As was the pattern nationwide, Louisiana saw its foster care population plummet after the COVID-19 pandemic. But unlike most other states, the Pelican State’s foster care population jumped up 12% between 2021 and 2022 according to federal data, making it the largest increase in entries of any state. 2023 data provided directly to The Imprint suggests that the number of youth in the system grew again last year, approaching the 4,000 mark for the first time since 2019.
A class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of nine of those foster youth against Gov. Jeff Landry and his child welfare director David Matlock, accused the state of inadequate staffing, placement instability and insufficient medical care for kids.
“Foster children in Louisiana have essentially been abandoned by the state,” said Marcia Robinson Lowry, executive director of A Better Childhood, one of the organizations which has filed the lawsuit. “The stories we have heard in putting this case together are nothing less than tragic, and we hope the court will order the state to enact significant reforms. The constitution requires nothing less.”
The Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services told local news outlet The Advocate that it is reviewing the lawsuit before commenting. But Matlock, who has only served as child welfare director since January, is cited right at the top of the complaint. In February, speaking to a local NPR affiliate, he said his agency was in a “death spiral” fueled by high job vacancy rates and corresponding high caseloads.
His predecessor, Marketa Garner Walters, told the legislature a year beforehand that the agency was “drowning” with 400 open jobs.
The lawsuit alleges that these worker shortages and high caseloads have contributed to a failure to deliver necessary services and safety to children. Among the specific problems named in the complaint:
- Placement stability: one in five foster youth had experienced three or more placements in their first year in care, according to 2021 data.
- Lack of best options: Facing a shortage of foster homes, the state over-relies on group homes and institutions, and has placed children in hotel rooms.
- Misuse of prescriptions: Louisiana “often uses psychotropic medications in a haphazard manner, as a form of chemical constraint to control children’s behavior, rather than for the limited uses for which psychotropic medications are acceptable,” the complaint states.
- School absence: “Louisiana foster children often spend weeks, if not months, without receiving any education.”
The plaintiffs in the case, filed as Jacob B. v. Governor Landry, are all adolescents and teenagers currently in state foster care. Six reside in congregate care programs or psychiatric facilities; one lives in a foster home; one is home on a trial visit with her biological mother; and one is currently a runaway.
A Better Childhood filed the lawsuit in tandem with two law firms, Wheeler Trigg O’Donnell and Simon, Peragine & Redfearn.