Advocacy group says it needs more funding to address kids being locked in psych hospitals longer than needed under DCFS care

CHICAGO (CBS) — We have been exposing the issue for years – kids locked in psychiatric hospitals for longer than medically necessary while in the care of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.

CBS 2 Investigator Megan Hickey has been digging into the possible solutions, one of which was a court order that would allow special advocates to step in automatically.

That order went into effect less than a month ago, and Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) of Cook County has already been assigned 22 Illinois kids who are stuck in hospitals.

James McIntyre, director of community outreach and engagement for CASA of Cook County, has been down in Springfield since February trying to get lawmakers to designate $2 million to help Cook County kids in care.

That sounds like a lot, but McIntyre points out that there has been a history lack of funding for his organization.

“So we’ve been around for 35 years,” McIntyre said. “In that 35 years, for the first 33 years, we had no state grant assistance whatsoever.”

Lake, DuPage, and Kane Counties also have Court Appointed Special Advocates, and they are able to help nearly 100 percent of kids in the care of the state.

But in Cook County — CASA of Cook County is only able to service about 11 percent of the kids who need it.

Right now, the organization is focusing on kids like a teenage boy who talked to CBS 2 Political Investigator Dana Kozlov about his experience being in a psychiatric lockup for 67 days longer than he should have been.

“We’re being like locked up in these hospitals as if they were shelters or prisons,” the then-17-year-old told Kozlov in 2020, “and they’re just forgetting about us.”

Last year, more than 350 kids were in that same boat. McIntyre gets it. He himself was in the care of the DCFS as a kid, and he was stuck in a psych hospital longer than he should have been too.

“By the fourth time of my hospitalization, the adoptive parents decided that they weren’t going to pick me up anymore,” McIntyre said. “And I didn’t have an advocate to fight for me, you know, and so I know what it’s like you know when people say ‘Oh, you know, they can empathize or they can sympathize.’ I know what it is like with these with these children. I know exactly what they’re going through every single day.”

Now, CASA of Cook County is focusing on kids in such circumstances, and wants to help many others.

But McIntyre says they need the funding that is currently proposed in HB 4751 and SB 3499 – or the problem will only get worse.

“The foster children in our Cook County system have been left behind and forgotten for far too long. I am proud to partner with the dedicated professionals at CASA to increase funding so all children have a court advocate on their side, beyond just medical necessity,” said state Rep. Lamont J. Robinson (D-Chicago). Working “together, we can help put these children’s best interests first at all times, keep families together when it is safe, and ensure judges can fairly rule in every case for the outcome that best fits each child.”

McIntyre says additional funding would allow them to bring in 120 new volunteers, which would mean we would be able to serve us 240 new children know top of on top of their current caseload.