Sec. 531.158. LOCAL PERMANENCY PLANNING SITES. The commission shall develop an implementation system that consists initially 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 lives 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 program funded by the state 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 1997, 75th Leg., ch. 421, Sec. 1, eff. May 23, 1997. Renumbered from Sec. 531.154 by Acts 2001, 77th Leg., ch. 590, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 2001.