Topic: Volunteer recommendations to the court (court reports)

15 July 2003

This FYI addresses an Ohio minimum Standards issue.

According to Standards, volunteer court reports must be written, reviewed by the program prior to being submitted to the court, and properly maintained by the program according to its volunteer records policy.

A fundamental tenet of the CASA network is that volunteers serve as independent voices in the court system, not beholden to any group or entity; volunteers advocate for the child’s best interest regardless of other’s opinions.  As such, it is inappropriate for a program (i.e., supervisor, staff attorney, volunteer coordinator) to change a court report without the volunteer’s knowledge and the program must make a concerted effort to obtain the volunteer’s agreement. 

There may be times when the volunteer is unwilling to change inappropriate language (i.e., recommendations, non-fact-based observations, etc.) in a report.  To maintain the credibility of the program and to provide the best advocacy possible for the child, the report may be changed without the agreement of the volunteer but not without the knowledge. 

The ideal approach is to work closely with the volunteer to resolve any issues, though some programs have chosen to take a more aggressive approach and submit a separate report to the court that basically disagrees with the volunteer’s recommendations.  While this practice may work in some counties, there is the possibility such measures may reflect poorly on how the program is perceived by the court.  Regardless of how your program chooses to address this issue, the practice you choose to adopt should be clearly communicated in writing and provided to volunteers during pre-service training.

If a program frequently finds itself needing to ask volunteers to remove inappropriate language from a report, there is a need to examine program screening, training, and supervision practices.  If a volunteer should refuse to change something inappropriate in a court report, the program should consider releasing the volunteer. 

Of course, “inappropriate” is subject to interpretation, and this is where programs may struggle the most.  We encourage programs to use their best, non-biased judgment to resolve this situation.  One of the best examples we have heard is when a volunteer refused to remove the last sentence of the report: “This mother should never, ever be allowed to have any more children.”