Social Workers Plead for Help, but Officials Say Resources Low

Faced with overwhelming caseloads that they say have reached a crisis stage, Ventura County social workers demanded Wednesday that their agency fill vacant positions, hire more bilingual workers and start a regular safety training program.

They also asked for cellular phones and the right to carry pepper spray to protect themselves if necessary when making calls on families.

“We’re crying for help,” said Rosemary Fields, a county social worker for nine years. “The turnover rate is incredibly high. For the people that remain in the office, they love their jobs. They love working with children. We want to stay where we are.”

Fields was one of eight social workers who, calling themselves the Public Relations Committee, participated in a press conference at their union’s office to air complaints against Children’s Protective Services.

“We are all here because we care about kids,” said Debbie Paris, who has been with the agency seven years. “And we want to keep them safe. That is the agency’s reason for existing. But we need the tools to be able to do that.”

Social service officials said they are sympathetic to the employees’ complaints about heavy workloads, but they said recruiting more workers, particularly those with bilingual skills, is difficult.

“They make it sound awfully easy,” said James Isom, director of the Public Social Services Agency. “But there’s not a simple solution.”

Isom said his agency regularly runs newspaper ads and radio promotions, and has had extensive outreach programs with UCLA, USC and other major universities to recruit more workers.

But he said low salaries--which are set by an independent committee--and heavy workloads are discouraging to applicants.

“We have had trouble historically recruiting and hiring for Children’s Protective Services,” he said. “We have always had a problem.”

Meanwhile, Curt Hansen, the agency’s personnel director, said the workers’ claim that there has been a 75% turnover rate within children’s services since 1990 is not accurate. He said 34 out of a total of 85 had left during the last six years.

“We’re not talking about excessive turnover,” he said.

Also, Hansen said there are 10 vacant positions, and not 26 as the workers claimed. He said an exam is scheduled Tuesday for about a dozen job applicants to fill some or all of the positions.

With only seven bilingual workers, Hansen said the agency will be looking for workers with multi-language skills.

“If we could fill all 10 positions with bilingual workers, I think we would go ahead and do it,” he said.

Still, officials acknowledge that worker caseloads are heavy and can be overwhelming.

Workers say they handle an average of 35 cases, 10 more than what they consider acceptable.

“It’s been a concern for a number of years,” Hansen said. “But we can’t increase the number of workers without approval [from the Board of Supervisors]. So it becomes a money issue.”

Workers said they believe that Proposition 172 money should be used to hire more personnel, including support staff, in the social services agency.

Money from the half-cent sales tax is earmarked for the sheriff, district attorney and three other public safety agencies. The tax generates about $30 million a year.

The social workers also said their agency needs to purchase more cellular telephones to increase employee safety in the field.

“We, on a daily basis, go into areas alone that even police officers won’t go into,” said Ellen Mastright, a social service worker. “Police officers . . . tell me, ‘I can’t believe you’re going out there by yourself. Don’t do it.’ ”

Isom said he could make more cellular phones available, but that his agency cannot afford to purchase or pay to use dozens of the phones.

He also said that the agency would not purchase pepper spray or advocate its use because it would only open employees to lawsuits.