Los Angeles County Self-Assessment Report
Los Angeles County Self-Assessment Report
Los Angeles County Self-Assessment Report
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<strong>Los</strong> <strong>Angeles</strong> <strong>County</strong> <strong>Self</strong>-<strong>Assessment</strong> <strong>Report</strong><br />
Interagency Delinquency Prevention Program (IDPP): IDPP replaced Start Taking<br />
Action Responsibly Today (START) Program effective May 15, 2007. IDPP is a<br />
collaborative effort between the Departments of Children and Family Services, Mental<br />
Health, Probation and <strong>Los</strong> <strong>Angeles</strong> Unified School District to provide intervention<br />
services to dependent youth most at risk of delinquency. This team works together,<br />
along with care providers, DCFS Team Decision Making facilitators, and other<br />
stakeholders, to produce a comprehensive assessment and a shared intervention plan<br />
to address problem behaviors. Since the beginning of the program IDPP has serviced<br />
22 youth in the Torrance office.<br />
Faith-Based Committee: The Faith-based Committee is comprised of 45 churches<br />
working in partnership with the Torrance Office to support the most vulnerable children<br />
and families in the community. This Faith-based Committee is working on three<br />
initiatives: Recruitment and support of resource families, Visitation Centers, and<br />
Prevention. The initiatives are aligned with the departmental goals of reduced abuse,<br />
reduced timelines to permanency, and reduced reliance on out-of-home care. Two<br />
events were put on by the RDS workgroup, a Faith-Leaders Conference and Family Fun<br />
Day. The events' purpose was to enlist churches to recruit potential adoptive families,<br />
resource families and mentors. At the Faith Leaders Conference, 45 churches signed<br />
on to help in recruitment of adoptive and resource families within their church. All the<br />
resource families from SPA 8 were invited for the Family Fun Day event. Approximately<br />
4,000 people attended and 78 people were interested in becoming adoptive or resource<br />
families.<br />
The Faith-based Committee has partnered up with the South Bay Center for Counseling<br />
to plan how churches can support the Department through preventive services. In<br />
addition, a small pilot project will be headed by the faith community to reduce timelines<br />
to permanency by developing Visitation Centers throughout the Torrance region.<br />
Casey Foundation Anchor Site: As an anchor site for the Family to Family Initiative,<br />
the Torrance office receives technical support, funding, and specialized training from the<br />
Annie E. Casey foundation in order to help implement strategies that improve outcomes<br />
for children and families (e.g., building community partnerships, team decision making,<br />
recruiting, developing, and supporting resource families, and evaluation). As an anchor<br />
site, the Torrance Office is assigned a Family to Family Liaison that overlooks and<br />
manages the Family to Family organizational structure and coordinates the sharing of<br />
information and work plans among the various workgroups and committees that do the<br />
work of Family to Family. The Family to Family Liaison assists with coordinating events<br />
and meetings that maintain, strengthen, and preserve community partnerships and<br />
conducts outreach efforts to increase the quantity and quality of partnerships.<br />
Implementing the Family to Family strategies should result in a reduction of children<br />
entering foster care, more children being placed within their communities, improved<br />
service delivery, greater support for resource families, and reduced timelines to<br />
permanency.<br />
Adoptions and Permanency Resource Division (APRD)<br />
Concurrent Planning Redesign: Concurrent Planning Redesign (CPR) has been<br />
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