Scioto County leaders say one of the biggest threats to the county’s budget isn’t roads, buildings, or payroll—it’s the soaring cost of caring for abused and neglected children.
At Thursday’s commissioners meeting, Commissioner Scottie Powell said the county has cut the number of children in foster care roughly in half over the past several years, but the cost of caring for those children has continued to climb.
“It’s not that we’re putting kids in more expensive places,” Powell said. “It’s not an incremental raise. It is truly unregulated.”
According to Powell, private providers are largely setting their own rates based on a child’s needs, leaving counties with little negotiating power.
“If you want a kid in care, depending on their needs, these providers are just giving rates,” he said.
One Child Cost Nearly $1,500 a Day
Powell said some of the costs have become staggering.
He described one particularly difficult case in which county staff met twice a week trying to find another placement for a child.
“One of the children cost roughly $1,500 a day,” Powell said.
Even when less expensive placements can be found outside Ohio, the county still incurs significant costs because Children’s Services workers are required to travel to visit those children.
“Our staff has to travel frequently,” Powell said.
Drug Crisis Still Driving Many Cases
Powell said many of the children entering foster care are victims of abuse and neglect tied to the ongoing drug epidemic.
“When kids are taken that are being abused and neglected, a lot of it is connected to the drug epidemic,” he said. “We can see that in our data.”
He said Scioto County has become something of a test case for the rest of Ohio.
“We’re kind of the canary in the mineshaft,” Powell said. “We’re hearing other counties struggling with this, but not at the magnitude we are.”
Local Team Praised
Despite the growing financial burden, Powell praised Scioto County Children’s Services, the juvenile judges, and the prosecutor’s office for reducing the number of children in care.
He said they’ve worked together to speed up adoptions and reunify children with their families whenever it’s safe to do so.
“They cut the caseload in half in collaboration with the judges and prosecutor’s office,” Powell said.
But he added that even with fewer children, there simply aren’t enough available placements across Ohio.
“There’s only so many beds in the state of Ohio we can find,” he said.
State Looking at Changes
Powell said help may be on the way through proposed state legislation.
He said State Representative Justin Pizzulli is working on a bill that would create a statewide reimbursement schedule, or rate card, placing limits on what providers can charge counties.
“When you start saying it takes $500 a day to provide care for a kid, I really have to second guess that,” Powell said. “My brain goes to the other world I work for where we take care of the elderly—it’s basically half that.”
“The Answer Is Not Taxing More”
Powell stressed that the county’s financial problems aren’t the result of Children’s Services failing to do its job.
Instead, he said the issue is a broken statewide funding system.
“We went to the citizens when we had 407 kids in care and said, ‘Hey, we need your help,’ and they stepped up,” Powell said, referring to the levy voters approved to help fund Children’s Services.
“It is a systemic issue. Other counties are running into this.”
He added that some counties have reportedly become reluctant to remove children from dangerous situations because of the enormous financial burden.
“I know other counties are not taking kids into care because of it,” Powell said. “It is clearly a broken system, but it’s not the fault of our local team. They are reviewing our high-cost cases all the time.”
For Scioto County officials, the hope is that statewide reforms will bring some predictability to foster care costs while ensuring abused and neglected children continue receiving the care they need.
