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Social Workers Reiterate Need for Analysis of ER Crisis

DCFS reassigned 40 SCSWs and CSWs from nine separate programs including Wraparound, Team Decision- Making, RUM, Kinship, ASFA, Youth, and Education & Licensure, but social workers were notified about the September reassignment without any discussion or meeting with the union.

Social workers reinforced our commitment to working in partnership in the meeting with managementand to win assurances regarding the reassignment and future collaboration with social workers prior to major decisions.

In spite of our objections, the department is moving forward with these changes, but we were able to ensure the following:

  • Workers reassigned previously this year should receive a letter from the Department in October stopping further extensions of reassignments beyond Dec. 21.
  • All workers will stay in their home offices and work on cases assigned to an office in their Service Bureau.
  • DCFS agreed to review the reassignment of those with more seniority. 
  • The Department promised:
    – overtime (to be approved by team leaders)
    – working from home (to be approved by team leaders)
    – cellular phones
    – Remote Service Access (RSA) devices that will allow workers access to their desktops from any Internet connection.

DCFS intends for this reassignment to last from Sept. 21 to Dec. 21.

Goals:

The Department said its goal is to safely close 900 Over 60s. There are approximately 5,100. The Bureau of the Medical Director will close an additional 200 cases. In total about 20 percent of the Over 60s will be closed by the end of the year.

Attempts to close cases in the Wateridge office resulted in 5 new cases and 2 detentions out of about 340 referrals.

Categories: Los Angeles County