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Rensselaer County Department of Social Services
Commissioner John Beaudoin

Q: What is the mission of Social Services? “The primary mission of Social Services is to provide services in a dignified and accurate professional manner, to enhance peoples’ ability to become self sufficient moving forward, whether it be employment purposes or whatever. It’s to provide services, human services in a real compassionate and professional manner.” Q: What are your responsibilities as Commissioner? “I’m responsible for the largest department in county government in Rensselaer County. I have over 232 employees that report directly to the Social Services Department. I’m also responsible for the county nursing home, which is a 362-bed skilled nursing home.”

Commissioner of Social Services for Rensselaer County, John Beaudoin meeting with TIC’s Ray Feliciano. (photo by Kimberly Feliciano)

Q: What inspired you to seek this public service position?

“With this position, I’m entering into my fortieth year as Commissioner of Social Services in Rensselaer County. I majored in Sociology when I was at Siena [College]. And subsequently, in 1963 I went to Syracuse University to get a Master’s Degree. So, I’ve always been in the field of trying to help people as best as I can. That’s the best positive thing that I can talk about. I really feel comfortable, and feel that it’s a challenge here every day to come to work here, but the bottom line is we’re taking care of people who can’t take care of themselves, whether it be an infant, an elderly or disabled person, or whatever. It’s a great job if you’re in the business of helping people.”

Q: On an annual basis, how much assistance is doled out and to how many people in Rensselaer County?

“Right now on public assistance, which would be the safety net and family services, there’s approximately 2,400 people on it. Overall, our budget, excluding the nursing home, runs around $84 million, of which about $42 million of that is raised locally by either sales tax or property tax...We do provide about $4 million worth of home energy assistance programs for approximately 7,500 people.”

Q: How big an issue is fraud within the system?

“There’s two types of fraud that we’ve been seeing an awful lot of over the last several months and that’s Medicaid fraud... So the fraud situation, and there’s been studies, it’s much higher than what people thought within the profession, but we’re talking about $10 million. You’re talking about a $46 billion dollar program in New York State. It is a huge program, a major program, and much of the fraud because of the size seems to be emanating from NYC. So we are very diligent in pursuing and making sure the truly needy get the assistance, whether it be cash, Medicaid, or what have you.”

Q: According to your website, regarding adoption, a child is matched with adoptive parents as close as possible with respect to ethnic and religious background and the ability of the adoptive parents to meet the child’s needs. Does this mean that a family would be ineligible if they were of a different ethnic or religious background? What if the parents were interested in a multicultural family?

“That has never been a major problem here. We try to make sure that we match the child with the religion if we can, but we take on people as adoption that are from all ethnic groups, really. We do a remarkable job here with the children being adopted. Right now we have over 150 kids that are in subsidized adoptions. We really are moving forward pretty rapidly in making sure that some of the more difficult kids to be placed are given that opportunity. Many kids may be multiracial. Other kids that come from poverty backgrounds, what have you, there are a number of children that are handicapped, and we’ve made a sincere effort in a Capital District basis to move forward or make sure that those kids—there’s literally a catalog of those kids that are available for adoption. One thing that we’re really proud of is the number of kids that move from temporary sheltering and foster homes to become permanent. That’s what we’re looking at.”

Q: I recently read that China will block adoptions to any single parents or even obese parents. What are the standards here for prospective adoptive parents?

“It doesn’t have to be two parents. We make sure that they have, you know, a health survey or whatever, okay. If somebody’s obese or whatever that is not a disqualifier.”

Q: What about gay couples? Are they eligible to adopt?

“We don’t’ have a problem with that. We do have a couple of gay partners who have adopted kids, and they do a super job.”

Q: Does your staff do the investigating themselves to determine which 30-35% are the bona fide abuse cases?

“We have a large commitment of twenty-five personnel addressing exclusively child abuse and neglect issues.”

Q: Does Social Services work with the parents at all to correct any possible behavior as opposed to grabbing the child right away and saying they’ll be better off somewhere else?

“That’s one of the dilemmas that we have, but we’re also looking at the unification of the family… Child Protective Services has an awesome task to provide those services because behind that call from the state registry is a potential child having a major problem. There has been forty deaths in NYC alone, among children who are in situations that are abuse and neglect. You’re talking a huge, huge population, but forty children dying from abuse is… it’s just too much to accept. If that were some kind of an illness, if that was some kind of bacteria or whatever, you would see monumental money flowing towards that.”

