November 1, 2008

Report to the Legislature: Social Worker Workload Final Report

This final report to the Washington State legislature, presents recommendations from the Department of Social and Health Services, Children's Administration (CA) and the Washington Federation of State Employees (WFSE) for addressing the workload of social workers. CA and WFSE met eleven days over a a six-month period to prioritize social worker tasks and discuss alternatives to alleviate lower priority tasks from social worker workloads. In past years social workers have had to absorb tasks previously performed by other staff due to reductions. In addition, other requirements, such as new federal and State laws and Braam implementation plan mandates have added to the workload. This report describes the agreed upon assumptions used by the working group, the process used, the resulting prioritized groups of social worker tasks, and the alternative methods discussed for reducing lower priority tasks from case carrying social workers workload. The committee identified 12 tasks that should have considerable time savings if removed from case carrying social workers' workload and 9 tasks that may have some impact if removed or partially removed from their workload. Recommendations for each task are discussed, and attachments include options for each proposed change, a cost-benefit analysis, and a recommended measurement of success.