DEE WILSON CONSULTING
Washington State Trends in Child Placement, Kinship Care,
and Permanent Planning: 2018-2025
(Originally published September 2025)
Washington State’s Department of Children, Youth and Family Services (DCYF) assumed administrative control of the state’s child welfare system in 2018. Under DCYF leadership, there have been large dramatic changes in child protection and foster care services that include a nearly 50% reduction in the state’s foster care population and more than a 50% reduction in entries into care. The percentage of children in out-of-home care placed in kinship care has increased by more than 25%, and the percentage of kinship families licensed as foster homes has increased from less than 10% to more than 60%, thereby greatly increasing financial support for kinship families.
Multiple indicators indicate a steady decline in timely permanent planning for children in foster care longer than 12 months, including findings from internal audits, a large increase in median length of stay, and worsening performance in meeting state or federal guidelines for holding fact finding hearings and conducting court reviews for children in foster care or unlicensed kinship care longer than one year. In addition, DCYF exit from care data indicates a reduced interest in adoption and increased commitment to guardianship as a permanent planning outcome.
All of these changes have been value driven, both in the positive sense of setting ambitious goals and achieving them and the negative tendency to ignore, minimize or rationalize bad outcomes. It should also be noted that juvenile courts share the responsibility for the decline in timely permanent planning.
The data I cite below comes from the following sources: the DCYF child welfare agency performance dashboard; from Annual Progress and Services Reports (APSR) from 2020-2026; from DCYF’s Keeping Families Together Act (KFTA) implementation reports and Office of the Family and Children’s Ombuds (OFCO) 2025 annual report on child fatalities and near fatalities.
DCYF reports are often remarkably candid regarding practice deficiencies, though the APSRs are so lengthy and poorly organized they are difficult to review. I doubt that anything I have to say in this commentary will come as a surprise to the authors of the APSRs and KFTA implementation reports, or to DCYF data analysts who do an exemplary job of tracking agency performance.
The reduction in foster care
Ross Hunter was director of DCYF from its creation as a stand-alone children’s services agency in 2017 until the fall of 2024. Hunter set a goal of reducing the state’s foster care population by 50%. By the end of SFY 2024 this goal had nearly been achieved.
Children in foster care on last day of state fiscal year
2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
9175 8,799 7,610 6,892 6,454 5,931 4,994
(Source: Child Welfare Agency Performance Dashboard)
The number of children in foster care on the last day of the state fiscal year declined 46% from 2018-2024.
Entries Into Care
2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
5,882 5,570 4,766 4,174 4,161 3,309 2,837
(Source: Child Welfare Agency Performance Dashboard)
Entries into care declined 52% from state fiscal years 2018 to 2024. The most recent KFTA implementation report indicates there was about an 11% increase in entries into care in SFY 2025 from July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2025 (3200 vs. 2887 during the previous twelve months), returning the number of entries into care almost to their pre-KFTA implementation level.
This would be a striking level of foster care reduction during any seven year period, but what is even more remarkable is that the reduction in foster care occurred during an opioid epidemic in which a steadily increasing number of children (mostly infants and toddlers) with open or recently open child welfare cases died or nearly died of fentanyl overdoses. Consider the effect of foster care reductions on the number of children, 0-3, who entered foster care in 2024 compared to 2018.
Entries Into Care by Age of Child
Child age 2018 2024
0 to 12 months 1,483 664
1 to 2 years 393 217
2 to 3 years 384 183
3 to 4 years 371 186
total 2,631 1,250
(Source: Child Welfare Agency Performance Dashboard)
1,381 fewer children, 0-3, entered out-of-home care in 2024 compared to 2018. This is the age group that makes up more than 80% of child fatalities and near fatalities in OFCO reports, i.e. fatalities and near fatalities from all causes and child maltreatment (CM) fatalities in which abuse or neglect either caused or contributed to fatality or near fatality on open or recently open cases.
