Action At Last

I'm such a tease!

No...no action for "W"...it's been quite a long time for that.

After stirring in bed a few nights ago thinking about the situation with my foster nephew Zach, I kept thinking about what I could to do help.

After filing a ton of complaints with the ombudsman's office and repeated calls, my sister and brother in law were getting no where. They first started trying in December. So they waited and waited and waited and heard nothing. In the last month or so, I've emailed and called several state legislators, officials with the Foster Care System, among various other people I thought might help. Only one state senator (who happens to be gay) replied saying he couldn't help, but was very disappointed the problem got to this point.

Oh, when I was doing my calls and emails, I used my 'work' title rather than 'concerned brother/uncle' title...thinking it might carry more weight.

It didn't.

That is until Thursday, when I emailed the Secretary of the Cabinet over the FCS, and basically said, "Hey, I'm not going to air a story on this, but I'm sure my colleagues in Louisville and Lexington could have a field day with yet another series of blatant mistakes made by the Cabinet. Please let me know how we can resolve this issue quickly and quietly."

I've blogged before about how the Cabinet is under a ton of scrutiny and the focus of a major investigation by the Office of the Inspector General. That investigation is still ongoing, and I found out last week it's not too late to add more 'findings to the report'.

Well my little email worked.

A few hours later, the Cabinet's right hand man (woman) called me at work and asked for more information about the situation. I told her I didn't feel comfortable disclosing what I felt was confidential info, without the family's consent. So she was nice and helpful and said, you have them call me directly and I'll help them.

Help them? Well she did. She directed them to yet another man (who was out of the office), but his assistant called my sister back three times to get information about the case and assure her that first thing Monday morning, they'd get started at looking into things when the 'right people' were back in the office.

So yeah...Zach's not back home yet, but I feel like this will hopefully get the ball rolling so we don't have to wait on the court to make a decision.

Things are looking up.

Have a great weekend. I'll leave the 'four truths and a lie' up until Sunday and see if anyone else comments...I'll give my answer at the end of the weekend.

Smooches All Around
"W"