CPS Head Honored as Director of the Year

The head of Scioto County Job and Family Services was named Outstanding Director of the Year by the Ohio Job and Family Service Directors Association. Tammy Moore Morton’s fellow directors honored her for her work in Scioto County which included bringing the troubled Children Protective Services into her own agency in hopes of saving more children from abuse and addressing a multi-million-dollar deficit. Morton recently spoke at the Scioto County Commissioners meeting about the challenges of that transition. “We continue to move that mountain one rock at a time. We’re moving forward daily, but that progress seems like it can be an inch at a time,” said Scioto County Jobs and Family Services Director Tammy Moore Morton. We need to make the necessary changes, regroup, and continue to move forward. Are we where we need to be? No, we’re not where I want us to be.” She said the issues were not due to lack of effort and hard work on her staff’s part. “We are trying, but some of the forces are against us. We don’t have enough staff. Director Morton said she is still struggling with finding and keeping qualified employees. “My top priority is to stabilize the staff, get enough people on board, and get them trained. With the recruitment and retention situation, it seems like we take one step forward and two steps back almost on a daily basis.” In July 0f 2022, there were over 400 children in care. Morton says the number of kids in care is slowly dropping, but that’s not due to fewer children coming into their custody. The reduction in numbers is due to children leaving the system after they are placed in permanent homes. “We are removing the children that need to be removed.” Morton said Scioto County CPS received 561 complaints of neglect or abuse in the first three months of 2023. “The most alarming increase in those referrals is the increase in sexual abuse cases. This is shocking. We had 20 sexual abuse reports in January, 22 in February, and 45 in March.” (Some of those reports involved multiple children) The director said that Scioto County SVU was “hot and heavy” on dealing with these complaints and that she was very proud of the team’s efforts. “We’re really making a difference.” She told commissioners that placement costs for the children in care were $623,000 for the month of March. So far this year, 37 children have been removed from their homes by the agency. Morton said the agency was working with local law enforcement, courts, and other agencies to clearly define each agency’s role when it comes to dealing with child abuse and neglect. “Once this is implemented, it will serve as a roadmap as to how cases will be processed. I don’t think that’s something that has ever existed before.” She said the agency was currently working on updating its policy manual since most of the procedures in place are left over from the 1990s. “It’s a slow process, but we want to do it right.”

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