Previously: In Part 1, I followed the emergency spending behind children sleeping in offices. In Part 2, I found $17.7 million in lab charges with no laboratory named. In Part 3, I traced $292.7 million in child support money to the counties, where some clerks paid themselves bonuses, and found that most county contract pages name no contact at all.
The one voice that’s supposed to be separate
In every South Carolina child-welfare case, the court appoints a guardian ad litem, often a trained volunteer from a CASA program. Their job is to speak for the child, independent of DSS and independent of the parents.
State law places the guardian ad litem program outside DSS. DSS’s own brochure tells families plainly: “A GAL does not work for DSS.”
To a parent who feels the agency has already decided their case, that independence matters. The guardian may be the one person in the room whose only job is the child.
So I was surprised to find how much of that work runs through DSS’s budget.
Following the CASA money
- DSS paid Richland County CASA about $11.5 million from FY2014 through FY2025. About $7.6 million of that was the program’s own spending, certified to DSS to claim federal match. About $3.9 million was federal cash passed through DSS.
- One agreement (contract 4400028723, October 2022 through September 2027) is with the Richland County CASA Foundation for “Guardian Ad Litem Training,” with a value of $2,454,781.05.
- DSS also paid the state guardian ad litem program’s home agencies: about $7.9 million to the Governor’s Office in FY2014 and FY2015, and about $16.1 million to the Department of Children’s Advocacy from FY2020 through FY2025.
Why the money goes through DSS
There’s a legal reason. Title IV-E, the federal foster care funding stream, reimburses 75% of the cost of short-term training for “guardians ad litem, or other court-appointed special advocates.” A 2024 federal rule also lets states claim federal administrative funds for independent legal representation of children and parents.
Because DSS is South Carolina’s Title IV-E agency, federal money for those purposes has to pass through DSS. DSS pays toward parents’ lawyers the same way: it sent about $20.3 million to the Commission on Indigent Defense from FY2021 through FY2025, most of it certified spending. .
But it raises a fair question about independence. The agency that’s a party in every case is also the channel for the money that funds the child’s independent advocate and the parent’s lawyer. The public should be able to see the agreements that govern that money, and DSS should confirm in writing that it has no say over what a guardian tells the court.
The forensic interview centers
The same web reaches the child advocacy centers that conduct forensic interviews with children.
DSS paid the South Carolina Network of Children’s Advocacy Centers $1.5 million in general funds each June in 2023, 2024 and 2025. The Department of Children’s Advocacy separately sent the network $1.5 million in nonrecurring funds and an $80,000 recurring contribution in October 2024.
The network reported spending that $80,000 on one January 2025 bill to Guardify, the system that stores children’s forensic interview recordings.
The software has a legitimate purpose. But two parallel state funding streams going to one nonprofit should be explained in one place, so the public can see the full picture.
The web of agencies
DSS doesn’t only pay private companies. It pays other parts of government, and those payments add up. From FY2014 through FY2025, the largest public and connected recipients were:
- 46 county treasurers (mostly Title IV-D) – $292.7 million
- University of South Carolina – $206.8 million
- Department of Administration (IT, leased cars, rent) – $163.8 million
- Clemson University – $46.1 million
- Department of Health and Human Services – $41.3 million
- Department of Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse Services – $25.2 million
- Budget and Control Board (FY2014–15) – $25.2 million
- Department of Education – $23.6 million
- Commission on Indigent Defense – $20.3 million
- Winthrop University – $16.9 million
- Department of Children’s Advocacy – $16.1 million
- Richland County CASA – $11.5 million
- Medical University of South Carolina – $10.6 million
- Department of Mental Health – $6.9 million
Some of these relationships show up in contracts. DSS holds a $9,337,988.10 agreement with the alcohol and drug agency for “intensive residential and outpatient” treatment through September 2026, and two “shared position” agreements with the Department of Mental Health worth $429,000 and $360,029.44.
Interagency agreements are normal. But when hundreds of millions move between agencies under labels like “Contract Agreements with State Intergovernmental,” the public loses track of what was bought and who benefited.
The contract with a Connecticut address
One contract in that web stopped me.
Department of Mental Health (now the Office of Mental Health within the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities) contract 4400032965 is worth $450,000 and runs from May 2023 to April 2028. Its vendor is listed as “Department of Social Services c/o JDA, 2 Lakewood Road, Waterbury CT.” The item is “MISC,” under a mental-health services category. No bid is listed. The vendor’s only contact is “CONVERSION, INCOMPLETE,” the same placeholder I described in Part 3.
I looked up the address. It’s the Waterbury Housing Authority building, which the Connecticut Department of Housing lists as a customer office for J. D’Amelia & Associates, the private firm that runs Connecticut’s housing voucher programs.
Then I checked whether any money went there. I searched twelve years of South Carolina spending files for any payment to JDA, D’Amelia or a Waterbury vendor, from DSS or any other state agency. I found none.
