It was fate that led former foster parent Rebecca Armbrust to bring the nationwide Court Appointed Special Advocate program to Johnson County.

If she were still a foster parent, CASA volunteers might not be on their way to the courtroom this spring to look out for foster children there. For three years Armbrust and her husband fostered children who Johnson County Child Protective Services had taken into protective custody because of abuse or neglect. After adopting three of their foster children, the couple stopped fostering.

But Armbrust felt like her work with foster children wasn’t done. She felt called to start a CASA program in Johnson County. “I really believe this is what I’m supposed to be doing. I really believe that it’s part of my life mission because it’s something that I have passion for. I feel like it will make a difference to a large number of children and people,” said Armbrust, who began soliciting local judicial support for a CASA program last summer.

When reports of abuse or neglect are confirmed, CPS files a suit to take temporary custody of the children and to ensure they have a safe place to live. In addition to the assignment of a CPS caseworker, the children in protective custody are appointed an attorney ad litem and a guardian ad litem as required by the Texas Family Code.

In Johnson County and Texas counties without CASA programs, the attorney ad litem will often serve a dual role as attorney ad litem and guardian ad litem. But in counties served by a CASA program, judges appoint trained CASA volunteers to serve as guardian ad litem.

“The attorney ad litem represents what the child wants. A guardian ad litem represents solely (the child’s) best interest,” said Toni Driver, who is often appointed as attorney ad litem and guardian ad litem in CPS cases in Johnson County. “It gets really sticky when you have a child that, say they’re like 14, that says I want to go with this relative. But you know that basically what is in their best interest is to do something totally different.”

Children are placed in protective custody because of “danger to the physical health or physical safety of the child,” according to the Texas Family Code. Going back to live with an abusive parent may be what the child wants even though it is not in the child’s best interest.

The CASA volunteer, serving as guardian ad litem, might not always agree with the attorney ad litem or caseworker about what is right for the child. For example, the attorney ad litem might urge the court to allow weekly parental visits because that is what the child wants. The CASA volunteer, working for the child’s best interest, might see such frequent visits as harmful to the child, disagreeing with both the child and the attorney ad litem.

“It may just be a matter of perception. It may just be a matter they’ve talked to different witnesses or been involved differently. It may just be their own personal experiences that they have that make them come to a different conclusion. There rarely is a clear-cut right and wrong answer,” Driver said.

Without a CASA volunteer or a separate guardian ad litem, foster children, especially young ones, don’t have a voice in the court, Armbrust said.

A CASA volunteer must pass a criminal background check and undergo a minimum of 30 hours of training. Each volunteer is appointed to only one case, which they serve until the child or children are placed in a permanent home.

“Our kids, they get stuck in the system. The first three [foster children] we had long-term are still in care. And, we’re talking, they’ve been in care for five years, almost six years. They haven’t achieved permanency. I firmly believe that had there been a CASA on their case, that things would be very different,” Armbrust said.

While investigating a case, the CASA volunteer spends time getting to know the child or children and talks with anyone who has contact with the child, which can include the CPS caseworker, attorney ad litem, biological parents, foster parents, teachers, neighbors, relatives, therapists and doctors.

“The CASA is going to look at everything and bring it all together,” Armbrust said.

Child abuse is a statewide problem, said Jennifer Paul of Texas CASA, but CASA is a way for counties to help.

In 2001, 42,813 children were confirmed as victims of abuse or neglect and 27,865 of those children were taken into CPS custody, according to statistics from the Texas Department of Protective and Regulatory Services.

In Texas, 195 children died as a result of abuse or neglect in 2001. Three of those children were in Johnson County. More than 200 children are in foster care there now.

All four judges who hear Johnson County CPS cases are in favor of the new CASA program as another tool for the court to utilize.

“Frankly, I think that any court that deals with domestic relations needs a program like that,” said Robert Mayfield, Johnson County judge for County Court at Law #1. “If we can reach a child and make their life less traumatic, then that’s going to affect the rest of their life. It’s got excellent potential to affect the county for good.”

In addition to the support of Mayfield, 18th District Judge John Neill spoke in favor of CASA at several local community meetings with Paul, expansion specialist for Texas CASA.

“For me, for the courts, it’s basically an extra set of eyes and ears that is not associated with anybody. CPS kind of has their own thing going on. The attorneys have their own thing going on. The CASA is there strictly for the child or the children. It is a very comprehensive set of eyes and ears,” said Neill, who worked with Armbrust to spearhead the Johnson County CASA campaign.

Judicial and community support are the essential elements a CASA program needs to succeed.

