I am pleased to announce we have selected more excellent managers for our agency. All of these positions take effect July 1, 2018. You can read more about each of these leaders on our DCYF website.

As promised, we are presenting our next level of organizational structure for the new Department of Children, Youth, and Families. What we are outlining here is a model that describes the organization of functions within DCYF, not individuals. Getting this functional model in place allows us to start putting names in slots, but we have not completed that phase of the planning yet.

When Ross Hunter was appointed last year as secretary of the new Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF), he made a commitment to visit every office to learn from employees who would eventually work for DCYF. He also committed to visit with community members and stakeholders across the state.

Over the past few months, I’ve visited a number of Children’s Administration offices while on my tour of the new DCYF offices. Two chronic problems the agency faces have become clear to me during these visits — high turnover among caseworkers and a severe shortage of foster homes.