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Contact:
Bebe Gaines
President – 512.422.4384
WoodsideTrails@gmail.com


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


Former Executive Director Settles Federal Lawsuit against Texas for $300,000


Smithville, TX – August 13, 2008 – Four years to the day after CPS erroneously removed the boys from Woodside Trails in 2004, the Executive Director, Bebe Gaines, was finally and totally vindicated. Earlier, in 2006, the Department of Family and Protective Services had lost all six cases relating to Ms. Gaines and Woodside Trails before the State Office of Administrative Hearings. Immediately following those hearings, Ms. Gaines sued Thomas Chapmond, the former Commissioner, Diana Spiser, Deputy Commissioner for Licensing, Char Bateman, Director of Residential Child Care Licensing, Sherry Loyd, Supervisor, Darla Jean Shaw, investigator, Amy Chandler, a program specialist, and Jan Martin, retired. Her claim was that the investigations and process that led to the removal of the children and the attempted revocation of her license as a child care administrator was politically inspired and failed totally to comply with the Department’s requirement to perform a prompt, thorough investigation, and this violated her Federal right to due process of law.


After two days of testimony before a jury in the courtroom of Judge Jim Nowlin, Senior Judge of the Austin Division of the U.S. Federal District for West Texas, just as the case was ready for the jury, the defendants agreed to pay $300,000 to Ms. Gaines – the maximum amount of money that the state can pay to indemnify employees who have been sued under the federal civil rights statutes. The Department also agreed to issue a letter that her child care administrator’s license was in full force and effect, with no restrictions, and that there were no adverse findings in her record. Finally, the Department agreed that it would comply with the Religious Freedom Act relating to American Indians with regard to American Indian foster children. This was the coda to Ms. Gaines’s four year fight against the injustice of the Department’s actions and the high handed behavior of the state officials.


“It’s about time,” said former Woodside Trails Chair, Robin Peyson.


“Perhaps now the Department will take a long, hard look at its practices,” said Ms. Gaines on the courthouse steps. “It’s time for a new partnership between the Department and those providing treatment and care for foster children, rather than the adversarial relationship that now interferes with the proper care of these kids. I also want to thank my counsel Susan Henricks, the best lawyer in Texas, whose unstinting efforts on my behalf overcame the Department’s belief that I would be unable to defend myself.”


Erland Schulze, a former volunteer and employee at Woodside Trails was less charitable. “The Department’s spokesman stated that ‘there is nothing in the agreement that faults the Department for our actions in this matter,’’ said Mr. Schulze, “and that’s true – it’s standard boilerplate for a settlement agreement to stipulate that the defendants are not admitting any fault. However, no reasonable person would think that the Department paid the maximum indemnifiable amount of $300,000 if they thought they had done nothing wrong. This unwillingness to examine the conduct of the people who moved against Woodside Trails, led to the Department’s doing the same thing recently in El Dorado, an action that was rejected by the Texas Supreme Court. As a citizen of Texas, I call for the resignation, retirement, or disciplinary actions against these defendants before they cost the good people of Texas even more money and before they cause unjustified misery to more parents and caregivers.”


Woodside Trails provides counseling to the alumni of its therapeutic camp who are still in state care as well as “after care” mental health and other services including temporary living quarters, family mediation, and communication and conflict resolution skills training, to alumni and other youths who have aged out of the Texas foster care system. In cooperation with Eagle Pines Academy, we plan a trade school in the renewable energy and sustainable living field. Woodside Trails has been caring for abused and abandoned boys since 1982. We are a non-profit organization located near Smithville, Texas. For more information about Woodside Trails, visit our website at www.woodsidetrails.org or call 512.237.4602.

 

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