From an article written a few years ago by the National Council on Disability:

 

 

"Services are often denied not out of malice, but because of the lack of coordination among systems of care and complexity of funding arrangements..."

 

"...Moreover, the criteria that youth must meet before they can receive services can easily be interpreted to deny services. In practice, many states do not have specific definitions of all covered services, so it is likely that many Medicaid-eligible children receive neither the mental health screens nor the mental health treatment to which they are entitled by EPSDT (Medicaid's Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment Program). The shortage of knowledgeable legal advocates virtually ensures that the rights of many children to EPSDT services will not be enforced."

Did you all see this from the sentence above? "...the criteria that youth must meet before they can receive services can easily be interpreted to deny services." Can anyone show me a mental health agency who is committed to PROVIDING services instead of finding reasons to DENY services?

This isn't a federal issue, in fact federal law seems more lenient. Per the Child Welfare League of America:

"Federal law does not require parents to give up their parental rights or transfer custody to place their children with a child welfare agency. It includes specific language that allows voluntary placements. Federal funding can be used for foster care payments for up to 180 days under a voluntary placement agreement. If your child needs to remain in foster care longer than 180 days, federal law says that the court must get involved. The court must decide that remaining in out-of-home care is in your child’s best interests. But the court is not required to transfer your child’s custody to the child welfare agency."

I will be the first to say that my state can better care for its residents than the federal government in many situations, and perhaps that's the case here. But this is a tragic injustice, and to fix this we will need federal government assistance - it's not going to be done at the state level. Perhaps a federally funded program administered by the states? No matter how it's addressed, this is something I'll be asking my elected officials to consider this upcoming year. We just can't let this travesty continue.