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North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services Division of Social Services 325 North Salisbury Street · Raleigh, North Carolina 27699-2406 Courier # 56-20-25 Michael F. Easley, Governor Pheon E. Beal, Director Carmen Hooker Odom, Secretary (9x9) 733-3055 Oct 1, 2002 MEMO To James Cook, Director Cabarrus County Department of Social Services From: Jane Malpass, Children's Program Representative Re: Attorney Caseload On September 17 th I had the opportunity to meet with your Agency Attorney, your Program Manager and you, in an attempt to review and discuss the responsibilities and duties of the DSS attorney. As you may recall I suggested that while there is no precise way to measure the time required for any case, we can determine an estimate based upon court time required in a year for an "average" case. At a minimum, each child - during the first year of placement - would require your attorney's involvement in four hearings. A hearing on the non-secure would average about one half hour of court time, a hearing on the merits - the adjudication and disposition - may require two hours and a half hours and each review usually takes an hour with two reviews being required during the first year. This results in a minimum of 5 court hours and at least thre additional hours of preparation time for each case in a year, resulting in eight hours of attorney time per child. Obvisiously sibling groups would take less total time per child, while complicated or contested cases may require more time. Preparation for and presentation of Termination of Parental Rights actions woul add eight to ten hours in a year for about one quarter of the children in custody. Please remember that this is only an estimate but one that is in fact based on the minimum requirements. Using this time requirement as an estimate does give us a realistic picture of the number of cases that a single attorney could be expected to manage. When we consider the time that the attorney must spend in meetings, both training and case discussions, and further reduce the total time available by leave time, it would appear that a caseload of 75 to 90 children is a full caseload per attorney. I hope that this discussion helps in your planning to assure the most effective representation for the children in the custodyof Cabarrus county. An Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer