16 group home contracts not renewed, impacting hundreds in Arizona foster care

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — Some big changes are coming to hundreds of kids in the state’s foster care system.

The Arizona Department of Child Safety confirms it’s working to find approximately 200 kids new homes after deciding not to renew contracts with more than a dozen providers.

DCS says these contract decisions were made because the agency projects there will be fewer kids in need of congregate care this year.

Arizona’s Family spoke with three of the providers whose contracts were not renewed, Ohana, L’s House, and Village De Amor, who say they were all blindsided by the decision.

“We have been providing homes for these kids since 2016 so we’re honestly shocked by it,” said Ohana CEO Dr. Ryan Senters.

Senters says the contract decision means they may have to lay off 50 employees.

Right now, Ohana works with 500 kids overall, and Senters says that around 80 of those kids will be moved to a new setting in the aftermath.

“I think the tragic part is that the kids are being caught up as collateral damage,” he said.

At L’s House, the family who runs the small provider says they’re unsure how to tell their two kids they’ve built trust and relationships with they’re going to have to leave.

“They told us to look in the portal at the paperwork, but there was no clear reason why we were not awarded,” said L’s House program director Cathy Donnell.

“A lot more love than negativity. These kids, at the end of the day, just want to be accepted, loved,” added house manager Lyric Donnell.

It’s the impact on the kids that is the hardest for these providers to understand.

“There has been no thought process, no discussion on how these kids who have already experienced significant trauma are going to be able to transition,” says Village De Amor President Monessa Duran. “The dollars drive the decision.”

“The Department confirms that through the competitive request for proposal process 52 Congregate Care contracts were awarded this week. There were 16 providers that ultimately were not awarded. There are approximately 200 children that will need to be transitioned in the next 5 months into new settings- preferably a family setting whenever possible. The contracts not awarded are not related to the DCS or state budgets, but rather the strength of the applicants competitively bidding for the contracts. We have a plan in place to relocate children affected by this decision to make necessary placement transitions as smooth as possible.

We are extending existing contracts past the June 1 deadline in order to not disrupt any child’s school year. Our contract decisions are based on the Department’s projected capacity needs, and we are anticipating a further reduction in the number of children in congregate care this year.

Even though we expect a decrease in congregate care homes, we would like to remind the public that we are always in need of foster parents, and we are constantly recruiting. We especially need homes for sibling groups and teenagers. We encourage anyone who is interested in becoming a licensed foster parent to visit dcs.az.gov/foster for more information."

“Children thrive when they are able to make strong, family connections. These connections are most likely to form when children are placed in homes surrounded by caring adults.

This is why the Department’s top priority for years has been to place as few children as possible in congregate care facilities in favor of family-like settings such as foster and kinship homes.

Children who spend an extended amount of time in congregate care settings are more likely to age out of foster care without a permanent family connection, which increases their chances of experiencing adverse outcomes as adults.

With the goal of placing every child in a family-like setting and connecting them with a caring adult, here are some of the steps we are taking to accomplish that:

-Kinship support services for emotional support and service connection

-Increase kinship licensure for financial support

-Designated staff to locate missing and runaway children

-Partnership to review cases of children in congregate care

-Expand Fostering Sustainable Connections to locate relatives

In regards to the most recent contract evaluations and violations, we conducted a Request for Proposal (RFP) for Congregate Care Services following the solicitation process outlined in the Arizona State Procurement Code.

If a provider has a violation, it doesn’t automatically disqualify their proposal.

Violations are one part of a broader formula that we use to determine who is awarded a contract.

During the evaluation period, each proposal is evaluated on the following criteria: Cost, Methodology, and Experience/History. For every provider that submits an offer, a question about disciplinary action/administrative action is asked and is considered in the evaluation process. Only Corrective Action Plans (CAP) and Demands for Assurances (DFA) are considered in the process since they are formal contract compliance actions. Providers must disclose these violations with their proposal. You can find the evaluation and supporting documentation in the Arizona Procurement Portal at https://spo.az.gov/contracts.”

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