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Governor Bush Must Replace Head of Child Welfare

Aired August 14, 2002 - 14:25   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: In Florida this week, Governor Jeb Bush is facing what some are calling the toughest challenge of his three- plus years in office. He has to find a new director of the state's Department of Children and Families. The current director resigned amid a series of scandalous embarrassments involving children that were supposed to be in Florida's care.
CNN's John Zarrella is live from Miami -- supposed to be in their care, but missing in action.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That is exactly right, Carol, and you know, you were talking about Governor Jeb Bush there, and of course, during the last several months all of the issues swirling around Florida's department of Children and Family have been a drag, and it was threatening to become a bigger political issue than it already is with his reelection coming up in November. At this point, likely to face a Democratic challenger Janet Reno. That would be the likely candidate he would face, and again, in order to try and at least stop some of that bleeding from what's happening, the announcement made yesterday late in the afternoon that Kathleen Kearney, head of the embattled agency, Florida's department of Children and Family, did resign, sent the governor a letter saying that, in fact, she was going to step down effective September 3.

The governor accepting her resignation. No idea, at this point, who is going to replace her, although it is believed that the governor may already have been searching for the past couple of weeks for a potential replacement given all the issues surrounding the Department of Children and Families.

And it began, of course, last April. And in April, that is when the story of Rilya Wilson first surfaced. It came to light that she had been missing for 15 months, supposed to have been in the care of the Department of Children and Families, but they did not know she was missing, and had been missing for 15 months. She is still missing.

Following that eye opener, six young girls between the ages of 11 and 15 years old were found to be staying at a motel up in Palm Beach. They were put there by the Department of Children and Families, but they were left unsupervised for several weeks while they were staying at the motel because there was no room in foster care shelters for those girls.

And then, there was a case in Tampa where a 1-year-old toddler, his body was found on the side of the road outside of Tampa, along Interstate 75, and it turned out that he died on the same day that a caseworker had told authorities that she visited the boy, and that he was fine. She admitted having lied. So again, all of these things embroiling the Florida Department of Children and Families, and now leading to the resignation of Kathleen Kearney, who has been heading the agency for the past couple of years for the governor, and the governor, of course, when he ran for election here in Florida, one of the big things he said he wanted to do was to reform the agency. That challenge, now four years later, still lays before the governor's feet -- Carol.

LIN: You bet. Some answering to do.

ZARRELLA: Yes.

LIN: All right. Thank you very much, John Zarrella. Live in Miami.

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