Text of section effective on April 01, 2025
Sec. 546.0206.  IMPLEMENTATION SYSTEM: LOCAL PERMANENCY PLANNING SITES.  The commission shall develop an implementation system that initially consists of four or more local sites and that is designed to coordinate planning for a permanent living arrangement and relationship for a child with a family. In developing the system, the commission shall:
(1)  include criteria to identify children who need permanency plans;
(2)  require the establishment of a permanency plan for each child who resides outside the child's family or for whom care or protection is sought in an institution;
(3)  include a process to determine the agency or entity responsible for developing and overseeing implementation of a child's permanency plan;
(4)  identify, blend, and use funds from all available sources to provide customized services and programs to implement a child's permanency plan;
(5)  clarify and expand the role of a local community resource coordination group in ensuring accountability for a child who resides in an institution or who is at risk of being placed in an institution;
(6)  require reporting of each placement or potential placement of a child in an institution or other living arrangement outside of the child's home; and
(7)  assign in each local permanency planning site area a single gatekeeper for all children in the area for whom placement in an institution through a state-funded program is sought with authority to ensure that:
(A)  family members of each child are aware of:
(i)  intensive services that could prevent placement of the child in an institution; and
(ii)  available placement options; and
(B)  permanency planning is initiated for each child.
Added by Acts 2023, 88th Leg., R.S., Ch. 769 (H.B. 4611), Sec. 1.01, eff. April 1, 2025.