Scrutiny: Is Your Pad Up to Snuff?

Note: the names/identities/details of the foster children, foster parents and social workers have been changed to protect their identities

Thanks to all who have emailed with questions about our dinner date with Jack & Jordan.  Due to the weather, Academy Award street closures, and a last minute birth-mom visit for Jordan, we decided to postpone until this weekend.  So stay tuned…

In the meantime, we’ve been contacted by our agency regarding recertification.  Our foster license, which expires this week, requires several steps in order to be renewed.  There are so many reasons why people don’t foster.  And the safety inspection often ranks near the top of the list.

As a foster home, we must comply with no less than 76 points of safety.  Here’s just a sampling of the scrutiny we endure.  A quick note before we dive into things – Scout got promoted.  It’s no wonder.  Her no-nonsense, quick-witted approach to all things foster makes her a natural leader.  We’ve been assigned to Hattie, a fairly new social worker with big hair and a slightly condescending air about her.  “She likes her checklists,” Scout told (read: warned) us. 

Turns out, safety inspections are Hattie’s specialty.

Rule 1:  Toxins, pesticides, paint, bleach, cleanser, nail polish remover, disinfectants, cleaning solutions and any other items which could pose a danger to children must be locked up. 

Okay, at first blush, this seems entirely reasonable.  But what you don’t know until the home inspection is that you can’t just put one of those annoying plastic hooks onto the inside of your cupboards.  The cupboards must, in fact, lock – like with a key.  If you’re game to mess up your cupboards, this is fine.  If you rent, like we do, this rule means that you have to purchase plastic tubs with a hole punched into the lid that will fit a padlock, and then you have to shove anything you use to clean – including dishwasher soap, vinegar, toilet bowl cleaner, nail polish, etc.-  into these bins, lock ‘em up, and stash the key someplace you’ll remember but that the child can’t find.  And every freakin’ time you want to clean or do your nails or run the dishwasher or gargle with mouthwash (gotta lock it up, too!), you have to find the stupid key, unlock the bin, and retrieve the potentially lethal item.  This tantrum-inducing rule is one of the toughest to obey.

Rule 2:  Knives, scissors, and any other sharp objects must be locked up.

Yes, yes – we don’t want toddlers stabbing themselves.  The intention of this rule is indeed very good.  We got a couple of plastic toolboxes and locks.  Which meant that whenever we wanted to, say, chop up vegetables or provide a dinner guest with a steak knife, we had to find the key, unlock the box and retrieve a knife.  Do you shave in the shower?  Better find the key!

Rule 3:  Frozen foods are properly wrapped, dated, and rotated.

What’s in your freezer?  Seriously, open that bad boy up and check out the contents.  Hattie requested that we take out each and every item for her inspection.  She also wanted to see the seven-days’ worth of meals and snacks we must have on hand at all times.   “Soup’s not a snack,” she informed us as we desperately held up several cans of Annie’s Tomato Bisque.  “Crackers, a slice of cheese, a cereal bar – those are snacks,” she explained.  “In an emergency, the soup would work, would it not?” we countered.  “Beside the point.  I’d really like to see you get some crackers.”  Never mind that many foster kids are fed diets that consist of fast food, boxed and processed food, and frozen meals.  We put crackers on the shopping list.

Rule 4:  All medications (including over the counter meds, prescriptions, inhalers, vitamins) and all alcohol must be under lock and key.

First, interesting that alcohol and medications are in the same rule.  That may say more about Social Services than they’d care to admit.  Hattie did not find this to be funny at all.

Second, children should not get drunk – we get this.  But if a child is Jordan’s age – 3 ½  – isn’t it reasonable enough that the alcohol is in a cabinet that’s up so high, the adults in the household can’t reach it without a stepladder?  Hattie says no.  Her theory:  Jordan could somehow drag a chair in from the dining room, set it on top of the stepladder (which lives above our stacked washer/dryer unit in the utility room), shinny himself up to the counter and then parkour to the cabinet above the oven where we keep the wine.  “How would he get the wine bottle open?” we asked, feeling snarky.  “The corkscrew is locked in the Sharps toolbox.”  Her reply:  “That’s not the point.”  Heather thought of training Jordan for this very act as she can’t reach the wine on her own.

Rule 5:  All medications given to a foster child, whether prescription or over the counter, are logged into the child’s medical record each and every time the medication is given.  Foster parents are to log the date, day, time, and the initials of the person giving the medication as well as the reason the child is receiving medication.  Under no circumstances should a child be given any medication, including baby aspirin, without the written permission from the child’s doctor.  Logs will be turned into social workers weekly.

This rule is the tip of the iceberg in the paperwork department.   We only had Jordan a couple of weeks and still haven’t finished all the forms we were supposed to fill out prior to his arrival.  Every time a foster child has to go to the doctor, which is frequent given the fact that they can’t even have a vitamin without doctor approval, we had to muscle the pediatrician into filling out the three page form and accompanying checklist that’s required.  Okay, doctors – they hate these forms.  They find ways to duck out of appointments early, leaving their nurses to check all the boxes and fill in the blanks.

When we picked up our first set of foster children, Champion and Radelle, we learned that their foster mom would put them into a cage as punishment for jumping on the bed.  There is no safety point rule for that.  When we picked up Jordan from his most recent foster home, foster-mom hadn’t even attempted to potty train him – a situation that can qualify as neglect.  Again, no safety point there.  But Hattie, having the best of intentions, was more concerned that we consider purchasing new lighter-weight picture frames, lamps we could hang from the ceiling, and a set of shorter bookcases instead of the two tall ones in our living room.  “That way if there’s an earthquake,” she explained, “the books won’t fall that far.  Plus, you might enjoy how they look.”

Obviously the rules exist for a reason.  A few moronic foster homes ruined it for the rest of us.  But seriously, when licensed through an agency, can’t the “spirit of the rule” be good enough?  And how many homes where biological parents live with their biological children can withstand this kind of scrutiny?