Union 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 Families and Children 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 prevelant problems exhibited by parents in the community who have their children in Foster Care.

Most Prevelent Barriers in Union 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 Union County

Union County Summary

Annually about 30 children from Union County enter substitute care and stay in care for two weeks. Forty-three cases where children entered care between 1991 and mid-1993 were randomly selected and reviewed by researchers from the Child Welfare Partnership at Portland State University. A profile of children entering substitute care in Union 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. Sexual abuse, parental absence, and threat of harm are the most common reasons children enter care in Union County; these three reasons for removal are more common in Union County than elsewhere in Oregon. Treatment issues of the child and physical abuse are less likely to be reasons for removal in Union County than in other Oregon counties.

The level of vulnerability system contains seven levels; level 1 cases are the most severe instances of abuse/neglect while level 7 cases are the least severe. The level of vulnerability system considers numerous factors including severity of abuse and age of the child. In Oregon, the largest groups of children entering care are identified as levels 1 and level 3. In Union County, 46% of their children are identified as level 1 and 36% are identified as level 3. Although 71% of the children entering care in Oregon are identified as levels 1-3, seven of every eight children (87%) are identified as levels 1-3 in Union County. Severe sexual abuse, child endangerment by parental actions, parental absence from incarceration, and chronic neglect to younger children are a majority of level 1 and level 3 cases in Union County.

Many children entering care have behavioral, physical, or mental problems. The problems being exhibited by children entering care in Union County are similar to the problems being exhibited in other counties with two notable exceptions -- a higher proportion of Union County children are victims of sexual abuse and a higher proportion have behavior problems. The percentage of sexual abuse victims being placed in substitute care continues to increase. In Oregon, 26% of the children entering foster care between 1987-1990 were sexual abuse victims; the percentage increased to 31% for children entering between 1991 and mid-1993. This trend is troubling considering the long-term effects of sexual abuse. Sexual abuse victims tend to be more depressed, more sexually active, more prone to suicidal behaviors, and more likely to be sexual offenders than other children entering foster care. Victim of sexual abuse is the most prevalent child's problem in Union County (42%).

Parental factors are problems or situations that describe characteristics of the families served by SOSCF. Drug/alcohol involvement, poor parenting skills and unemployment are the most common family factors in Union County. Most parental factors in Union County are slightly more prevalent than families served in other counties. A higher prevalence of family factors and a higher prevalence of sexual abuse is an anomaly -- parents who sexually abuse their children tend to have fewer identified problems than other abusive/neglectful parents.

Barriers are parent or child problems which need resolution before a child is returned to his/her parents. A family factor, which may be considered by a caseworker when contemplating a removal, could also be considered a barrier when the caseworker considers returning the same child. Poor parenting skills, chronic neglect and drug/alcohol involvement are Union County's most common barriers. Chronic neglect, domestic violence, and sexual offenders residing in the home are more common in Union County than elsewhere.

After a child has been removed from a home, a service agreement between families and SOSCF is developed. This agreement identifies the services necessary to resolve barriers, facilitates the child's return home, and minimizes the chance for reabuse. The most common services provided to parents in Union County include parent training, visitation, non-SOSCF family counseling, homemaker and SOSCF family counseling. Residential treatment and child counseling are the most common services provided to children in Union County. More parent training and homemaker services are provided to parents to address the poor parenting and chronic neglect. In addition to parent training and homemaker services, residential treatment and non-SOSCF are much more common in Union County than in other Oregon counties.

Return home rate and reabuse rate are calculated for each branch office. Return home rate is the proportion of children returned in the year after removal. In Oregon, about half the children return home while in Union County about 30% return home in the year after removal. Reabuse rates consider abused children who remain with their parents as well as, children who have been returned home. The reabuse rate in Oregon approximates 10% while in Union County about 13% reabused.

All SOSCF branch offices attempt to balance the child safety with efforts to preserve families. This delicate balance weighs the potential for reabuse with the emotional needs of the children to remain with their parents. This balance is particularly difficult knowing SOSCF serves the most needy children and families in Oregon.