TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Stacey Shrader Joslin on Jan 4, 2023

Tennessee state Sen. Kerry Roberts, R-Springfield, has revealed that he discussed dissolving the state Department of Children’s Services (DCS) during the height of criticism against the agency, WKRN reports. Roberts is chair of the Government Operations Committee, which oversees DCS. He remembers asking a colleague: “We have had nothing but problems since 1996 of varying degrees, so do we have it structured wrong? Do we have a fundamental flaw in how we have structured this entity? Do we have a fundamental flaw in the way we funded it? The way we’ve organized it? Do we need to just blow it up and start all over? Do we need to take the various functions and give them to other people? Do we even need a DCS?” Roberts now says there is a “robust” plan in the works to reform DCS.