Records show Arizona's Department of Child Safety is falling short on key reforms meant to protect children in state care, despite a 2020 settlement agreement that gave the agency five years to fix major problems.
Court filings reveal that the state hasn't reduced its reliance on group homes as required by the settlement agreement, with claims that placements increased rather than decreased over the past few years.
“The mediator found that in three critical areas they had not met the terms of the agreement, so they had not reduced the use, their use of congregate care by the specific percentage that was agreed to,” said Anne Ronan, an attorney with the Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest.
Ronan's firm sued the Department of Child Safety a decade ago, challenging how the state treated kids in group homes.
"One of the real criticisms is, and it seems so basic about congregate care is it doesn't give the children an opportunity to have a trusting relationship with adult," Ronan said.
In 2020, DCS promised major changes. They agreed to move more kids into specialized foster care and dramatically cut group home placements within five years.
A court-ordered mediator recently evaluated the terms of the settlement agreement from the class action lawsuit that was filed more than a decade ago.
The mediator wrote that DCS has not substantially complied in multiple areas including reducing kids in congregate care and there are still concerns about whether kids are getting the behavioral health care they need.
With the mediator’s findings, Ronan said she hopes it says DCS will be willing to work with them on the real solution, “That's how we're looking at it,” she added, “maybe we can move past this defensiveness and let's get a solution that really benefits kids.”
According to the report, the mediator wrote that instead of group home placements going down, they actually went up from 13.7 percent in 2022 to 15.9 percent in 2025. DCS was supposed to get that number down to 10.5 percent.
"They actually spend as much or more on congregate care than before you signed the agreement. And given that the number of children in care totally has gone down so significantly, the fact that the dollars are still going to congregate care is a real tell. You know that they have not moved the needle there," Ronan said.
In key court filings, DCS does not dispute that they are not in compliance.
The mediator did find that DCS complied in two other areas of the agreement including physical health services and the workload requirements of staff.
In a statement, a spokesperson for DCS said, “After years of sustained improvements within the Arizona Department of Child Safety, the mediator recognized the meaningful efforts of all parties to improve the conditions for children in foster care and found the Department has successfully complied with two provisions of the settlement agreement.”
They went on to say that court oversight of DCS cannot be concluded unless DCS has met all the measures of the agreement.
DCS FULL STATEMENT:
After years of sustained improvements within the Arizona Department of Child Safety, the mediator recognized the meaningful efforts of all parties to improve the conditions for children in foster care and found the Department has successfully complied with two provisions of the settlement agreement. Despite the mediator’s findings that DCS has fully met the requirements related to children’s physical health services and the workload requirements of staff, court oversight of DCS cannot conclude unless DCS has fully achieved all the measures of the agreement.
The Department has significantly reduced the number of children in congregate care by 800 children since the start of the settlement agreement. However, this progress is not reflected by the agreement’s required percentage reduction. Because the overall population of children in DCS care dropped more quickly than anticipated by the agreement, the Department did not meet the percentage requirement in the settlement agreement. DCS will continue striving for a reduction of both the number and percentage of children in congregate care, while ensuring sound practices that align with our commitment to child safety and responsible decision-making. As it has done over the past 5 years, DCS is actively and collaboratively meeting with the plaintiffs on the case to safely increase the number and percentage of children living in family-like settings, while working within the statutory constraints and resources of the Department.
Compliance with the settlement agreement requires coordination with healthcare providers, foster parents, and health plans to increase access to therapeutic foster care. DCS is continuing to engage in conversations around increasing utilization of this service as one of many tools to move children to family-like settings.
