EDITORIAL: Kids' needs need to be a priority for lawmakers

Then the legislators will shower you with bills aimed at granting you special rights.

But the need to protect abused and neglected children hasn’t evoked the same level of passion at the Statehouse.

Is that beginning to change? We hope so.

Problems with the Department of Child Services began under former Director James Payne, who returned hundreds of millions of unspent dollars to the state’s coffers while caseworkers were overworked and complaints piled up about the agency’s slow responses to children in danger. 

Payne resigned in the fall of 2012 and was succeeded by Mary Beth Bonventura, who has brought a more compassionate approach to the job and has attempted to rebuild the department’s staffing, morale and public image.

Last summer, Gov. Mike Pence put an end to five years of foot-dragging on subsidies the DCS promised to families who adopted foster children – though not before a class-action lawsuit and lots of media had focused public attention on the problem. It appears that funds to continue the subsidy program will be part of the pending biennial budget.

But the DCS still is woefully understaffed.