Frustration

I had posted a while back about biomom and threats to us and the social worker.  We have not had any problems with the biomom but remain very aware of the situation.

However, we have had a situation with the system that is so frustrating.  On the last day of our vacation we received a call from my moms caregiver.  She was staying at our house while we were gone.  She called to tell me that they tried to serve biomom papers at our house.  The documents had her name and our address.  She told the sheriff that we were foster parents to the person that they were trying to serve and that we had received threats from her.  The person wrote that information down and left with the papers.  When we got back I called the sheriff's office to see where they got the address from and if our address had been removed from it.  She said she got the address from the state DSS and that they delivered the papers with our address on it.

I then went up to the sheriff's office to talk with them.  The person in charge told me that she knew we were the foster parents and that the person was the biomom.  No, she didn't know that our address was supposed to be confidential.  No she didn't in any way mark out our address.  She said she couldn't alter the papers.  When I asked her why she didn't send it back to be corrected she said that they do this all the time.  I again told her that foster parents addresses should be sent to bioparents. She said she never heard of such a thing and that we had visitation anyways.  Yes, I explained, at DSS not at our home.  Yes, I am taking this further.  If this is standard operating procedure then it needs to be changed.

Then I went to DSS in Columbia where the papers came from.  I got a lot of run around but finally got in touch with someone who understood my complaint.  Apparently medicaid says she lived at that address.  She has never lived at this address.  They think that since we got Little Man straight out of the hospital that he was still connected with her.  They seemed very concerned about this and are looking at the problem.  I received a call from a supervisor above the person I spoke with and answered her questions.  I also received a call from my county supervisor because she heard from the state and she wanted to understand what happened.  She is going to look into the problem too.

Honestly, my complaint isn't with the DSS system.  There was a slip-up somehow.  They admit it and seem interested in fixing it.  They see it as a problem.  My main complaint is with the sheriff's office who didn't see it as a problem. When they were told that she had threatened us you would think that they would have had a moments thought about sending it to her with our address, but they didn't.  I am working on making sure that the procedure is changed.

Never a dull moment at our household!