ASFA TRAINING PROJECT
PHONE POLL FOR COURT IMPROVEMENT PROJECTS

Wisconsin

1. How would you rate the child welfare agency staff in terms of their understanding of ASFA requirements? Please rate the understanding on a scale from 1 to 5 with 1 being 'poor' and 5 being 'comprehensive'.

a. Why did you give them that rating?

The child welfare agency in Wisconsin operates in a state supervised-county administered system. The state staff is well educated regarding ASFA; however, understanding in the counties varies. There are staff shortages at the state level so sometimes no one is available to disseminate information into the counties.

2. Based on the court's experience to date, what skills do you think child welfare supervisors and workers need to have to implement ASFA?

a. Supervisors?

• Knowledge of time frames, especially the legal time frames
• Take initiative to set up a process for generating hearings, court dates in a timely way
• Set up a relationship with courts that includes a system that gives the court case details and documents in accordance with required time frames
• Identify adoptive resources

b. Workers?

• Knowledge of the law
• Know what court needs and how and what information needs to be brought to the judge's attention
• Knowledge of the time frames required, especially legal time frames
• Know how to gather information about families and synthesize it for court use
• Concurrent planning
  

3. As part of your state's ASFA implementation, have the court and the child welfare agency undertaken or changed any day to day joint activities?
Yes No
If yes, please describe

• At the state level a working group has been formed comprised of state agency staff and the Court Improvement Program coordinator. The purpose of the work group is to deal with ASFA implementation issues and to prepare for the federal review scheduled to take place in 2002 and 2003. The group meets twice a month.
• At the county level, work groups comprised of the county agency director, agency supervisors, district attorney, corporation counsel, public defender and guardians ad litem court staff. Have been set up to address case processing issues related to the ASFA requirements.
• In the process of developing a check list for judges and social workers to determine when the next case event takes place.
• Mandatory forms for court orders are being amended jointly with the agency and the courts.
  

a. Has communication changed? Yes No
If yes, please describe

Communication between the agency and the court has increased. Sometimes communication is difficult because judges must deal with all kinds of cases in courts, not just child welfare which represent from 8-12% of the caseload. Agency staff doesn't receive training on court structure or what the courts do and what they need. Sometimes the state agency doesn't know how to communicate most effectively with judges because the agency doesn't fully understand the institutional structure and culture of the courts.

b. Are you getting the information you need regarding cases from the agency?
Yes No
If no, please describe.
More information is shared between the court and the agency since ASFA. Also, preparation for the federal review has forced the agency and the court to communicate.

4. How do you handle training on ASFA for court personnel?
a. Please describe the training.

• The Director of State Courts sent written information to all the judges.
• A representative from the American Bar Association delivered a two hour training session on the requirements of ASFA. Chief Judges (judges with a percentage of their time devoted to handling administrative matters) and district court administrators attended these sessions. The Chief Judges were expected to go back and circulate the information to other judges at district meetings held at the annual judicial conference. Most judges attended the district meetings.
• The National Center on State Courts did a presentation on ASFA prior to the final rule issuance at district meetings.
• The director of the Court Improvement project talked to the judges attending the State judicial conference.
• In the larger courts, the judges held meetings on ASFA attended by agency and court staff.
• In March 2000 Mark Harden, from the ABA conducted a seminar on the role of the judge in child abuse and neglect cases. This event will be held again in March 2002.
• Two judges each year for the past two years were sent to the National Council on Juvenile and Family Court Judges Child Abuse and Neglect Institute conference in Reno.
• A check list is being developed for use by judges and the agency staff to determine when the next case event takes place.
• The Juvenile Benchbook was updated to include changes related to ASFA.
  

b. Who does the training?

• The Director of the Court Improvement Project
• Consultants from national organizations
• Training delivered outside the state at national conferences
• Court staff - judges and others
  

c. Is the training just on ASFA or is it incorporated into other training that you provide?
ASFA training is still separate from any other training.

d. Have you done any training with or for the child welfare agency?
Yes No
If yes, please describe.
Agency staff and courts staff have different needs regarding information about ASFA so it is difficult to train them at the same time. Also, judges need to know different things about a case from the things case workers need to know.

e. Have you done any training with or for the agency attorneys?
Yes No
If yes, please describe.
The District Attorney or the Corporation Counsel handles the interests of the agency. They are involved when there is a request by an individual county for training/technical assistance. They have received minimal information about ASFA via newsletter and at an annual convention.

5. What has worked best for you in terms of working with the child welfare agency as it implements the ASFA requirements?

• More communication, more openess.
• The Director of the Court Improvement Project is able to go to the agency and participate in planning discussions. It has helped to have someone with a court background to provide feedback in these discussions.
  

6. What do you view as barriers to your work with the agency as it implements the requirements of ASFA?

Lack of understanding of the responsibilities of the key stake holders responsibilities and how their organizations/institutions are structured.

7. Is there anything else that you want to tell us regarding the best way to implement the requirements of ASFA?

• A number of ASFA requirements don't take into account the day to day operations of many courts. It would have been helpful if there had been more judicial input into the development of the policies and additional resources to implement the changes.
• The information about ASFA that came to the courts would have had greater creditability if it had been delivered to them first by top HHS officials directly to high level court officers (such as state courts directors or chief justices) or directly to legal organizations recognized in the field rather than informally through the state agency. The court in Wisconsin is not routinely receiving resource materials, program instructions, or training notices directly from HHS.
  

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