Iowa Judicial Branch Children's Justice
Initiative
Goals and Objectives
Goals
Adopted by the Iowa
Supreme Court
- Approve, in principle, the
recommendations of the PEW Commission
on Foster Care, a national bipartisan commission that called for
sweeping reforms to protect children in foster care and secure safe,
permanent families for them.
- Assign top priority status to
child dependency cases for the entire judicial branch and make decisions
on this basis.
- Study for adoption certain
national court performance outcome measures and ensure we have the systems
in place to collect relevant data.
- Support the chief justice in
efforts to collaborate with the executive and legislative branches of
government in efforts to protect children and promote their well-being.
- Provide leadership in efforts
to educate judges and court personnel who handle child welfare cases,
including joint training with DHS.
Objectives for District Courts
Adopted by the Iowa
Judicial Council
Under the
guidance of the judicial council, each judicial district will achieve the
following:
- Develop and implement specific
strategies to meet the performance measures set out in the federal
Adoption and Safe Families Act and Iowa Code chapter 232 in all counties.
- Organize judicial resources and
assignments so one judge who has experience in handling child welfare
matters and who is committed to improving outcomes for children in
juvenile court presides over all proceedings and makes all decisions in dependency
cases involving one family.
- Conduct an assessment, with the
assistance of the Court Improvement Project, of the effectiveness and
timeliness of court practices and processes in dependency cases in at
least one urban county and one rural county within the year.
