DCF Hires Social Workers To Relieve Caseloads

By Stephen Singer

Associated Press

HARTFORD –– The Department of Children and Families said it is hiring dozens of social workers to reduce high caseloads that critics say hamper the agency’s efforts to protect children.

The agency said it has hired 132 social workers since late July, and will hire 76 more in the coming weeks. The total number of social workers it will employ after hirings is 1,145.

The agency is seeking to reduce caseloads to no more than 20 per worker, spokesman Gary Kleeblatt said.

“Many are at or under, but there are a significant number who are over,” he said. “The hiring will help that.”

The troubled agency this month was placed under a joint federal and state task force in an effort to get out from under a longstanding federal court decree.

A court monitor has watched over DCF operations since 1992, following a class-action lawsuit alleging the state violated federal laws by not adequately protecting children.

Last year, a federal judge approved an 18-month plan that required each agency social worker to handle no more than 20 cases of children placed outside their homes.

A court monitor found in July that DCF was violating a federal court order for failing to provide enough workers to properly serve children and burdening social workers with heavy caseloads.

An official of a national child’s advocacy group in New York offered limited support for the hiring initiative.

“It’s great, but it’s just a start,” said Ira Lustbader of Children’s Rights. “If the department is finally speeding up the hiring process to cure the last two years of staffing deficiencies it’s certainly a good start.”

Stephen Karp, executive director of the Connecticut chapter of the National Association of Social Workers in Rocky Hill, said social worker hirings are unusual as public agencies cut spending in a weak economy.

DCF hiring is “the exception right now,” he said.

Pay for social workers with two years of experience or with a master of social work degree start at $50,189. For trainees with a bachelor degree in a social service or human service field and with no experience, salaries start at $38,456.

The agency also is hiring nurses, child care workers, psychiatrists, and psychologists, officials said.

Those hired must participate in an agency training program and will take on caseloads within four months of their hiring, Kleeblatt said.

Kleeblatt said DCF has spent $100,000 for advertising its recruiting efforts, and has scheduled a job fair Tuesday in New Britain.