Q: Do you work with third party agencies? Are the child advocates all from your Social Services Department?

“No, we deal with a lot of the initiative with not-for-profits. We’ve got some great programs with Northeast Parent & Child Society out of Schenectady. We’ve got probably one of the most unique programs collaboratively with them. This is a service regarding ‘fire-setters’. This is a new program. We initiated that. This is where children have committed offense by lighting fires and what we try to do is determine whether it was an accident or is it an indication of a deeper personality problem. And we’ve got other programs. One of our primary thrusts has been to maintain kids in the community rather than place them for $100,000 in institutions. We’ve come across and have worked very diligently with Northeast. We also develop a relationship with many of the not-for-profits in the community.”

Q: We’ve received several letters from parents and families who believe kids are being taken out of homes too quickly, there’s not a lot of oversight, that questions aren’t being asked, and that they have been pushed ram-rod through the process. They’re under the impression that CPS gets credit for each child that is placed out, and that an incentive has been created there to ‘move’ children. They point to Vice President Walter Mondale in 1974 when he promoted the Adoption & Safe Families Act, that he was himself concerned that it could turn into a ‘business’. Do you see any danger of that?

“God forbid we don’t deliberately go out looking for abuse situations looking to build up the case load. We have much to do without doing that. Every decision that we make is subject to an appeal. The family’s entitled to a fair hearing if they feel that we have removed a child inappropriately, or what have you. We’re not out there just pulling kids away. The other thing is, we have to go before the court. If we go in and we are able to remove a child within seventy two hours, but after that there is a court hearing and the child has a law guardian, and there are representatives from social services, representatives from the not-for-profit agencies. So, flatly I would indicate that we’re not out there just arbitrarily and willfully moving people out as rapidly as possible. If there is imminent risk, yes, ya know? That risk may be in the eye of the beholder. I am really deeply involved and deeply committed to make sure that these kids live in a safe and healthy environment. Every child in this county, and I can’t speak for other counties, has a right to live within that kind of environment.”

Q: What would you recommend to those families who feel that the system didn’t work for them and feel that their family has been broken up?

“I would suggest that they talk to the worker. There’s case conferencing and all those things that sit down with the parent or whatever. Of course, a parent who has been told that the child has to be removed right away, they become very defensive, very defensive. We have to work through that defensive behavior and say, ‘Look, we’ve got the information.’ We don’t just arbitrarily say that this is an abuse situation. We do collateral interviews, we touch base with everybody. I’ve got people out in the field seven days a week around the clock making sure that we’re out there to make sure that these children are removed. Those that are really neglected and abused physically, psychologically, emotionally—it has a major, major impact on these children. They’re scarred for life. The child may be scarred physically because of abuse, but psychologically they’re scarred for the rest of their lives, really.”

“I still have difficulty day in and day out accepting the fact that parents would abuse children—particularly children who are defenseless, particularly infants. Why would you burn them? Why would you beat them? It’s mind boggling and one of the best-kept secrets going in the community—the volume of child protective issues that occur. We only see the one or two cases in the paper that are more dramatic, but the ones that we are dealing with day in and day out that have gone through the hospital system and the doctor refers, or the school teacher sees a kid coming in with the same clothes for the last three weeks, no food, whatever.”

“And a lot of the child abuse and issues related to substance abuse and alcoholism. Some of the children themselves have the alcoholic problem because they were born to an alcoholic mom. What we are trying to do with our intervention, and the intervention of other professionals for mental health and substance abuse issues, we’re trying to create an environment where these folks hopefully could be reunited or stay in that environment. And a lot of these folks know that abuse is going on because they live there. And isn’t it strange that the paramour is the one that’s usually involved in the abuse? That’s why we have a commitment of twenty-five field workers to this endeavor alone... We’re not in the business of taking kids and just grabbing and running away. What we’re trying to do, within reason, is to make sure those kids, maybe with certain interventions, can go back to their parents. Because no matter how vigorously they’ve been abused, they still love mom and dad, or mom, ya know?”

Q: Is that statistically common where the live-in boyfriend is perhaps jealous of mom’s attention, and is secretly abusing? “Yep, exactly, exactly. We’re doing about two hundred and twenty CPS investigators per month and of that about 30% would be indicated. It is a huge and significant problem. Every county faces it.”

