State Guard or State Reserve: Another Way to Get Tuition Reimbursement

[dfrecore]

California's problems stem from different issues. Besides, California has county CPS agencies. Texas does not have county CPS agencies. Because the Texas legislature only meets every other year, it does not always know when it is going to have a budget shortfall or how much it is going to be. By the time they get to something, they have to make drastic budget cuts. Emergency funding had to be put together while the legislature was not in session after a court ruled that our foster care system was unconstitutional. The state had children sleeping in hotels and CPS offices because they didn't have anywhere to put them. Texas' spending on child protective services is low in comparison to other states. I'm sure there are plenty of other states that have their legislatures meet every year, and they run perfectly fine.

I don't think people quite understand how bad things have gotten with the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. It just might be the worst state-operated child protective services agency in the country. In one two-month period last year, over 3,000 children with open cases were not seen. Almost 700 of those cases were documented as being urgent. In other words, the children were potentially in imminent danger of being injured or dying from abuse or neglect. Bringing up California does not change the fact that Texas has horribly mismanaged its child protective services agency, and it's going to cost Texas taxpayers hundreds of millions to correct the problem because the state waited until the last minute to address the problem.

Sorry, I was not saying that Texas doesn't have a problem, just pointing out that how often a state legislature meets is not always the problem.

And, with CPS - counties do a terrible job here. We hear horror stories regularly. They especially love to take kids from parents who aren't victimizing their kids (think homeschoolers) while missing the truly terrible crimes being committed. It's unbelievable sometimes what happens. I know it's a damn near impossible job, but there seem to be people who have their priorities screwed up pretty regularly.

Anyway, not trying to say that TX doesn't have problems at all, I'm sure they do. But I don't think how often the legislature meets is the issue, as much as legislators not thinking it's a priority. No matter what state you're in, it seems like there is such waste, fraud and abuse, while things that truly need fixing aren't given the priority they need to.