Polk County, Oregon

Reason Children are Removed

Children are often removed from their homes and placed in out-of-home care for multiple reasons. However, if the most serious reason were identified for each of the children removed, the following profile would characterize children entering care between 1991 and 1993.

Level of Vulnerability

State Office for Services to Children and Families has formalized a child welfare priority system known as the level of vulnerability. This system, which replaces an informal prioritization system in each branch office, assures workers provide services to the more vulnerable children and recognizes the level of service provided in each branch office.

SOSCF administration, program managers, and researchers created the level of vulnerability system in 1990. There are seven levels in the system. Level 1 includes the most severe abuse and neglect cases: life threatening neglect, abandoned or orphaned children, siblings of children who have died from abuse or neglect, severe familial sexual abuse, and severe physical abuse. The least vulnerable children are identified as Level 7: chronic acting-out teenagers, adolescents exposed to chronic neglect, teenage victims of mild physical abuse, court ordered services where no abuse has occurred, and voluntary requests for services where abuse, neglect, and threat of harm are not apparent. Younger and more vulnerable children are in the higher levels of vulnerability (levels 1-3); older children, better able to protect themselves from moderate and mild abuse, are assigned to the lower levels of the system (levels 4-7).

Child's Problems

Children and youth entering the foster care system exhibit a variety of troubling behaviors and suffer from myriad of physical and mental problems. The following table contains a list of the child's problems most often cited by case workers.

Family Factors

Parents who abuse or neglect their children are themselves often burdened by a host of problems known as family factors. The table below contains the 10 most prevalent problems exhibited by parents in the community who have their children in Foster Care.

Most Prevalent Barriers in Polk County

Barriers are problems or conditions that a caseworker identifies as requiring some resolution before a child can be returned home.

Services Provided to Children and Families in Polk County

Polk County Summary

About 120 children per year from Polk County enter substitute care and stay in care for at least two weeks. Forty-four of these cases were randomly selected and reviewed by researchers from the Child Welfare Partnership at Portland State University. A profile of children entering substitute care in Polk County is compared to the state profile for the following: the reason children enter care, severity of the abuse, problems of the children, parental problems, barriers to returning children home, and services offered to the parents and children.

The most common reasons children enter foster care in Oregon are physical abuse, neglect, treatment issues of the child, parental absence, and sexual abuse. Child's behavior (22%), and treatment issues of the child (22%) are the most prevalent reasons children enter care in Polk County. These two reasons for removal account for 43% of the children placed in care in Polk County; this estimate is significantly higher then other Oregon counties (22%). Physical abuse, parental absence, neglect, and sexual abuse are less common reasons for removal in Polk County.

To ensure that Oregon's most needy children are served, Oregon's child welfare system has developed a seven-level priority system known as the level of vulnerability. Level 1 includes the most severe types of abuse and neglect cases while level 7 includes the least severe. In Polk County level 3 is the largest group of children entering care followed by level 7, level 1, and level 5. A greater percentage of children from Polk County are identified as level 7 (24%) than elsewhere in Oregon (11%). Eighty percent of level 7 cases from Polk County are chronically acting out, non-adjudicated teenagers. Level 3 includes chronic neglect, child sexual offenders needing treatment, severely emotionally disturbed children, and children needing care due to their parent's mental illness. Although level 3 comprises over 35% of the children entering care in Polk County, level 3 represents 43% of the children entering care in Oregon.

Many children entering foster care in Oregon are afflicted with problems associated with maltreatment and family dysfunction. Being a victim of sexual abuse, beyond parental control, criminally involved, and angry/aggressive behaviors are the most common child problems being exhibited by the children entering care in Polk County; these most common behaviors are more prevalent in Polk County than elsewhere in Oregon. Interestingly, there are fewer children entering care in Polk County for sexual abuse (11%), although there is a high proportion of sexual abuse victims (35%). The discrepancy exists because most sexual abuse victims do not enter care when the victim discloses the abuse but rather when the child exhibits behaviors resulting from the abuse during adolescence. Generally the perpetrator leaves the household after the disclosure and the victim is provided treatment.

Parents with children entering the foster care system are themselves often burdened by a number of problems known as family factors. There are certain family factors associated with risk of a child being placed in foster care or risk of serious abuse. The factors associated with risk of removal and risk of serious abuse include unemployment, criminal involvement, drug/alcohol involvement, inadequate housing, domestic violence, parent abused as a child, and social isolation. The parents with children entering care in Polk County tend to have fewer of these family factors than families served in other Oregon counties.

Family factors, which provide a profile of family problems when a child is placed in foster care, can also be barriers to returning children home. Barriers are family problems which must be addressed before a child is returned home. The most common parental barriers in Polk County include drug/alcohol involvement, physical/emotional/mental condition, failure to complete treatment and inadequate housing. Although Polk County SOSCF serves parents with drug/alcohol issues, serves parents who fail to complete treatment, and serves parents who have poor parenting skills, other branch offices serve more parents with the same barriers. In general, the profile of barriers to returning children home in Polk County are different than the barriers found elsewhere in Oregon. Resolving family barriers improves the chances of a child returning home. Services are designed to help families resolve barriers, reduce the potential for subsequent abuse, and minimize the impact of child maltreatment. The most common services provided to families in Polk County include drug/alcohol treatment, parent training, child counseling, drug/alcohol evaluations, psychological examinations, and visitations. Although most of these services are offered to families at similar rates in other geographic locations throughout the state, visitations tend to be less prevalent in Polk County. Interestingly, mental hospital treatment is provided to 20-25% of the parents in Polk County compared to 1-2% elsewhere in Oregon.

Return home rate refers to the percentage of children returned home to the same parent(s) from whom they were removed in the year after removal. The return home rate is influenced by the parents' involvement with services and their ability to resolve barriers. Return home rate in Polk County is similar to other branches serving the same client population (about 42%). Reabuse rate, which combines the percentage of children reabused after returning home with the percentage of children abused after being assessed by SOSCF, is about 4% in Polk County; this is lower (9%) than other branches serving a similar clientele.

The Polk SOSCF branch office strives to balance child safety with efforts to preserve families. This delicate balance weighs the potential for reabuse with the emotional needs of the child to remain with their parents. Services to Children and Families attempts to moderate the effects of child abuse and neglect and ensure the most vulnerable children are protected from abuse and neglect.