DCS commissioner cites lower turnover, more assessment beds and foster-care modernization in budget briefing

Department of Children's Services Commissioner Margie Quinn told the Finance, Ways and Means Committee the agency has reduced case-manager turnover, opened more clinical assessment beds, and included several family- and child-focused items in its budget request.

Quinn said DCS—s all-case-manager turnover rate for the first seven months of the fiscal year is 11.9%, down from 16.9% for the previous year and substantially lower than 2022 and 2021 levels. She said case-manager openings have declined from 692 when she took office to 258 at the time of the hearing, and that a new class of 75 case managers is scheduled to start April 28.

Quinn reported the agency opened 72 new clinical assessment beds to reduce the number of children in transitional settings and said a funded DCS real-estate plan will support construction of leading-practice care centers. She listed budget initiatives that align with a DCS bill discussed earlier in the committee: an administration request to modernize extension-of-foster-care eligibility (raising the legal age from 21 to 23), cost-of-living increases for foster-care provider rates, adoption-assistance and subsidized guardianship rate increases, and funding for child advocacy centers including a new CAC in Williamson County and salary increases for forensic interviewers.

Quinn said the department will also discuss a supplemental request to recalculate the residential custodial budget and that additional details would be part of the ongoing budget review. She introduced senior staff who would stay to answer committee questions.