Agency begins comprehensive reorganization
Oct. 10, 2008 -- The Hamilton County Department of Job and Family Services will eliminate one section and redistribute some of that group's work as the start of a comprehensive reorganization. Agency Director Moira Weir yesterday announced to staff the first of a series of structural and personnel changes that will shape the organization for the future.

"Today we begin a process that will be long and difficult, but ultimately better position us to meet our mandates, remain on solid financial ground and serve the citizens of this county," Weir said. "These changes are small compared to what is coming, given difficult financial times and a desire to focus on our mandates. But it does provide us with a beginning."

Effective Dec. 1:

~ The Family and Adult Assistance section and Workforce Development section will re-join Integrated Services under Assistant Director Cynthia Smith.

~ Information Systems will join the other Shared Services under Chief Financial Officer Vaughn Smith.

~ Decision Support will move under Information Systems.

~ Child Care will join Child Support under Assistant Director Jeff Startzman.

~ Overpayment Recovery Unit/Investigations/ Benefit Recovery will move under Workforce Development.

~ Health Services will be dissolved and the work redistributed to other areas. Charles Woode will become a section chief in Family and Adult Assistance. Healthy Start/Healthy Families will move under the management of Family and Adult Assistance. The training unit will move under the Performance Improvement section. The Healthchek/Pregnancy Services unit will move into Integrated Services.

~ Michael Patton will move to the Children's Services Program Support Section, replacing Amy Story.

~ Amy Story will move to the Accreditation Section to replace Kathy Schellinger. Story will bring the Children's Services Training and Policy units with her and also assume responsibility for Project Management.

~ Kathy Schellinger will move to the Permanency Section to replace Mary Eck, who is moving out of state.

These moves follow the announcement last month of changes in Children’s Services leadership (Weir with oversight, Assistant Director Ron Kirkendall with day-to-day operations and Section Chief Colleen Gerwe with clinical decision-making).

The moves are the result of Operational Team recommendations, Organizational Planning Committee suggestions, the need to put key leaders in critical areas and requests by some leaders for different or more responsibilities. They are all being made to improve efficiency and create equitable workload distribution with an eye toward budget concerns and the realization that the agency is trying to avoid or minimize layoffs.

"We are waiting to hear more about current and future state budget cuts and how they will impact us," Weir said. "We are still trying to determine what positions can be eliminated through retirement and attrition and we are studying other proposals for costs savings."

Agency managers share expertise at state conference
Oct. 2, 2008 -- Several members of Hamilton County Department of Job and Family Services management team gave presentations at the Public Children's Services Association of Ohio's 22nd Annual Conference in Columbus in September.

The conference was a time for attendees to share their expertise and to increase their knowledge while attending 35 workshops; all workshops were related to the conference's theme of "Creative Collaborations for Safe Children, Stable Families and Supportive Communities."

HCJFS staff presented these workshops:

Elevating Safety and Quality in Substitute Care Settings: The workshop provided an overview of the county's strategic initiative to improve safety and quality in foster care following the tragic death of Marcus Fiesel in 2006. Four core areas were targeted for systemic improvement subsequent to a critical examination of organizational practices -- criminal checks, quality of care, assessment and recruitment. Margie Weaver, section chief over Children's Services Care Management; Kathy Schellinger, section chief over ACQI; and Gaja Karyala, quality review manager in ACQI, led the presentation.

Facilitated Visitation to Support Permanency Planning: The workshop described the public/private partnership between HCJFS and the Family Nurturing Center to provide facilitated visitation services. The presentation looked at the differences between facilitated visitation and traditional supervised visitation, strategies for implementation in a community and lessons learned from the unique program. Attendees also learned the pros and cons of utilizing professional staff versus paraprofessional staff in facilitated visitation services; learned successful strategies for implementation and identified barriers to success and how to overcome them. Amy Fritsch, supervisor in Ongoing 1; Sandra Costa, transportation coordinator in Program Support, led the presentation, along with Stephanie Brock, visitation coordinator of the Family Nurturing Center Facilitated Visitation Program.

Thousands apply for windstorm emergency assistance
Oct. 2, 2008 -- Hundreds of miles away from Cincinnati, Hurricane Ike destroyed whole neighborhoods, leaving nothing but piles of wood and siding in his aftermath. Cincinnati, not known for its hurricane-related weather disasters, also felt Ike's aftermath.

On Sept. 14, electrical power went out for thousands of residents. Many, including Hamilton County Department of Job and Family Services employees and clients, were without power for days, which in turn, meant refrigerated food was lost for a lot of folks.

But even as JFS employees were dealing with their own clean-up, they stepped up to the plate to help thousands of agency consumers.

“As I walked through the building last week, I felt a sense of pride,” Director Moira Weir said. “And as I stood outside and watched consumer after consumer come up and ask for emergency assistance, I saw our employees answer their questions with patience and understanding. This was a unique situation and our employees didn’t hesitate to jump in and help where they were needed.”

At last count, the agency received more than 23,000 applications for replacement food stamp and more than 12,000 for emergency assistance because of the windstorm.

“That’s an extreme amount of applications for our employees to handle, while they continue to do their daily duties,” Weir said. “But I have no doubt that employees will dot every ‘i’ and cross every ‘t’ to make sure the families involved with our agency receive the proper emergency assistance.”

Weir said seeing employees come together made her realize “once again how grateful I am to work with such extraordinary people.”

“I saw Family & Adult Assistance employees going above and beyond to make sure all of the clients were assisted, even if it meant working into the weekend,” she said. “I saw employees in the Direct Client Contact Unit and the Document Drop-off Center working efficiently to make sure clients turned in the proper documents. I also saw employees in other sections of the agency who took time away from their daily duties to help the FAA workers with the additional consumers coming in for emergency assistance.

“Because of the willingness of so many agency employees during this time of need, we were able to achieve the agency’s main goal – serving our clients in the most effective and efficient way possible,” she continued. “I truly appreciate employees’ hard work and enthusiasm that I see as I walk through agency buildings every day.” 

Approval or denial letters for those who applied for PRC emergency assistance because of the Sept. 14 windstorm began going out the week of Oct. 6.

Those wanting to know about food stamp replacement should check their balance by calling 1-866-386-3071.