Staff writers Greg Bluestein and James Salzer contributed to this article.
Lawmakers made an error when drafting a bill to contract out child welfare services, meaning that nonprofits and other companies who sign up to care for Georgia's most vulnerable children would only be paid a fraction of a penny per child.
Senate Bill 350 would require the Division of Family and Children Services to bid out primary functions such as case management, family preservation and independent living. The massive overhaul passed the state Senate on Tuesday by a vote of 31-18.
But the funding formula detailed in the bill’s current version is incorrect. Lawmakers say it’s an easy fix. Critics say it’s more proof the state is moving too quickly to pass the legislation.
“All the right people are not at the table to make sure we are doing our due diligence and doing this in a thoughtful way,” said Kenneth Joe Sr., a lobbyist and a former chief administrator for DFCS. “No state that’s instituted a privatized system has done it in 30 days. Why are we doing this?”
The bill hit the fast track this session in part because of Alpharetta businessman and political donor Richard L. Jackson, who spent time in foster care as a child. He is fighting to give faith-based organizations and other private groups a broader role in caring for the state’s children in most need of protection, and his people helped craft the legislation.
Jackson, who started a temp empire that provides doctors and nurses for short-term staffing, is relatively new on the state’s political scene. Records show he and his family have contributed $156,000 to Gov. Nathan Deal and lawmakers since the beginning of 2013.
The bill, which was sponsored by Sen. Renee Unterman, R-Buford, is now under consideration in the House.
Unterman, who was made aware of the error by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, said it was unintentional and will be easy to fix.
“That’s part of the process when a bill moves from the Senate to the House or vice versa, that errors, omissions and unintended consequences are picked up,” she said.
Georgia’s child welfare system received a total of $537 million in state fiscal year 2014, according to DFCS. Unterman and other sponsors said switching to private providers will likely cost more money, but they have not said how much. Supporters believe that taking the child welfare system into the free market will improve services for children across the state.
The bill was already likely to be altered at the request of Gov. Nathan Deal, who said he has some issues with it but would not elaborate.
“We do look forward to working with the House on areas of concern,” he said. “In general, I support the concept of being able to move this function into privatization mode. I just want to be sure that since the state is always going to be held accountable and that this is a very sensitive area, that the state have adequate input into the process on a continuing basis.”
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