Rule 217.Review hearings. (90 days*)

Within 90 days. A review hearing is held within 90 days of the dispositional hearing, and subsequent reviews are held at the court's discretion until a permanency hearing takes place. The case does not go quiet between milestones.

What is reviewed. The court evaluates, and then issues a written order on, seven matters: the safety of the child; the necessity for and appropriateness of the placement; the delivery of services and whether the child's needs, including educational, medical and mental health needs, are being met; where the plan is reunification, the extent of compliance with the case plan by both the parent AND DSCYF; the progress made toward alleviating or mitigating the causes that made placement necessary; the projected date of the child's safe return or placement for adoption, guardianship or permanent guardianship; and whether independent living services are appropriate and are being provided under Rule 222.

Two of those repay attention. Compliance is measured on both sides — a parent who was never offered the services their case plan requires has not failed to comply, and the rule makes the court look at the agency's performance as squarely as the parent's.

And the court must name a projected date. Not a status, a date. That single requirement is what keeps a case from drifting: every 90 days somebody has to say when this child's life is expected to become permanent, and to explain why the last answer has moved.