Child Fatalities & Near Fatalities
Total Fatalities & Near Fatalities
2018 2019 2023 2024 2025
108 77 149 140 92*
* - Jan-June, others are full year
Maltreatment Fatalities & Near Fatalities
2018 2019 2023 2024 2025
60 45 102 82 27+12*
*Pending
(Source: OFCO 2025 Report on Fatalities and Near Fatalities)
The largest increase (by far) from 2018-19 to 2023-24 has been in child maltreatment near fatalities. There were:
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13 cases in 2018
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16 cases in 2019
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53 cases in 2023
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44 cases in 2024
January - June 2025 data is taken from an email I received from Patrick Dowd, the recently retired OFCO Director.
The sharp decline in foster care from 2018-24 has created a natural experiment regarding the effect of foster care placement on all-cause mortality for children, 0-3. A large birth cohort study completed in Washington State during the 1990s found that Medicaid eligible children placed in foster care from age 1 month to age 4 had an all-cause mortality rate half the rate of Medicaid eligible children of the same age reported to CPS but not placed out of the home. It is time to replicate this study in a recent birth cohort.
It should not be a surprise that a more than 50% reduction in entries into care of children, 0-3, would lead to a large increase in child fatalities and near fatalities when safety-oriented services were not created at scale to provide alternatives to foster care. However, it is not just the lack of services and an infrastructure to support in-home safety plans that had led to critical incidents; it is also DCYF assessment practices.
The July 2025 KFTA implementation report states: “Since 2020, DCYF has seen an increasing percentage of moderately high to high-risk cases being re-referred to CPS intake and screening in (within 90 days of the completion of the risk assessment).” Translation: For several years, CPS caseworkers have been closing an increasing number of cases with chronic histories of child maltreatment and/or parental substance abuse, mental health challenges and domestic violence, only to have these cases quickly re-reported and screened in for a CPS investigation/assessment. It appears that risk assessment has not been an influence on CPS decision making for several years. Recent APSRs do not provide information regarding rates of CPS re-reports, possibly (I suspect) because re-report rates have increased.
Curiously, despite a strong commitment to social justice as reflected in indices of racial disproportionality in child welfare, DCYF has not been especially services oriented in recent years. (see APSR internal audits of service provision). It is only during the past year that KFTA implementation reports show a marked increase in families served on Family Voluntary Services (FVS) caseloads.
Recent debates among policymakers, advocates and foster parents about the Washington’s reduction in foster care have focused on the KFTA, which was not implemented until July 1, 2023. KFTA had a large impact on infant placements during the first year of implementation, but this impact was greatly reduced during SFY 2025. It has been DCYF’s strong commitment to its foster care reduction goal that is primarily responsible for reduction of the state’s foster care population to less than 5,000 and for the decline in child safety that has resulted from this reduction, not KFTA.
Kinship Care
The state’s child welfare agency, the Children’s Administration, increased the use of kinship care by about a third during the decade preceding the creation of DCYF. The steady growth in kinship care has continued under DCYF. In addition, DCYF has achieved a huge increase in the percentage of kinship families licensed as foster homes, from 7.6% in 2018 to 61.1% in 2024. Licensing kinship homes, an option that has been available to child welfare agencies for decades, increases financial support for kinship families, especially when a sibling group is placed in the home. The increase in kinship care and in financial support for kinship care is another example of DCYF’s capacity to make big positive changes when staff at all levels are motivated to do so.
Children in Out- of- Home Care Placed in Kinship Care
2019 46%
2024 58%
(Source: 2025 Annual Progress & Services Report)
Licensed vs. Unlicensed Kinship Care Providers, last day of each state fiscal year
The decline in timely permanent planning
There have been large shifts in permanency planning practices and outcomes under DCYF, changes that have received little public attention, and that once again reflect agency values and their unintended outcomes.
There has been one major positive outcome: the percentage of children for whom permanency was achieved within 12 months has increased, and in 2023 exceeded the national standard set by the Administration for Children and Families by 7.5% (43.7% vs. 35.2%). Child welfare staff who manage foster care cases appear highly motivated to complete reunification, when possible, within a year of a child’s out-of-home placement.
