The objectives of substitute care are to:

  •  provide temporary, planned placements for a child at risk of abuse or neglect;

  •  provide or arrange for social, therapeutic, medical and educational services appropriate to the child’s needs; and

  •  make reasonable efforts to achieve positive permanency for the child, which includes reuniting the child with his or her family, transferring conservatorship to another appropriate adult, or finding an adoptive parent.

Reasonable efforts to reunite a child with his or her family include:

  •  assessing each child’s and family’s situation;

  •  developing and implementing a time-limited service plan to change the conditions that have placed the child at risk and prepare the child and family for the child’s return; and

  •  finding a permanent placement for the child, if the child cannot be safely reunited with his or her family.

DFPS Rules, 40 TAC §§700.1301External Link, 700.1305External Link