Los Angeles DCFS Transitional Home-Accounting FAIL
More than an Oops! They kept foster kids’ EARNED money. And how about using that money for their accounting shortages?…Fraud? No, not all, they say. DCFS owes $36,000 to former foster kids [Daily News 3/16/12 by Christina Villacorte]
“The county Department of Children and Family Services owes $36,000 to former foster youths who temporarily turned over earnings to the county and never claimed them as they left the system, according to a new audit.
The department is now scrambling to find hundreds of youths who are owed money, but is having a difficult time because most of them left no forwarding information.
Auditor-Controller Wendy Watanabe said the money should have been handed out to participants of the DCFS Transitional Housing Program, which provides housing, food and other assistance to emancipated youths ages 18-21 who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.
The program requires youths to work full time or to work part time if they are attending school full time, and deposit 50 percent of their earnings into a trust fund.
When the youths graduate from the up-to- 18-month-long program, the DCFS is supposed to give them their savings back – with interest.
Watanabe said many of the youths left the program unexpectedly, without providing contact information.
If they can’t be tracked down, she recommended the county take the funds for itself.
“Given the difficulty in locating participants, and the relatively low dollar amount that may be owed to them, we have recommended that DCFS set a date to stop searching for the participants, and transfer the remaining funds to the treasurer and tax collector,” she said
DCFS spokesman Armand Montiel vowed the department would track down as many of the youths as possible before the deadline expires.
Watanabe’s audit revealed the DCFS was holding onto $17,000 that belonged to 475 youths who participated in the program over the last 10 years.
Another $19,000 belonged to an unknown number of youths who were in the program more than a decade ago.
No fraud was detected, though Watanabe did criticize DCFS for using some of the youths’ unclaimed savings to cover shortages from accounting errors and lost checks. “
REFORM Puzzle Piece
Corruption and incompetence…a dangerous combination.
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