“If the judges would not have supported, then it would have been dead in the water until we could get that support because the judges have to be willing to use the CASA volunteers,” Armbrust said. CASA programs look to their communities to supply them with volunteers and to provide funding.

As a community resource, most counties in Texas support CASA programs with funding, said Cathy Cockerham, program operations director for Texas CASA.

In Smith County, CASA For Kids of East Texas has received county funds for more than eight years. Reggi Durch, executive director of the program, tracks the amount of the time her CASA volunteers spend in the courtroom.

“We’re real lucky because our county commissioners realize how much we save the county,” Durch said. “Everybody’s worried about saving money, and we’re already there.”

Each year her organization, which serves Smith, Wood and Van Zandt counties, saves Smith County alone about $300,000 in attorney’s fees. Smith County Commissioner Gus Ramirez acknowledges the money CASA saves his county, but with or without the savings, he sees the need for the program.

“It’s a win-win deal for the taxpayers of the community. It’s a cost-saving mechanism for the county,” Ramirez said. “CASA steps in and does that for us when they’re dealing with children. CASA picks up the slack where others can’t pick up the slack.”

Ramirez assumes most Texas counties would fund their local CASA program if they could because if they don’t pay now, they’ll have to pay more later.

“Some of them may not have the luxury of a half-a-cent sales tax. They might not have the populations that Smith County has. They might not have the industry. You always have to look at the funding and the valuations and the tax rates. It’s a big puzzle,” he said. Judges, attorneys, foster parents and community members are supportive of CASA in Johnson County, seeing the need for the consistency that CASA volunteers will bring to each case.

“The supervisor of the [case]worker at CPS usually remains a constant [in a case]. But the caseworker in the field is a concern all over the state. There are very few areas where the turnover is not a real critical issue,” Paul said.

Cases often change caseworkers because of the difficult nature of the work, Paul said, and the inconsistency is hard on the children.

“It’s really like managing an unmanageable set of circumstances because children do not thrive in foster care. Children continue to deteriorate generally even though you make them safe physically. You then open them up to an emotional issue that is so heartbreaking because children are so harmed by instability.”

In a CPS case, the judge, attorneys, caseworker and foster families have the potential to change, Paul said.

In addition to providing consistency, the CASA volunteer can spend their time looking for relatives or missing biological parents to help find a permanent home for the children in their case. The volunteer can also testify in court on behalf of the child.

“Our volunteers are resource brokers. They make sure all of these very busy entities and possibly bureaucracies have all the information everybody else does to make the most informed decision. Each case is different and each volunteer may spend their time in a different way depending on the needs of the child,” Cockerham of Texas CASA said. “I don’t know that the CASA volunteer has the answers, but they ask questions.” The work CASA volunteers do also has a lasting effect on the children and the community.

“A lot of these kids, they just need someone to acknowledge they are more than the [psychological evaluation] that you get on them or the story you get from the CPS worker. Just to get to know them for someone to recognize you have multiple facets of your personality and probably haven’t tapped into them yet,” said Erin Lamb, assistant county attorney who represents Johnson County CPS.

Even if the new CASA program doesn’t have a broader effect on the county, Neill knows the program will fulfill its purpose by helping one child at a time.

“Every other Thursday we have a jail line. Probably a lot of those people came from abusive type situations. If we can save one child from being on that jail run 20 years from now that would be perfectly fine. I think the impact will be a little stronger than that,” said Neill who has already worked with a CASA volunteer from a program in nearby Hood County.

Texas CASA, which is a member of the National CASA organization, provides ongoing support to help existing CASA programs like in Hood County in addition helping new programs become established.

Since its establishment in 1989, Texas CASA has grown from having 14 programs to 57 programs, serving more than 12,000 child victims in 152 of the 254 counties in Texas with more than 2,500 volunteer advocates.

The organization’s goal is to serve every county in Texas and expects to have 59 programs serving more than 152 Texas counties in 2003.

David Soukup, a superior court judge, began CASA in 1977 in Seattle and the program was expanded by Congress in 1990. The program is in all 50 states, and more than 52,000 volunteer advocates served more than 300,000 children in 2001.

Armbrust knows that in Johnson County, like other places, CASA will help the children involved as well as the communities they live in.

“I know it will make very systemic changes. It will make a difference for many, many different children,” she said. “Not only are the children going to receive advocacy and support and continuity, the advocates themselves are going to experience such a different part of the world than most of them live in. They’re going to affect change in their community, and their experiences are going to change their family. And it’s going to change their coworkers’ perspective because they’re going to bring back amazing stories of accomplishment, stories of genuine outright love in pure form.”