43
Ohio JFS orders another review of Trumbull Children Services
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services has ordered a second, more- comprehensive review of the Trumbull County Children Services agency.
The additional investigation follows an Ohio JFS report released Nov. 18 that analyzed the agency’s visitation policies relating to a specific child in the agency’s custody.
The review was done as a result of allegations that a Warren couple sodomized their 9-month-old daughter while visiting her at the children-services offices on Reeves Road in April. The parents are in the Trumbull County jail, charged with rape and other offenses.
In a Dec. 2 letter to the Rev. Alton Merrell Sr., president of the Childen Services Board, Ohio JFS Director Michael B. Colbert said the additional review will begin “promptly” and conclude around Feb. 1. It will look into the agency’s “practice and compliance with Ohio Administrative Code [Ohio law] and policy.”
The letter says the new investigation will be a “more thorough review” than the first one.
Colbert wrote that he has asked his staff to “review twice as many cases as called for under normal protocol. In addition, monitoring staff will conduct an expanded review of compliance with visitation policies on applicable cases under review.”
Benjamin Johnson, spokesman for Ohio JFS, did not return a phone call seeking clarification of the letter.
The Rev. Mr. Merrell could not be reached to comment, but another board member, Atty. Dan Letson, pointed out that it was the CSB that “asked [Ohio JFS] to look into” the matter.
“The [CSB] requested the review, and if it takes further review to get where we need to be, then it’s a good thing,” Letson said.
Trumbull County Commissioner Dan Polivka, who earlier this week said he plans to personally look into the feasibility of Trumbull Children Services’ being placed under the control of the county Job and Family Services agency and the county commissioners, said he welcomes the additional investigation.
“I welcome that to be looked at because we want total transparency. Because of the way it’s set up, we don’t have much to say about the day-to-day operations,” Polivka said of CSB. “If something needs to be corrected, it should be corrected.”
As for whether the county commissioners would favor having more responsibility for overseeing Trumbull Children Services in the event that the board were eliminated, Polivka said: “We’re going to look at it.”
Asked whether the board should be eliminated, Letson said: “The commissioner has the best interests of the children at heart. He needs to be satisfied that the boards and agencies are doing the best for the children involved.”
On Nov. 18, the Ohio JFS released the findings of its first review, finding problems with some of the agency’s record-keeping and “technical errors” in its documentation.
The Children Services executive director, Nick Kerosky, has said the record-keeping problems Ohio JFS cited “could not have prevented” the purported rape.
In the Dec. 2 letter, Colbert said he decided to conduct the additional review because of “the nature of the case and the findings” of the first review, adding, “The allegations in the case are extremely disturbing.”
Atty. David Engler, who represents the grandmother of the child, said the state’s finding that employees were not recording information regarding the child in question in state and federal databases means that “all the records” kept by CSB “are suspect.”
Ohio JFS said Trumbull CSB employees compiled information about the child starting in November 2010, but that information didn’t get recorded in the Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System until October 2011, after the accusations came to light.
“The point is you can’t rely in the records they keep,” Engler said. “That’s a big deal.”
Engler has asked the state to take over the agency because of the reported rapes, which police say were captured on cellphone video.