Gov. John Carney’s FY25 budget plan did not include money for additional victim service specialists (VSS) in the Department of Justice (DOJ), but the Joint Finance Committee (JFC) is reconsidering.
Attorney General Kathy Jennings is requesting around $645,000 to replace two expiring grant funded positions in the victim compensation assistance program and add six new positions to support the work of the criminal and family divisions.
State Sen. Stephanie Hansen (D-Middletown) was among the committee members to express their disappointment about the lack of recommended funding.
“We have spent a lot of time as legislators on issues regarding sexual abuse and domestic violence, child abuse, neglect – we spend a lot of time with that, and to not see that reflected over in the recommended column was shocking and disappointing,” she says.
“One of the things they don’t teach you in law school is how to be a victim service specialist or a social worker, and there’s good reason for that — because there are individuals who are trained to be social workers and victim service specialists. They are the one’s who literally hold the hands of victims of violence and other people in the community who need help to be able to stand back on their feet… so whatever we can do to help you on this, I am committed to doing, because I know the value that these individuals bring,” adds State Rep. Krista Griffith (D-Wilmington).
Office of Management and Budget Director Cerron Cade says while he agrees the positions are important, OMB did not receive any year-over-year case growth data to justify funding the new positions.
“I’m completely open to continuing the conversation throughout this process, and if we can get that information that would justify this level of growth, I think everybody here would probably be supportive,” Cade says.
Later in the hearing, Chief Deputy Attorney General Alex Mackler explained current social workers receive 16 new cases in a month, and that number is growing.
“They have 275 of those cases in a year. That is a completely and totally unsustainable number for any single social worker to have, so we are in desperate need of more of those social workers,” he says.
Mackler adds DOJ currently does not staff any family division social workers below the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and with the increase in juvenile violence, the department sees a need to fill those gaps.
The Department is also requesting permission to utilize their own $330,900 in appropriated special funds to back pay victim service specialists who did not receive initial pay increases after a series of position reclassifications in 2020.
There was a two-year delay in implementing those raises, and while paralegals and administrators received back pay for the delays, social workers are still waiting.
“We have exhausted every conventional option to deliver them this money — all of our efforts have been rebuffed. It is high time to make that right,” Jennings says.
Cade says once the reclassifications were approved, DOJ requested the payments start from the application date, not the approval date, which caused some discrepancies.
He says the back pay made out to the other employees was not approved by OMB and actually violates existing epilogue language.
Cade says instead, the office offered to provide retention bonuses to the affected social workers, which he says DOJ and the Department of Human Resources agreed to, but he adds there still seems to be concern that the retention bonuses do not provide enough compensation.
DOJ is no longer pursuing the payments from the general fund, but they are instead requesting permission to use their own funds to provide the back pay.
“The fraud division has found the necessary money to compensate the VSS workers, that’s where the $300,000 comes from, but it requires your consent,” Jennings told JFC.
DOJ is also requesting close to $2.5 million to increase senior attorney pay. Currently, deputy attorneys general and supervisors salaries are capped below that of the elected Attorney General, and Jennings hopes to rectify that.
She says this practice is uncommon in most states — highest-level attorneys generally make more than the attorney general.
“It is wrong that professional staff have to wait for a politician to get a raise before they can be fairly compensated,” Jennings says.
What questions do you have about the 2024 elections? What major issues do you want candidates to address? Let us know.
This story was supported by a statehouse coverage grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Delaware Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long has contradicted a new state Department of Elections report that found she and her husband were paid $33,000 more than they reportedly loaned her campaigns; however, her two opponents in the Democratic gubernatorial primary on Friday said that the report shows she’s corrupt and unfit for state government’s highest office.
The report and related documents that were released late Thursday — including copies of canceled checks — concluded that Hall-Long’s political campaigns repeatedly violated state law from 2016 to 2023 by not disclosing nearly $298,000 in payments to her husband Dana, who had been her campaign treasurer, or reporting $266,000 in loans to the campaign.
Hall-Long is embroiled in a three-way primary race with New Castle County executive Matt Meyer and former state environmental chief Collin O’Mara. The election is Sept. 10 — less than seven weeks away.
Despite the harsh report, state elections commissioner Anthony Albence, whose office had hired former Philadelphia FBI chief Jeffrey Lampinski to investigate the matter, told Hall-Long in writing that he was not referring the findings to Attorney General Kathy Jennings for possible criminal prosecution. Jennings said she concurred and pledged to work toward strengthening election laws so that similar issues don’t arise in the future.
Jennings issued a written statement that said if charges were brought, a defense attorney “could credibly attribute the committee’s errors to carelessness. We cannot pursue charges where the law does not provide the standards to do so; but neither should we abide a precedent that flouts the spirit of the law when committees demonstrate negligence.”
Hall-Long received the report last week and had urged Albence in writing not to release the investigatory files, arguing they were not public documents, “until such time as we can discuss our concerns with you.” Albence responded in an email that he did “not intend to publicly post or release” the report unless a public records request was made.
