DHHS Accused Of Underfunding Children’s Homes, Putting Surplus Back Into General Fund

Controversy over state funding for social and health services has already generated a high-profile lawsuit filed by 10 New Hampshire hospitals.  Whether more lawsuits in response to the current budget are coming down the pike remains to be seen.  But new one case, covered by Elizabeth Dinan at SeacoastOnline.com, has been percolating for years:

erjkprunczyk / Flickr

The state is accused of skipping out on its funding commitments to a series of children's homes in favor of beefing-up the general fund.

“Portsmouth’s Chase Home for Children and six affiliated homes for abused, neglected and delinquent youths have been underfunded by the state by millions of dollars, forcing one of them to turn to a food pantry to feed children, according to a Superior Court lawsuit.

At the same time the youth homes were underfunded by the state Department of Health and Human Services, DHHS returned unspent money to the state’s general fund, according to the lawsuit, filed by attorney Lisa Snow Wade of the Concord law firm, Orr and Reno.

The children placed in the seven homes “were some of New Hampshire’s most disturbed children; many had a variety of problems from mental illness to severe abuse, conduct disorders and all kinds of diagnosable mental conditions,” Wade wrote to the court. They were placed in the homes by the state, which failed to increase annual rates as required by law, beginning in 2004, according to the suit.”

You can read the whole story here.