Q: How much weight is given to what the child says they want?

“A lot. Very much so, if they are mature enough. If you have an infant, it’s a different story. If they are mature enough, they should have a right to participate in that, too.”

Q: Are those who are found making false or exaggerated claims of abuse held accountable? “Sometimes that’s what we find because it’s always a custody issue. People raise issues, exaggerate them, or people say someone is a sex abuser, for example. That’s why we rely on our field staff. It’s a judgment call. After they have done collateral work, interviewing people, interviewing the school district, and a whole bunch of people because we don’t just take somebody’s word. ”

Q: What about spanking? Is it up to the family to determine what discipline is okay, or the state? Some parents fear losing their kids if they spank them.

“Depends. It’s all corporal punishment. It’s a degree of severity. If somebody lightly taps somebody [shakes head ‘no’]… but if they leave bruises, marks, and belt buckle marks, obviously the obvious thing is to remove that child… It all goes back to parenting. How to become a good parent. [says there are classes available for learning parenting] I think there is an assumption that people will instinctively be good parents. Good parenting is difficult as it is. You don’t just instinctively become a good parent.”

Q: It appears from our own investigations that there may be experts like attorneys, psychiatrists, and psychologists, who are there to protect the families and children, but at the same time, they are sitting on boards of non-profit agencies that are actually benefiting from protecting and servicing families because their federal grant money depends on those families in crisis. Nationally, there have even been cases of judges who are now being prosecuted for conflicts. What can we do to prevent this type of corruption? Can there be an oversight committee? What can we do to prevent such conflict of interest?

“The judges are being prosecuted because it’s sort of implied that they are case finding for whatever reason to make sure that they’re shoring up their not-for-profit? Is that it?… If there is real major conflict, I don’t think judges want to be on these boards. They are busy enough without being on some of these boards. I mean, you guys must read the national publications or whatever because some of the things that you are referencing relate to other places.”

Q: Four years ago a retired Supreme Court Judge, Brian Lindsay said, “There is no system ever devised by mankind that is guaranteed to rip husband and wife, or father, mother, and child apart so bitterly than our present Family Court System.” How do you account for so many critics warning about the Child Protective and Family Court System being detrimental to families rather than helping them?

“I feel that over here in this county, for the most part, that our folks, the judges, are very professional, very compassionate, are interested in making sure that children are safe and held harmless in an environment that is really treacherous out there. People don’t fully appreciate or realize what poverty does to folks, and the impact that poverty has on their behavior... As far as CPS goes, in the community we either react too quickly, or not quick enough. It’s the only business where every little innuendo and every decision is reviewed and people who least know what’s going on have an opinion. There’s nothing like an informed opinion. But people, for whatever reason, their motivation could be, maybe their child was taken away from them or whatever, they’re complaining about us, you know? About the Department of Social Services. I think, basically, the family court and the Family Court Act, probably needs to be revised and hopefully Judge Kay who is in charge of attorneys across the board, would pursue looking at the various courts. You just can’t keep adding on and on and on. You got family court, the integrated court, the drug programs. You got all these programs out there, and the volume of people going through is horrendous.

Q: What would you like people to know?

“There’s a multitude of services we provide through Social Services. There’s home energy assistance (HEAP), temporary assistance, shelter, food stamps, and a whole array of services that we provide. The other program that’s really inundating us and creating major problems ever since it was formulated back in 1966 is the Medicaid program which is taking away from resources that otherwise would have been put into roads, police, children’s services, and such. Medicaid is a $200 million dollar program in little Rensselaer County.”

Q: Speaking as Commissioner of Social Services, should people be entitled to a minimum amount of medical care?

“Absolutely. Because those folks that come down with pathology are eventually going to cost more money to people. I think everybody has a right to have health insurance and to be in a healthy situation. I mean, senior citizens have national health insurance basically under the Medicare. But there are many people out there that work at minimum wage, and they have no health insurance. Places like Wal-Mart hire people but they have no benefits.”

Q: Does the solution lie in our education system?

“I think so. The people in the education system spend more time with the kids than their parents do. It becomes, depending on what school district you’re in, a major issue when dealing with social problems, let alone educational problems. We are proud of developing a character education program. It’s taken off like wildfire three or four years ago. It’s those things like honesty. We boil it down to a few words, ya know, but implied behind that is ‘behavior modification’. Expose kids to being honest.”

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