WHYY News made a Freedom of Information Act request last Tuesday for the files upon learning that the report had been completed after a six-month investigation, and Albence’s office released it late Thursday afternoon, nine days later. Sources have said Jennings had prodded Albence to make the report public.
Albence had not responded to requests for interviews about Hall-Long’s campaign finances since issues arose publicly last fall following a revolt within her campaign over more than $200,000 in unreported payments to Dana Long. Albence similarly has not made any comment since the report’s release.
Hall-Long would not agree to an interview about the report, but continued her practice of releasing written statements about the controversy, as she has over the last nine months.
The statement Hall-Long released late Thursday night reiterated that she “voluntarily disclosed discrepancies with previous campaign finance reports” in the fall and since then has cooperated with Albence’s office “on a confidential process to amend previous campaign finance reports.”
Hall-Long’s statement added that she will always “address any bookkeeping discrepancies head on” and noted that “none of this will be referred to the attorney general.”
In November, Hall-Long amended seven years of campaign reports to disclose $308,000 in loans and $207,000 in repayments to herself — not her husband. Her 2023 report, filed in January, forgave what the campaign said was an unpaid loan balance of more than $100,000.
She added that “contrary to the Lampinski preliminary report, our family has loaned the campaign more money than we have been reimbursed and we have forgiven that remaining loan balance.”
Lampinski’s report said that based on the bank records, finance reports and documents provided by Dana Long and the campaign, “I cannot account for the difference in their public reporting and my findings.”
Hall-Long’s categorization of Lampinski’s report as “preliminary” stands in contrast, however, to what Albence informed her Tuesday about the 16-page document.
“Please be advised that the report, dated and issued to me on July 13, 2024, by Mr. Lampinski, is his final report, not a draft. … this final version of the report is not subject to change,” Albence wrote in an email, adding that her attorney could feel free to respond to him.
In light of Lampinski’s findings, Albence also directed Hall-Long to further amend her reports to “to ensure all committee transactions … are accurately and fully reported.”
Today, Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo announced that the Department of Commerce and NOAA have recommended $1.97 million for a project including Delaware to make the state’s coast more resilient to climate change and other coastal hazards. The project encompasses rural coastal communities in the Delmarva region of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. The awards are being made under the Biden Administration’s Climate Resilience Regional Challenge, a competitive, $575 million program funded through the nearly $6 billion total investment under the Biden-Harris Administration’s Inflation Reduction Act.
“As part of President Biden’s commitment to combating the climate crisis, we are investing $575 million to help make sure America’s coastal communities are more resilient to the effects of climate change,” said U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo. “As part of this historic investment in our nation’s climate resilience the Biden-Harris Administration is investing $1.97 million to help underserved communities in Delaware develop and implement new strategies to protect themselves from the impacts of climate change.”
Administered by the Department of Commerce and NOAA, the Climate-Ready Coasts initiative is focused on investing in high-impact projects that create climate solutions by storing carbon; build resilience to coastal hazards such as extreme weather events, pollution and marine debris; restore coastal habitats that help wildlife and humans thrive; build the capacity of underserved communities and support community-driven restoration; and provide employment opportunities.
“To be a climate-ready coast and nation, the issues facing our farmers must be met,” said NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad, Ph.D. “This project will help ensure the continuation of our food supply and farming as a means of supporting families.”
The recommended project and $1,973,267 in total funding will be led by Virginia Tech. The project, Leveraging Cooperative Extension to Build an Enduring Capacity for Equitable and Inclusive Resilience in Rural Agricultural Communities across Coastal Delaware, Maryland and Virginia will be a joint, multistate effort that includes establishing a regional collaborative to support climate resilience in rural communities in the Delmarva region, where agriculture plays a key role in the local economy and culture. Project partners will conduct a needs assessment and a series of community listening sessions to identify current capabilities, challenges and opportunities to increase resilience – particularly in low-income, minority and agricultural communities.
This project will also support an educational component that will strengthen the capacity to initiate and participate in climate adaptation and resilience projects. Challenges addressed with this project include sea level rise, temperature changes, changing precipitation patterns and the impact on communities and agriculture.
Additional information is available on the Climate Resilience Regional Challenge website.
Climate, weather, and water affect all life on our ocean planet. NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict our changing environment, from the deep sea to outer space, and to manage and conserve America’s coastal and marine resources.
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/pmn/GYNBFVX3RJFONASKO5EMISYHTE.jpg "Police recover man’s body from Delaware River in Northeast Philadelphia")
Police recovered the body of a man from the Delaware River in Northeast Philadelphia Thursday afternoon.
The body of the man, described as in his 40s, was recovered around 3:30 p.m. by the police Marine Unit near the Linden Avenue Boat Ramp in the city’s Torresdale section, police said,
The man was pronounced dead at 4:20 p.m. by fire department personnel at the scene.
Police said the investigation into his death was ongoing.
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