What I did find: the Department of Mental Health paid a payee recorded as “Social Services Dept” about $100,811 in FY2024 and $192,108 in FY2025, in federal funds. The spending files don’t show contract numbers, so I can’t say those payments belong to this contract…
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The car wash line
Some of the clearest questions are also the smallest.
DSS has a spending account called “Motorized Vehicle Car Wash Services.” From FY2021 through FY2025, it recorded $963,444 across 30 vendors, about a quarter of a million dollars a year since FY2022.
The largest recipients were:
- Certified Custom Cleaners LLC: about $197,000 over 385 payments
- Freddies Mobile Service: about $169,000
- Donnies Pressure Washing: about $137,000
- Brandon Mobile Service: about $99,000
- All Clean Mobile Wash LLC: about $96,000
DSS runs a big fleet of leased state cars, and caseworkers transport children every day. Clean cars are a real need. But nearly a million dollars in small, repeated payments to local mobile-wash businesses raises ordinary questions: how many vehicles, what price per wash, chosen how, and compared to what?
Those answers should be easy. If they aren’t, that tells us something too.
Billions behind one label
Across this whole series, one obstacle kept coming back.
About $3.9 billion, roughly 57% of DSS spending in the files for FY2014 through FY2025, sits under a single internal label: “DSS Case Services.” Annual spending under that label rose from about $270 million in FY2021 to $512 million in FY2025.
That label includes child care vouchers and other programs, not just foster care, so the increase doesn’t mean foster care costs doubled. But it shows how much can hide behind one line, including the $17.7 million in lab charges from Part 2.
The families behind the files
I’ve spent four installments on dollars. I want to end with people.
Across South Carolina, families have been gravely affected in recent years by DSS policies, by the actions of caseworkers, and by the third-party contractors DSS pays to test, place and supervise. In my advocacy work, I see what those administrative categories mean for a family.
Some of it starts with a placement. When there’s no foster home, a child may spend the night in a DSS office. When a relative steps up, that relative may get little or no help paying for day care, clothes or the gas it takes to keep the children connected to their parents.
Some of it runs through a lab. A parent’s case can turn on a drug screen from a company the parent never chose, reviewed by a doctor they’ll never meet, and reported in a format they can’t check. When that parent asks for the paperwork behind the result, it can be impossible to get.
Some of it runs through the courthouse. A parent waits months for a hearing that’s supposed to happen in weeks. A parent who asks for their own file can find that the record is sealed, the transcript can’t be found or the motion was never filed.
And some of it is simply time. Every continuance, every missing record and every month spent waiting on another agency is time a child spends apart from a family that may be able to bring them home. Those months don’t show up on a spending report. But they add up the same way the dollars do.
None of this proves that any particular contract caused any family’s circumstances. That isn’t my claim. But it explains why this matters.
To the state, there’s a price tag behind every removal, every referral and every decision, often paid with federal money and too little public accountability.
To a family, no price tag comes close. It’s a mother checking her mail every day for a hearing date that doesn’t come. It’s a father who missed a birthday because a visit was canceled and no one called. It’s a grandmother counting what’s left after day care. It’s a child who stops asking when they’re going home, because no one has an answer.
A placement is where their child sleeps tonight. A test is a parent’s chance to bring that child home. A case record is the only way to understand how their family was torn apart, and whether it ever had to be.
The state can close a file. A family carries it for the rest of their lives.
Thank you for following this series. If you’ve been affected by any of the issues in it, or you have records that can help fill in the gaps, we want to hear from you.
Editor’s note: The South Carolina Department of Social Services and the Office of Mental Health were asked for comment on October 27, 2026. Any response will be added to this article and to later installments.
Sources
- S.C. Code Title 63, Chapter 11 (guardian ad litem program) (Other)
- DSS guardian ad litem brochure (Other)
- S.C. Comptroller General, Monthly State Spending Transparency Files, FY2014–FY2025 (Other)
- SCEIS Contract Search (including 4400028723, 4400028079, 4400033003, 4400035218 and 4400032965) (Other)
- Child Welfare Policy Manual 8.1H, Title IV-E training for guardians ad litem and CASAs (Other)
- ACF Information Memorandum IM-24-05 (legal representation (Other)
- S.C. Network of Children’s Advocacy Centers, FY2025 Q3 expenditure report (Other)
- Connecticut Department of Housing, housing subsidy contractor list (Other)
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ON THE BENCHUp nextFollowing the Money, Part 3 of 4: The Clerks and the CountiesNearly $300 million in child support money, two former clerks facing criminal cases, and contract pages that name no one to call.
Oct 30, 2026
FALSE DRUG TESTFollowing the Money, Part 2 of 4: The TestOct 29, 2026
Following the Money, Part 1 of 4: The Night ShiftOct 29, 2026
FALSE DRUG TESTFollowing the Money, a four-part series on South Carolina’s child-welfare spending.Oct 27, 2026
