Rising provider costs, lack of foster homes cause increased Lebanon County CYS expenses

The need for more higher-costing placement providers and a lack of foster home availability is compounding the costs for Lebanon County Children and Youth Services.

CYS officials reported that the final department costs for the 2022-23 fiscal year were at $12.9 million, which increased by almost $1.8 million. CYS was certified at $11.1 million for the 2022-23 fiscal year.

Children and Youth Services is funded 80% by state, and 20% by county funds. The county share for 2022-23 fiscal year was certified at $2.27 million. But CYS officials reported that the county share would be $2.8 million, a $572,544 increase.

The increased costs to CYS are coming from sending children to higher level placement facilities to cover special needs along with a lack of foster home availability, according to Erin Moyer, Lebanon County Children & Youth Services administrator.

The system is taxed

"Our mental health system is pretty much taxed right now," she said in a phone call to the Lebanon Daily News. "They have huge wait lists, they have a shortage of staff in their services as well. So those kind of things are making our cases more complex. We're not just dealing with your typical child abuse and neglect cases, we are dealing with that on top of mental health issues. So we've having to open more cases for those issues and provide some of our services to assist."

The agency investigated 2,926 children in the 2022-23 fiscal year, which Moyer said was an increase of 366 from last year. CYS investigated 2,560 children in the 2021-22 fiscal year.

While officials are not getting involved in every child that has mental health concerns, Moyer said CYS is getting involved because those concerns couldn't be addressed and they are rising to a level of child abuse now.

"Typically, these mental health cases are rising to the level of abuse and neglect," Moyer said. "So whether it's parent mental health concerns that are rising to the level of abusing children or whether it's children's mental health concerns that are rising to a level where it's leading to parent child conflict ... It eventually becomes an issue for Children and Youth."

CYS has 52 placement provider contracts, 36 of which have requested an average increase of 7% and all of them within the commonwealth's approved rate. The agency also has 35 service provider contracts, 17 of which requested an average 3% increase.

The average rate of providers can range between $400 and $600 per day per placement.

The increases are due to increased wages to attract employees and an increased need for more specialized and trauma informed care services, Moyer said.

"Our providers are also seeing huge increases in reference to liability insurance," she said. "It is becoming more difficult for them get, and definitely more costly, so those costs in care are coming on to our agency as well."

Officials said that they are also seeing fewer adults willing to foster children, which could save the county hundreds of dollars a day. Moyer said she's not sure why the decline is occurring.

"We as an agency do recruiting for our own foster homes, and we contact with a lot of private agency foster homes," she said. "I know they do pretty extensive recruiting, so I'm not sure why people don't seem to be as interested in that as they have in the past."

At a Lebanon County Commissioners meeting Aug. 5, CYS officials proposed a $15.3 million needs based budget, with the county budgeting for $3.574 million of those funds.

CYS officials also reported an increase in $12.57 million Implementation budget for the 2023-24 fiscal year, which was approved last year. An implementation budget is done to ensure required resources are available to in order to facilitate the completion of proposed actions and accomplish planned objectives.

The projected budget for 2023-24 was raised to $13.8 million. The county's share, originally set at $2.7 million, was increased on the projected budget at $2.85 million.

Officials said the increase in both budgets were due to increased placement and in-home costs, CYS salary increases and more in-home service increases.

The county will be facing a large deficit as it begins to plan for the 2024 proposed budget, according to county administrator Jamie Wolgemuth. But just like 911 service and the Lebanon County Correctional facility, CYS provides services to which the county needs to pay for out of their general funds.

'It's not cheap'

"This is what society is bringing to the agency, and what has to be dealt with, and it's not cheap," he said at the commissioner's meeting.

If CYS does not budget these increases with the county, Moyer said there is no guarantee that the state will make up the difference.

"If we go into 2024 without this money budgeted, and we end up spending more money than we had projected, there's no guarantee that the state is going to come back and give their portion of our over expenditure," she said at the commissioners meeting. "Whereas if we go in with this budget, and we come under, then that's wonderful."

Commissioners unanimously approved the needs based and implementation budgets at their Thursday, Oct. 5, meeting, along with the provider contracts.

Moyer said she's seen cost increases for Children and Youth since see started as administrator in 2019, and that is a trend that is likely to continue even after the county's 2024 budget has been finalized.

"Since the pandemic, we've seen steady increases, and I don't see it slowing down anytime soon," she said.

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How to become a foster parent

Those residents wishing to learn more about becoming a foster parent can contact Lebanon Children and Youth Services at 717-224-4430 and ask for Michelle Curry.

The Department of Human Services operates a 24/7 hotline about the welfare of a child and to report suspected child abuse. ChildLine can be reached at 800-932-0313.

Matthew Toth is a reporter for the Lebanon Daily News. Reach him at mtoth@ldnews.com or on X at @DAMattToth.

This article originally appeared on Lebanon Daily News: CYS expenses on the rise in Lebanon County, Pa.