Treatment plan enforcement Welf & I C §5352.6

 
The term “reasonable efforts" is a novel concept to LPS Conservatorship. We always hear about no reasonable services within the Juvenile Dependency system in regards to whether the department upheld its duty to provide parents with reasonable services to help them ameliorate the conditions that brought their minor under the jurisdiction of the court. If the department fails to ensure that a finding of reasonable services makes it into the "record", then their Title XX [citation] funding is at risk of being stripped. Within child welfare law, reasonable services brings up many challenges and confounds; yet, there are no efforts to strike the reasonable services provisions from Welfare & Inst Code as everyone understands the best interest of the minor prevails over judicial expediency. We hear about the treatment plan for LPS conservatives per Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5350.1 in our legal trainings, we read about it now and also in CLE publications, and on monthly? basis nursing staff sign off on treatment planning progress. Despite there being legislature directives mandating that a treatment plan be developed after 10 days of the LPS conservatorship being established; there is scarce legal authority/remedies ensuring enforcement of the treatment plan Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5352.6. Parents frequently voice their concerns about the treatment at IMDs and attorneys rarely refer to reasonable efforts in court and most of them approve of what the IMD has done without much paperwork. LPS Conservatorship has been previously hailed as the holy grail of control; yet I believe that reasonable efforts/no reasonable efforts findings are second most powerful tool in LPS conservatorship court. Judges can use this tool at their disposal in LPS court to ensure stabilization and a move toward discharge to community setting. We must task the treatment team with holding review meetings a finding of whether there were reasonable services and use the legal tools to ensure that the IMD is doing its job.
 
Welfare and Inst Code provides no solid definition for enforcement of reasonable efforts in implementing a treatment plan, many commentators have criticized this omission as having codified enforcement clauses makes sense. Uniformity in treatment plan implementation varies depending on funding; what is reasonable in one county may not be in another. The capacity of each county will depend on the mental health funding and services available. Everyone in mental health knows that for the State to lose more funding dollars would make this proposal impossible and result in fewer resources for the IMDs and case managers. Moreover, most attorneys for patients do not address the issue believing that it does net really affect their client or that there is nothing they can do. I believe that the reasonable efforts/no reasonable efforts findings must be taken seriously as enforcing reasonable services will result in positive changes for the conservatee by the time their LPS conservatorship is up for renewal.