As you all know, DCYF decided to reveal my personal information to people I don’t know. Sure, intentions may (giving the benefit of the doubt) be good, but there are two sides to this. Yes, the Granddaughter needs to stay in contact with their families, but what are the costs to the foster families put in the same situation DCYF has created?
Unlike most, I take a different tack with Government, as you all know. I am going to use the greatest tool that Government has given to Citizens in following the demand laid upon us all in Article 8 of the NH Constitution (holding elected officials and bureaucrats accountable), especially in light that my Article 2-B Rights, IMHO, were violated (abuse of my personal information).
So, my latest Right To Know:
Right to Know Request per RSA 91-A: “Family Connections”: contacting out-of-home placement children by non-accused family members and friends
Pursuant to the Right to Know Law (RSA. 91-A), I am demanding access, within 5 business days, to the following governmental records:
For the Division of Children,Youth and Families, define the processes by which it identifies non-immediate family members or family friends that are then given contact information in order to reach an out-of-home child placed with other relatives | foster family | group home.
The Responsive Records are to include:
People:
- Provide the Title/Role of the “project manager” for the following steps.
- Provide the process by which these “contact information people” (or “CIPs”) are selected. This will include immediate, secondary, or tertiary family members and/or close family friends.
- Provide the complete mechanism process by which these CIPs are vetted for safety with respect to the child and the foster family.
- Provide the “scoring mechanism(s)” that “selects in” or “selects out” the CIPs for each of the above two processes.
- Provide the data items used to set a “score” by which they would be included to set a score for a CIP.
- Provide the relative importance priority of each of those data elements.
- Provided the source / origin of each of those data items.
Notification:
- Provide the Title/Role of the “notifier” for the following steps:
- Provide the process used to determine when notifications are triggered to go to the CIPs
- Provide the delivery routings by which notifications are sent out:
- telephonically
- letter/registered letter
- other
- Provide the processs by which the foster or kinship care providers caring for the out-of-home placement child asked for consent to have their personal information released to the CIPs?
- Provide the form used to acquire that consent.
- Provide the delivery mechanisms (see delivery routings, above) to the care providers.
- Provide the process used if the care givers refuse to give consent but are competent providers by any other DCYF attribute.
Legal Responsibility:
- Provide is DCYF’s legal responsibility in protecting the child from the CIPs that are passed through the vetting process but turn out to be bad actors those caring for removed or place children?
- Ditto the care givers.
- Provide the DCYF protocol(s) that are employed when, as the result of provider contact information being released:
- the child is attacked or harassed by a CIP?
- the providers are attacked or harassed by a CIP because they are seen as agents of DCYF?
- Provide the remedies, specified by pertinent DCYF protocols, upplied by DCYF:
- for the child
- for the providers
Per RSA 91-A:4 IV(c) If you deny any portion of this request, please cite the specific exemption used to justify the denial to make each record, or part thereof, available for inspection along with a brief explanation of how the exemption applies to the information withheld.
As you are aware, in 2016, the New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled that a governmental body in possession of records is required to produce them in electronic media using standard common file formats: Green v. SAU #55, 168 N.H. 796, 801 (2016). Unless there is a valid reason that it is not reasonably practicable for you to produce these records in the requested format, I ask that you either do so or explain why it is not practicable for you to comply. In this case, .TXT, .DOC, or .PDF files would suffice.
Please also note, per RSA 91-A:4 III, III-a, and III-b, you are required to maintain the safety and accessibility of such responsive records.
Please let me know when these records will be sent to me for inspection. If you have questions, don’t hesitate to reach out. You may email the responsive records to me at Skip@GraniteGrok.com. If the volume turns out to be substantial, I have already set up a Dropbox folder for those responsive records to which they can be uploaded.
Thank you for your lawful attention to this matter.
Sincerely,
-Skip
Skip@GraniteGrok.com
DCYF decided to “ramp it up”; two can play that game. With vigor.
