Grand Jury Criticizes Services to Children

MacLaren Children’s Center, the foster home of last resort for the most troubled children in Los Angeles County, is beset with a growing backlog of investigations into reports of abuse by staff members against children, according to the county grand jury.

The 357-page report by the Civil Grand Jury of 2001-2002, which acts as Los Angeles County’s citizen watchdog panel, investigated MacLaren as well as a broad range of other issues originating from more than 62 citizens’ complaints about education, jails, social services and public safety. The jurors made recommendations that they believe will improve county government.

Among other issues, the 23-member grand jury said the Los Angeles Unified School District has not properly accounted for $1.3 billion in state lottery funds; reported substandard conditions at some jail facilities; and urged the Board of Supervisors to take a closer look at potential problems with new electronic voting machines.

One of the longest examinations in the report focused on MacLaren center, where the grand jury said a backlog of 84 abuse allegations dating from 1997 to October 2001 is a crucial lapse that could result in “great harm coming to children.” The backlog gives staff the impression that there are few consequences for abusive behavior and discourages children from making abuse complaints, the jurors concluded.

Staff with the Department of Children and Family Services told grand jury examiners that the backlog of abuse reports has worsened because of inadequate staffing and an increase in the number of high-priority investigations, including child deaths.

Several MacLaren workers reported that probes into child abuse allegations are “at best perfunctory, and that [administrators] assigned to them tend not to give them due diligence because often the allegations are against employees who happen to be friendly toward them,” the report released Friday stated.

Also, internal affairs staff reported that “an atmosphere of silence pervades many MacLaren staff.” An “unwritten agreement seems to prevail” that if they talk against one another, they won’t get the backing of colleagues if a major fight breaks out with the residents, the report said.

MacLaren management reported to the grand jury that police reports were completed for all the allegations of abuse by staff “in at least the past year and a half,” and that none of the reports resulted in criminal charges. Also, in-house investigations at MacLaren are said to be up-to-date and some may result in actions against staff.

However, the grand jury said, the broader Department of Children and Family Services investigations, where the backlog exists, are particularly important because they focus solely on child abuse issues and could lead to different findings. The grand jury recommended that the county take away investigative responsibilities from Children’s Services administrators, who it believes cannot conduct independent inquiries. One manager with complete autonomy should be assigned to all abuse investigations, and new policies should be created to address the code of silence among staff, the panel said.

Officials with the Department of Children and Family Services and the Interagency Children’s Services Consortium could not be reached for comment Saturday.

The hike in assaults and attempted assaults at the facility, which rose from 1,320 in 1999 to 2,329 in 2001, came as the population changed to an older and more deeply troubled group. As the facility has moved to decrease overcrowding in recent years by placing children more quickly in foster homes, the youths who remain tend to be the hardest to place, the report said.

Because the population is in such great need, the jury recommended that staffing be reconfigured to include a stronger mental health component.

In other areas:

* L.A. Unified: Jurors hired an independent auditor to review the use of the school district’s share of lottery funds since 1998. Under state law, lottery funds must be used for instructional purposes. The jury found that the district has commingled $1.3 billion in lottery money into its general funds since 1984 and called for separate accounting practices.

The jury also said the district should transfer $27 million in general-fund money into a special fund for lottery-provided instructional materials to show that it has complied with state law.

“That money has not been misspent,” Joseph Zeronian, the district’s chief financial officer, said Saturday. Although the money “may have not been accounted for in the right place,” he said, “what we are dealing with here is an esoteric accounting.”

The district’s expenditures on instructional materials and books exceeds the lottery revenue, Zeronian said. “The important thing is that we are buying the materials.”

* Jails: After touring every jail facility in the county, the jurors found substandard conditions at eight juvenile camps and detention facilities.

The camps include Camp Holton, Camp Muntz and Camp Scudder, which are in need of physical plant improvements in areas such as restrooms, electrical systems and dormitory maintenance, and security lighting. Many of the poor conditions have existed for more than two years. At Camp Paile, the jurors found inadequate bedding and clothing. Also, juveniles were pulled from school to perform maintenance work for up to six hours.

The jury said the Board of Supervisors should arrange for immediate repairs and the county should re-prioritize maintenance schedules.

* Voting machines: The jurors evaluated the proposed electronic voting machines that the county is aiming to have in place by the 2004 elections and recommended that the Board of Supervisors conduct further studies on the machines.

The jurors found that they may be vulnerable to breakdowns and sabotage.

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Times staff writer Erika Hayasaki contributed to this report.