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2 <br /> 1 BOARD OF ORANGE COUNTY COMMISSIONERS <br /> 2 RESOLUTION OPPOSING THE MANDATORY REGIONALIZATION <br /> 3 OF SOCIAL SERVICES DEPARTMENTS <br /> 4 <br /> 5 WHEREAS, Orange County is committed to protecting children from maltreatment and to <br /> 6 working with the community to improve child wellbeing and strengthen families; and <br /> 7 <br /> 8 WHEREAS, Orange County commits significant local funds to support the programs and <br /> 9 services to meet these needs by administering both mandated and County initiatives that are <br /> 10 designed with the particular needs of the local community in mind; and <br /> 11 <br /> 12 WHEREAS, SB594/HB608, now provisions in the Senate budget bill, would require mandatory <br /> 13 regionalization of all social services programs and require counties to continue to finance these <br /> 14 services; and <br /> 15 <br /> 16 WHEREAS, most authority for services would be vested in regional authorities with little county <br /> 17 input or control; and <br /> 18 <br /> 19 WHEREAS, Orange County continues to provide quality services to families and believes that <br /> 20 mandatory regionalization will negatively impact the quality of services available to our families; <br /> 21 and <br /> 22 <br /> 23 WHEREAS, local departments, in addition to their child welfare duties, provide a wide arrange <br /> 24 of services to their communities, including Medicaid, Food and Nutrition, employment services, <br /> 25 child care support, services to elderly and disabled adults, crisis assistance and disaster <br /> 26 assistance; and <br /> 27 <br /> 28 WHEREAS, Orange County's data shows over the course of the last five years improved <br /> 29 outcomes for children including the percentage of children achieving placement stability within <br /> 30 the first year, the percentage of children remaining in their initial placement, and reduced court <br /> 31 involvement due to effective social work intervention; and <br /> 32 <br /> 33 WHEREAS, the State of North Carolina already has better performance than the national <br /> 34 average on six of seven national performance measures; and <br /> 35 <br /> 36 WHEREAS, there is no evidence that regionalization will provide improvements in the statewide <br /> 37 child welfare system; there seems to be no national evidence of any correlation between <br /> 38 performance and structure of services; and <br /> 39 <br /> 40 WHEREAS, fiscal and legal issues related to regionalization will be extremely complex, and will <br /> 41 take considerable time to study, and may lead to unintended negative consequences; and <br /> 42 <br /> 43 WHEREAS, county employees are already raising questions about the impact of this bill on <br /> 44 their ongoing work at social services potentially causing the system to lose well-trained social <br /> 45 workers who choose to seek more stable employment; and <br /> 46 <br /> 47 WHEREAS, counties are working aggressively on program improvement plans and continuous <br /> 48 improvement initiatives to improve practice and to have that reflected in the next federal child <br /> 49 welfare review; disrupting services with studies or with staff concerns about their employment <br />