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SALEM - Parents are paying more attention to the Department of Human Services and the care it takes with individual cases.
These parents who are used to getting the run around from DHS are now receiving attention because of a recent report.
It's hard to imagine what childbirth must be like unless you are a mother. It must be equally difficult to picture how painful it would be having that child torn away from you within hours of its birth, unless you experienced it.
That is the nightmare that Amber Tawney lives with. She is allowed a two-hour meeting once a week with her six-week-old boy.
"The only thing I want right now is my baby," she said.
It takes hours of waiting, phone calling and red tape and sometimes the meeting never occurs.
"They (DHS) tell you to do one thing, so you go do it, then they want something else, then something else… You call and leave messages, which you don't always hear back," said Tawney.
Tawney said the reason they took the newborn was that she refused to take anti-depressants during her pregnancy.
She said she didn't take them because she didn't want to the drugs to deform her child.
Caseworkers have cited a previous suicide attempt and a possible recent depression as reasons for not getting her child back.
But what parents have said for years; 'that this agency does not put kids back in touch with their parents' has been investigated by an outside consultant to report on the validity of the claims.
The consultants report is critical of the agency, finding '. . .no uniform system of management reports. . ."
It also said that '…caseworkers were struggling with a requirement for monthly face-to-face meetings with parents and children…' and that the '. . .meetings failed to occur more than 70 percent of the cases. . .'
"It's our intent to make this a better system," said Sue Ford of Department of Human Services.
Officials said they ordered the review after the failure to adequately handle the case of teenager Ashley Pond who was found murdered in Oregon City. Some parents still wonder if the agency is shorthanded and why they should be victims of it.
"There are a lot of folks out there doing their very best to make sure the kids are protected," said Ford.
Tawney said that she does her best to see her child, but if caseworkers want to see an improving relationship with her child then they should let her in more than two hours a week.
"They expect us to do what we say, they need to do what they say. You can't get a child home if both parties aren't participating," said Tawney.
Amber Tawney said that the judge has ordered for her to get more time and KATU is going to find out how well that order is followed.
