Separating siblings because of a lack of placement availability requires the approval of the program director. The decision to separate siblings is a CPS program decision and cannot be made by a caregiver.

Before the program director approves separating siblings, he or she must review efforts made to find placements to accommodate the sibling group to ensure efforts were exhaustive and sufficient. The program director must also ensure there is a plan for the siblings to stay in contact before he or she approves separating them.

When siblings are not placed together:

• The Regional Placement Team must continue searching for a placement for all siblings until one is located or until the conservatorship program determines that efforts are no longer necessary because it is not in the children’s best interest.
• Staff must revisit the decision to place siblings together at every permanency planning meeting (PPM) and prior to each court hearing.
• Staff must make sure siblings have regular and frequent contact, including weekly face-to-face visits. For information about exceptions to this requirement, see 6416.1 Sibling Visitation.
• The Child’s Plan of Service (CPOS) must reflect efforts made to reunite siblings and plan for regular contact.

The Appropriateness of Placement section of the Placement Detail page in IMPACT must address the separation and the plan for ongoing contact between the siblings.

Staff must document in IMPACT the decision to separate siblings and decisions about ongoing efforts to find placements that might reunite siblings.

See 6250 Permanency Planning Meetings (PPM) and 6241 The Child’s Plan of Service (CPOS).