Rule 3.975.Post-dispositional Procedures: Child in Foster Care

MCR 3.975 is the rule that keeps a foster care case in front of the judge. A dispositional review hearing lets the court check compliance with the order of disposition and the case service plan prepared under MCL 712A.18f, evaluate whether the child still needs to be in foster care, and approve or disapprove placement in a qualified residential treatment program. Subrule (A) states those purposes.

Intervals

Subrule (C)(1) is the ordinary schedule: a review not more than 182 days after the child's removal from home, then no later than every 91 days for the first year the child is subject to the court's jurisdiction. After that first year, a review comes not more than 182 days from the last hearing before the year ended, and no later than every 182 days after that until dismissal. Subrule (C)(2) relaxes the pace for a child under agency care and supervision who is placed with a relative in a placement intended to be permanent, or is in a permanent foster family agreement: 182 days after removal and no later than every 182 days after that. Either way, a review hearing may not be canceled or delayed beyond the days required, whether or not a termination petition or another matter is pending.

Subrule (D) runs the other direction. At the initial dispositional hearing and at every regularly scheduled review, the court must decide whether to hold the next review sooner than the schedule would require, weighing among other factors the parent's ability and motivation to make the changes needed for a suitable home and the reasonable likelihood that the child will be ready to return home early.

Procedure and evidence

Review hearings run under the procedures and rules of evidence that apply to the initial dispositional hearing. Subrule (E) requires the agency to give all parties every report in its case file, including case service plans, treatment plans, evaluations, screens, therapists' reports, provider reports, and parenting time logs, at least seven (7) days before the hearing, and reports filed with the court must be offered into evidence. The court considers written or oral information from the parent, guardian, legal custodian, foster parent, child caring institution, or relative caregiver. On a party's request or its own motion, the court may accelerate the hearing to consider any element of a case service plan.

What the court decides

Subrule (F)(1) lists the case service plan factors: services offered, whether the parent benefited, the extent of parenting time or visitation and why it was infrequent or absent, compliance with the plan and prior orders, the likely harm from continued separation, the likely harm from return, and for an Indian child whether the placement still complies with MCR 3.967(F). Subrule (F)(2) asks how far the case has moved toward alleviating the conditions that keep the child in foster care and directs review of the concurrent plan where one applies. Subrule (F)(3) covers a child in a qualified residential treatment program, requiring individualized findings on whether a foster home could meet the child's needs, whether the placement is the most effective and appropriate level of care in the least restrictive environment, and whether it fits the child's short- and long-term goals.

Subrule (G) sets the menu of orders: return the child home, change the placement, modify the dispositional order, modify any part of the case service plan, enter a new dispositional order, or continue the prior one. Subrule (H) offers a shortcut home. Unless notice is waived, if all parties get not less than 7 days written notice before the child is returned and no party requests a hearing in that window, the court may issue an order without a hearing permitting the agency to return the child home.