Letter to the Editor. No Growth In Backlog, It’s Going Down

In the Jan. 20 editorial “Sadly, governor’s budget doesn’t match his words,” The Republic referred to a “growing backlog” of inactive DCS cases.

I would like to offer an update of the backlog numbers. They’re going down significantly and have been for some time.

In January 2015, the backlog had risen to approximately 16, 200 cases, the amount Director Greg McKay inherited when he was appointed in February 2015. Because of a lot of hard work and focus by DCS field staff and leadership, that number had been lowered to about 13,800 as of January 11, 2016. That’s a drop of approximately 20 percent in less than a year.

And a better measurement of DCS productivity is the trend of completing more reports for investigation than come in. Cases may contain multiple reports, and the report completion trend is excellent. In 2015, DCS completed more reports than came in for an unprecedented eight of the 12 months, and the rate continues to improve in 2016.

Both measurements are evidence of real and sustainable progress at DCS.

— Doug Nick, Communications Director, State Dept. of Child Safety