Overcrowding has some kids sleeping on DCS office couches

Some kids in state custody are sleeping on couches in Department of Children’s Services offices or in a Nashville church because state officials cannot find a better place for them to stay, reports The Tennessean.

Davidson County Regional Administrator Tiwanna Woods said no more than 19 teenagers have slept in state offices or the church since the beginning of March — and no more than three teens on a single night. However, sources who work closely with DCS put the number of children higher – as many as 15 teenagers spending the night in offices or the church in just the past week, and as many as seven on a single night.

The reports come just as DCS nears the end of a 14-year federal lawsuit originally brought by children’s rights advocates over kids being place in emergency shelters or other inappropriate settings instead of foster care, group homes or residential treatment centers.

DCS Commissioner Bonnie Hommrich acknowledged the agency is facing challenges placing some of the teenagers coming into custody in appropriate residences. She said that most of the difficult-to-place cases involve delinquent teenagers and foster kids with behavioral or psychiatric problems. While there aren’t always enough spaces for them now, Hommrich said DCS is working to open 60 beds for therapeutic care in July at Mountain View Youth Development Center in Dandridge, a facility for teenage boys who have committed multiple felonies. The new spots will be in a separate section of that facility.

“I think it breaks all of our hearts to see these kids and not be able to place them just like that,” Hommrich said. “It makes us determined for this (situation) to not drag on.”