However, when reunification within a year is not possible, there has been reduced commitment to completion of other permanent plans such as adoption or guardianship. In 2024, the percentage of completed permanent plans for children in care 12-23 months was 28.9%, far below the national standard of 43.8%. The percentage of children in care 24 months or longer for whom a permanent plan was completed was 32.1%, below the national standard of 37.3%. (2025 Annual Progress and Services Report). The result of diminished completion of permanent plans for children in care longer than 12 months has been an increase in median length of stay: 574 days in 2020 vs. 685 days in 2023. (2025 Annual Progress and Services Report, p. 45.)
The ASPRs make the valid point that as the state’s foster care population has declined the percentage of children and youth with complex and challenging problems has increased, which partially explains increased length of stay and lack of completed permanent plans for many youths. However, this is far from the whole story, as the annual progress reports indicate. There was a marked decline between 2019 and 2023 in the percentage of various types of hearings held within mandated timelines:
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Fact finding hearing within 75 days: 65% in 2019 vs. 52% in 2023 (2025 ASPR)
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First dependency review hearing within 6 months of placement: 80% in 2019 vs. 64% in 2023 (2025 ASPR)
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First permanent planning review hearing within 12 months of placement: 82% in 2019 vs. 68% in 2023 (2025 ASPR)
What may be occurring with increasing frequency is an agreement between caseworkers, Assistant Attorney Generals (AAGs) and parents’ attorneys to resolve the conditions that led to a child’s placement without going to a fact-finding hearing by extending the time to fact finding when necessary. However, when this effort is unsuccessful, legal hearings that track the progress of permanent planning are likely to be delayed for the life of the case. In addition, the 2025 APSR acknowledges that caseworkers may be delaying implementation of adoption or guardianship for children in foster care longer than one year to make further efforts at reunification.
What this data suggests is that caseworkers who manage foster care cases have a much stronger commitment to reunification than to Adoption and Safe Families (ASFA) permanency timelines. There has also been a large reduction in adoptions from 2018-24 as would be expected given the decline in entries-into care, along with a 59% decline in Termination of Parental Rights (TPR) petitions (1901 in 2018 vs. 774 in 2023), which assures that the sharp decline in adoptions will continue and possibly accelerate (2025 ASPR).
The number of completed adoptions as a percentage of total exits from care declined by a modest percentage between 2018-2024 while the percentage of exits to guardianship almost doubled to 14%. Guardianship is widely understood among child welfare staff and parent advocates to be more birth family friendly than adoption; and it is common to pursue guardianship for children in kinship care who cannot be reunified with birth parents.
DCYF decreased dependency filings from 4601 in 2018 to 1935 in 2023, a 58% decline in five years, larger than the reduction of entries into care. (2025 APSR). DCYF, to its credit, is attempting to work with a larger percentage of families with children in out-of-home care through voluntary agreements, but is having difficulty doing so without compromising permanent planning timelines for children who cannot be reunified with a birth parent (or parents) within a year. It is uncertain whether DCYF’s commitment to family preservation and reduced use of legal structure with parents of foster children can be brought into alignment with a commitment to timely permanency. The history of U.S. foster care systems prior to 1980 suggests the answer is likely "no.” However, DCYF has the opportunity to prove that child welfare history prior to the passage of permanent planning legislation does not have to repeat itself.
Summary
During its brief history, DCYF has demonstrated the ability to achieve ambitious goals when its staff at all levels are motivated by shared values. However, the pursuit of an arbitrary foster care reduction goal has badly damaged the agency’s child protection program; and the determination to achieve reunification has compromised permanent planning timelines for children in care for longer than 12 months and 24 months. Whether DCYF can effectively adapt its practice to improve outcomes without moderating its family preservation agenda remains to be seen. ©
References
2020, 2024,2025 & 2026 Annual Progress & Services Report, Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Family Services, Olympia, Washington, available online.
Cawthon, L. & Hopps, D., “Mortality of CPS Clients in Washington State from Birth to Age Four” (1997), Research and Data Analysis, Department of Health and Human Services, Olympia, Washington.
Child Welfare Agency Performance Dashboard, Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Family Services, Olympia, Washington.
“Report on Child Fatalities and Near- Fatalities in Washington State” (2025), Washington State Office of Family and Children’s Ombuds, Tukwila, Washington.
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©Dee Wilson
