Historical Background of the Need for the Florida Health and Human Services Board.

In the early 1990s a broadminded and farsighted Florida Legislature saw the need for local citizen input into planning and evaluating the wide range of services that were being offered by the then massive Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services.

They established a Health and Human Services Board in each of the fifteen districts. After screening by a broadly representative local Nominee Qualifications Review Committee, the members were appointed, the majority by their local County Commissions and some by the Governor to assure representation of minorities, etc.

The Health and Human Services Board in each district nominated District Administrators who were then appointed by the Secretary of the Department.

There was also created a Statewide Health and Human Services Board composed of representatives of each of the District Boards. The Statewide Board obviously advised the Secretary.

In less than a decade we were trying to improve a very complex and seriously under-funded system of prevention and care for those who are often referred to as “our most vulnerable citizens,” children at risk of abuse, neglect, and delinquency, and adults at risk of disabilities, substance abuse, mental and emotional illness, poor health and, of course, poverty. In a series of assaults that prevented the natural development of a good system that might have better protected thousands of children and adults, the Florida Legislature broke up the Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services, separated out juvnile services, then child support enforcement, then health services, then children’s medical services, and still underfunded what was left under the label Children and Family Services.

The Florida Legislature passed a stringent welfare reform act (WAGES) that forced single mothers to go to work, leaving their children in the care of others. In 1998, the Florida Legislature passed a sweeping "Privatization of Foster Care and Related Services Act.” The next year they passed a 1999 "glitch" bill supposed to correct some of the worst of the 1998 act, but still put little money into services for children and families.

The 2000 Florida Legislature passed more bills, changing the word "privatization" into the phrase "community based child welfare," and, worst of all eliminated the watchdog health and human services boards, replacing them with "community alliances," forcing still another unfunded mandate on local communities, and reorganizing the remains of the Department of Children and Families into "regions" quite removed from local communities. That same 2000 Florida Legislature reorganized the WAGES programs into Work Force Florida, focusing sharply on employment statistics while weakening the social aspects of welfare reform. They also reduced the funds intended for prevention of juvenile delinquency and put those funds, instead, into more incarceration facilities.

So far, all this change has been chaotic, dismantling service systems before replacements are developed. With the Health and Human Services Board eliminated, there has been no voice calling attention to the problems this makes for a whole range of services.

The extremely unstable situation in the Department of Children and Families needs our vigilant attention. The problems are exacerbated in the Tampa Bay or Sun Coast area because under a poorly planned reorganization districts 5, 6, and part of 8 are being abolished and those populations and communities are being reorganized into the Suncoast Region. Much of the staff is completely demoralized, the turnover is incredible. The Employee Feedback system that used to operate in District 6 under the watchful eye of the Health and Human Services Board is inoperative, probably because employees are now afraid to offer any feedback. Managers and administrators are working under extremely unfavorable conditions, with no job security. With the Health and Human Services Board gone, there is no mechanism for public involvement. District Administrators used to think of the Health and Human Services Board as their local "board of directors," but now the administrators work only for the Secretary, and by the 2000 legislation, answer only to her.

The 2000 legislation contained another dreadful "unfunded mandate," in telling the County Commission, the School Board, the Judicial District, the Sheriff, and the Children’s Council in each county where they exist that they must form a "Community Alliance" and that they must do all the things that the Health and Human Services Board used to do. In most counties, these busy officers seem to have taken the worst possible approach to it this mandate – rather than complain and get the matter straightened out, they simply have not done the job. So, the ones who will suffer are the children and families of our Florida communities.

--Alvin W. Wolfe, 17920 Burnside Road, Lutz, 33549 (813) 949-4673

awolfe1@tampabay.rr.com