a take-the-child-and-run agenda and opposing any attempt to curb it. 

The class-action consent decree in force in Kansas won’t change any of this because it doesn’t address wrongful removal – in a state that wrongfully removes children at one of the highest rates in the nation. Vague comments about “prevention pathways” won’t change any of this. Neither will suggesting a “laser focus” on Wichita without explaining exactly where to point the laser.

None of the horrors of Kansas child welfare will change until someone has the guts to stand up to Ron Paschal. They might even have to say his name.