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Child Welfare Services (formerly Children and Family Svcs. Div.)

115,963 children were alleged to be victims of abuse and neglect.

9,842 children were substantiated to be victims of child abuse and neglect.

1,430 children were adopted out of the foster care system. Oklahoma’s adoptions are twice the rate of the national average.

9,132 children were in state custody at the end of the fiscal year.

13,114 children and their adoptive families continue to receive adoption subsidy payments.

In order to thrive, children need lifelong connections that come from caring and loving families. OKDHS is actively working to assure that all children served through child welfare have safe, loving families. In most situations, children are reunited with their families.

When a child cannot safely return home, an adoptive family is sought. In SFY 2012, OKDHS staff finalized 1,430 adoptions. Per capita, Oklahoma adoptions are twice the rate of the national average. In a few cases, adoptions do not work out. In SFY 2012, there were 29 adoption dissolutions (less than 1 percent of finalized adoptions). On average, these dissolved adoptions lasted 68 months.

Out-of-home care is a term describing all kinds of care offered to children including foster care, inpatient care, trial adoption, trial family reunification and similar services.

OKDHS protects children from abuse and neglect. In SFY 2012, OKDHS received more than 68,000 reports of alleged child maltreatment related to 115,963 children. More than 5,500 of those reports were substantiated, which involved 9,842 children.

Protecting children from family abuse and neglect is the goal of OKDHS Child Welfare Services. This program receives reports of abuse and neglect, conducts investigations and assessments, and makes recommendations to the court when abuse or neglect is substantiated.

OKDHS contracts with community-based providers throughout the state to provide child abuse prevention and intervention services designed to keep families together. The Oklahoma Pinnacle Plan, a five–year improvement plan for the OKDHS foster care system, was approved by neutral monitors (co-neutrals) as part of the settlement of a class action lawsuit.

The agency began implementing the improvements this fiscal year and will continue to implement this plan over the next few years.

75th Anniversary Factoids:

The Division of Child Welfare was created in August 1936.

The statewide Child Abuse Hotline – 1-800-522-3511 – was established in 1975.