Ohio agencies responsible for assuring the safety of troubled children appear to lack the ability or the authority to carry out the job, an Enquirer examination of li censing for a youth program has found.

        Teen Reach has housed, taught and counseled at least 14 out-of-town youths in Warren County since March even though it has no license to operate a group home, as required by state law.

        Despite neighbors' persistent complaints, two state departments responsible for overseeing such programs — Job and Family Services, and Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services — have done little but send Teen Reach letters explaining the law and demanding that it become licensed and certified.

        The Education Department also contends that Teen Reach should be registered as a private school, which it is not. The department has joined Job and Family Services in seeking help from the state Attorney General's Office.

        That office says it is waiting to see what happens at a March hearing on alleged Teen Reach violations of the state fire code. By then, Teen Reach will have been in Harveysburg for a year.

        “"Under investigation' has meant "done nothing,'” says Michele Cochran, a resident of Harveysburg, the Warren County village where Teen Reach has locat ed. “It seems absurd that they can say a house is not in compliance but have no muscle to enforce it.”
       

Neighbors concerned
               No one has alleged that Teen Reach is mistreating kids, and the teens have gotten into little trouble in Harveysburg. But neighbors are worried about their own and the teens' safety.

        Teen Reach says the kids are always supervised, but residents say they often see the teens walking around the village alone. At least two have run away, according to the Warren County Sheriff's Department.

        The Rev. Bobby Torres, president of Teen Reach, acknowledges that staff members are not certified to teach or to provide mental health or addiction treatment but says many do have college degrees. The program uses pastoral counseling, he says, to help kids kick drugs cold turkey.

        “Our certification is a very high moral standard,” says the Scottsdale, Ariz., resident.

        Social services experts, however, say state oversight of any group home or foster care program — public or private — is vital to assure children's well-being.

        “The minimum standard in Ohio is really pretty minimal,” says Penny Wyman, executive director of the Ohio Association of Child Caring Agencies, which represents about 100 group and foster homes.

        In Ohio, group homes are supposed to be licensed to ensure they are clean, maintain adequate staffing levels and training, and meet fire safety codes.

        The Department of Job and Family Services is responsible for carrying out the regulations but has been befuddled by Teen Reach's refusal to become licensed, and hampered by a state statute that's vague on enforcement.

        Family Services sent a letter May 26 that said Teen Reach appeared to need licensing and ordered program officials to send information within 10 days. Teen Reach never replied, and a Family Services inspector who attempted to visit one of the group's Harveysburg houses this summer was denied entrance.

        Teen Reach says it is a religious program and therefore exempt. But Job and Family Services spokeswoman Jane Haller says religious affiliation is irrelevant.
       

Law vague

               Usually when a state agency tells a group home it must be licensed, the facility either complies or shuts down, Ms. Haller says. Usually the home must comply, because it receives some state or federal money that would be withdrawn without a license.

        But Teen Reach is privately funded by charging $25,000 per teen for a stay of three or more months.

        In such cases, the Ohio Revised Code is fuzzy on how Job and Family Services is to enforce the law.

        “They're trying, but they can only do what they have the legislative authority to do,” Ms. Wyman says.

        The closest the code comes to specifics is a section that directs state or local authorities to go to court to shut down programs that advertise certain services, says George Biggs, a former chief of licensing at Family Services who now works with the Ohio Association of Child Caring Agencies.

        “This is a very weak statute,” Mr. Biggs says.

        Mr. Biggs serves on a Family Services committee that's been crafting recommendations that would give the agency more enforcement powers. A bill could be introduced in the Ohio General Assembly this month.

        Job and Family Services' review of its own records found that it has shut just one program in the past five years. The department revoked certification for Springfield-based Initiatives for Youth in 1998, saying it had falsified training documents. The program complied with the order to close.

        In contrast, Family Services' California counterpart, the Department of Social Services, closed two Teen Reach homes there in 1998 after receiving complaints that the program was operating without a license, Social Services spokesman John Gordon says.

        The state threatened penalties of $200 a day if Teen Reach did not close, Mr. Gordon says.

        In Ohio, Teen Reach plans to remain and even expand, program officials say. They've talked about building 21 homes that would bring 105 kids plus supervisors to Harveysburg, a village of 500.

        “There's a great need for this thing,” the Rev. Mr. Torres says.
       

Other agencies
               Another state agency, Addiction Services, is supposed to certify drug and alcohol addiction programs to ensure patients' safety. But it has no authority to close an uncertified facility, either.

        “We can order them to cease and desist; that's it,” spokesman Eric Wandersleben says.

        Addiction Services asked Teen Reach to apply for certification in November. The Rev. Mr. Torres says he will seek a waiver because his staff does not use psychological counseling or medication, but the agency says the program might still need certification.

        The Education Department, which oversees private as well as public schools, recently denied Teen Reach nonchartered school status, which would have allowed it to legally operate. Teen Reach applied after the deadline had passed. Until next year, the Rev. Mr. Torres says, “we're just going to do a home school.”

        But the program does not qualify as a home school because parents aren't doing the teaching, the Education Department says.

        In a rare instance of cooperation among government agencies, Education joined with Family Services in asking the Attorney General's Office to investigate whether Teen Reach is improperly operating a school.

        That investigation, however, is on hold while the agencies wait to see what happens with the Fire Marshal's Office, the Attorney General's Office said last week.

        The Fire Marshal's Office, which gained entry to Teen Reach facilities only after obtaining a search warrant in September, cited the group for operating a group home without smoke detectors, lighted exit signs or fire extinguishers. The Fire Marshal's Office now says Teen Reach may be moving to comply, but the state Board of Building Appeals is still planning a hearing in March on the citations.

        “Everyone keeps passing (questions about Teen Reach) off to somewhere else,” Mary Ann Bourne, an 18-year resident, says. “It seems like nobody cares about these kids. I'm concerned whether they're getting an education — I'm just concerned what's happening with them.”

How Teen Reach came to Harveysburg

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