Legal Practice & Process

Members: Hon. Thomas Stuckey, Chair; Mark Briggs, Marcus Crosby, Cindy Dyar, Hon. Charles Griffin, Hollye Pickett, Crystal Leff-Piñon, Kenneth Thompson Janet VanderZanden

Staff: Renée Castillo-De La Cruz, Brenda Kinsler

For more information about current Legal Practice and Process Committee projects, please link below:

Legal Representation Committee

When a family is involved in a child welfare proceeding, quality legal counsel is essential for all parties to ensure that the court strikes the appropriate balance between the rights and duties of all parties involved. The Children’s Commission has maintained a Legal Representation Committee (LRC) since its inception. The Committee exists to identify training needs, advise child welfare system stakeholders on best legal and judicial system practices, evaluate proposed statutory amendments, assess the quality of legal representation throughout the state, and help ensure that court proceedings guard due process, promote child and family engagement, and produce quality legal representation outcomes for the children and families involved.

Task Force on Court-Appointed Legal Representation

In 2017, the Children’s Commission conducted an extensive survey and research project on legal representation. The study culminated in a report to the Texas Legislature in September 2018 entitled Supreme Court of Texas Children’s Commission 2018 Study of Legal Representation in Child Protection Cases. Based on the recommendation of the study, the Children's Commission formed a Task Force on Court-Appointed Legal Representation to engage in dialogue with stakeholders and reach agreement on recommendations that could be presented to the Texas Legislature on the statutory and systemic reforms required to help ensure high-quality legal representation for parties involved in child welfare cases. The Final Report of the Task Force on Court-Appointed Legal Representation was released in May 2021. The report made several recommendations to raise the quality of court-appointed legal representation, including the creation of legal representation pilots that adopt different models of providing quality legal representation.

Legislative Matters

Each legislative session, the Children’s Commission tracks legislation relevant to child welfare law as it moves through the legislative process. The Commission is a resource to assist with the analysis of the impact of proposed legislation on the legal process in the child welfare system. At the conclusion of each legislative session, the Commission releases a Legislative Update that summarizes new legislation relevant to child welfare and organizes the legislative information both by bill number and by code section.

Mediation

Mediation in child welfare cases is a collaborative problem-solving process with the goal of reaching a consensus on how to resolve issues involving children who are alleged to be abused or neglected. An impartial, neutral, and specially trained mediator uses a process designed to facilitate constructive negotiation and communication amongst parents, attorneys, DFPS, and other parties. Mediation is used in child welfare cases throughout Texas and can be an effective and financially prudent method of resolving cases. One benefit of mediation is that it can enhance participants’ sense that they were treated fairly. Studies show that an enhanced sense of fair treatment increases both acceptance and compliance with court decisions. Though the use of mediation to resolve child welfare cases prior to trial has become widely accepted, the Children’s Commission is interested in exploring whether mediation is being underutilized in child welfare cases because it often occurs too late for the benefits of increased compliance to be realized. The Mediation Workgroup was formed to analyze the issues that arose from the Mediation Round Table held in February 2019, to address the challenges and opportunities of virtual mediation, and to develop action items that could be implemented to raise the quality of mediation in child welfare cases across the state of Texas.

Notice & Engagement

All parties involved in child welfare cases continue to struggle with securing consistent and timely notice of scheduled hearings from the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS). This issue includes the foster placements and DFPS service provider facilities where the children/youth are in placement and results in many parties not being able to attend scheduled court hearings. The Office of Court Administration, with funding from the Children’s Commission, hosts a Notice and Engagement service that uses non-confidential case data to provide hearing notice by email to and/or text message about upcoming hearings to court participants (attorneys, CPS personnel, CASA, parents, relative caregivers, and adoptive/foster parents) involved in cases heard by the Child Protection Courts. The Notice and Engagement tool was developed to improve and expand engagement of families and caregivers in court hearings so that court hearings could be higher quality and more meaningful for the families and children involved.

Currently, the Notice and Engagement tool is only available for cases heard by Child Protection Courts in the Child Protection Case Management System (CPCMS) application, but the Office of Court Administration has created an Application Programming Interface (API) that will allow courts other than those using the Child Protection Court Case Management System to upload their hearing data into the system. The goal of the is to expand the hearing notification tool to all courts hearing child welfare cases in order to provide parties with up-to-date hearing information and to provide courts with an alternate means of notification free of charge. 

Parent Resource Workgroup

The Parent Resource Workgroup supports efforts to assist parents in understanding the Texas child welfare system, their role and responsibilities when involved in a child welfare case, and the roles and responsibilities of others. As a result of these efforts, the Family Helpline and Parent Resource Guide were created.

Family Helpline Project

In 2017, the Children’s Commission partnered with Access to Justice and the Children’s Justice Act to fund the Texas Legal Services Corporation to establish the Family Helpline for Strong Families and Safe Children (“Family Helpline”), which provides easily available, statewide access for parents, family members, and community members to basic information, education, and resources addressing issues facing parents and caregivers as they relate to child welfare law including: Child Protective Investigations; The provision of Family-Based Safety Services; Safety Plan and Parental Child Safety Placements; Chapter 34 non-parent agreements; Termination of parental rights; Custody, access, and visitation; Service plans; The court’s role in conducting hearings and oversight; The right to legal counsel; Non-offending parents, minor parents, and incarcerated parents; Survivors of family violence; Intergenerational issues; Reinstatement of parental rights; and Other variations of these situations.

DFPS Representation Subcommittee

As part of the ongoing commitment of the Children’s Commission to promote quality of legal representation for all parties, the Commission brought together a DFPS Representation Subcommittee to complement its current workgroups dedicated to parent and child representation. The purpose of the subcommittee is to create a forum for experts in child welfare law to identify strategies and make recommendations related to the improvement of representation of DFPS and improvement of communication and collaboration with parties to ensure the best outcomes for Texas children, youth, and families.

Tribal/State Collaborative

The Children’s Commission recognizes and respects the Tribal sovereignty of Texas’ three federally-recognized Tribes and pursues efforts that protect the best interests of and promotes stability for Indigenous children and families. The Commission collaborates with the Texas’ three federally recognized Tribes and partners with other system stakeholders to promote ongoing knowledge and understanding of the ICWA and its importance. The Children’s Commission educates judges and lawyers on the importance of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), including the context of historical trauma and tools to assist with practical application of the ICWA. Further, the Commission continually works to include Tribal judges and attorneys in all relevant legal trainings including the Children’s Commission annual Child Welfare Judges Conference and the 2021 Texas Indian Child Welfare Act Summit. Collaborative efforts include maintaining relationships with representatives from the Texas Tribal nations and partnering with other system stakeholders to promote ongoing knowledge of Tribal practices. This collaborative effort includes maintaining Tribal representation on other Children’s Commission efforts, such as the Statewide Collaborative on Trauma-Informed Care. The Children’s Commission also partners with DFPS in supporting Tribal/State collaborative meetings and collaborates with the Capacity Building Center for Courts and the participants of the CIP ICWA Constituency Group. The Children’s Commission works with national ICWA and leading organizations on understanding and implementation of the Federal Rule and Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) Guidelines.