Licensed Child-Placing Agency Administrator (LCPAA)
Circle of Living Hope
Primary Location: Houston, Texas
Service Areas: San Antonio, Houston, Brownsville, and surrounding regions
Job Type: Full-time
Salary: Starting at $65,000 annually, commensurate with experience
Schedule: Monday–Friday, with occasional travel, evenings, and on-call leadership responsibilities
Help Us Rebuild, Grow, and Expand Our Impact
Circle of Living Hope is seeking an experienced, mission-driven Licensed Child-Placing Agency Administrator (LCPAA) who is looking for more than a traditional administrative position.
We are seeking a leader who wants to grow with the agency, help rebuild a strong child-placing program, develop high-performing teams, expand foster home capacity, and help position Circle of Living Hope for responsible long-term growth.
Circle of Living Hope has previously served approximately 250 children and is now in a strategic rebuilding phase. We are strengthening our infrastructure, improving systems, expanding our foster home network, developing staff, and preparing to responsibly increase the number of children and families we serve.
This is an opportunity for the right administrator to make a measurable impact, help shape the agency’s future, and become an integral part of the executive leadership team.
About Circle of Living Hope
Circle of Living Hope is a Texas nonprofit child-placing and adoption agency founded on the principles of Patience, Love, and Understanding.
Since 2006, we have worked to provide children with safe, stable, nurturing, and permanent family connections. Our programs serve children and families throughout San Antonio, Houston, Brownsville, and surrounding Texas communities.
Our agency is committed to:
- Child safety and well-being.
- Trauma-informed and relationship-based care.
- Foster and adoptive family development.
- Sibling and family connections.
- Permanency and placement stability.
- Regulatory and contractual compliance.
- Staff development and accountability.
- Responsible, sustainable agency growth.
The Opportunity
The LCPAA will play a central role in rebuilding and expanding Circle of Living Hope’s child-placing operations.
The successful candidate will inherit an established agency with a long history of serving children, while also having the opportunity to improve systems, rebuild capacity, strengthen compliance, recruit and develop staff, expand foster home resources, and help create the operational foundation required for future growth.
This position is ideal for a leader who enjoys:
- Building and improving programs.
- Creating structure from complex processes.
- Developing staff and future leaders.
- Strengthening regulatory compliance.
- Recruiting and retaining quality foster homes.
- Expanding services without compromising quality.
- Working directly with executive leadership.
- Seeing their ideas and leadership make a visible organizational impact.
We are not looking for someone who only wants to maintain the status quo. We are looking for someone who can help lead the agency into its next chapter.
Position Summary
The Licensed Child-Placing Agency Administrator is responsible for the overall administration, regulatory compliance, quality assurance, program development, and operational leadership of Circle of Living Hope’s foster care and adoption programs.
The LCPAA will work closely with the CEO, COO, executive leadership, case managers, foster home development personnel, caregivers, contractors, licensing representatives, Community-Based Care partners, and other child welfare stakeholders.
The administrator must be capable of managing current operations while also helping the agency expand its capacity, strengthen its workforce, improve service delivery, and responsibly increase its census.
Essential ResponsibilitiesAgency Growth and Program Development
- Partner with executive leadership to develop and implement the agency’s strategic growth plan.
- Help rebuild Circle of Living Hope’s child-placing capacity following a period in which the agency previously served approximately 250 children.
- Assess current program strengths, risks, staffing needs, and operational gaps.
- Develop scalable systems that support increased placements without compromising safety, quality, or compliance.
- Support expansion of foster care, kinship, adoption, and related child welfare services.
- Help establish measurable goals for census growth, foster home development, staffing, retention, compliance, and placement stability.
- Identify opportunities to improve agency performance, service delivery, and community partnerships.
- Help strengthen the agency’s presence in San Antonio, Houston, Brownsville, and future service areas.
- Participate in leadership planning regarding staffing, contracts, service expansion, and organizational development.
Regulatory and Contract Compliance
- Maintain compliance with Texas DFPS Minimum Standards for Child-Placing Agencies.
- Ensure compliance with applicable state contracts, Community-Based Care requirements, agency policies, monitoring plans, and accreditation expectations.
- Serve as a primary administrative contact for licensing representatives, contract monitors, investigators, and community partners.
- Prepare the agency for licensing inspections, contract reviews, audits, investigations, and monitoring activities.
- Track deficiencies, corrective action plans, deadlines, and supporting documentation through resolution.
- Review regulatory and contractual changes and ensure agency practices are updated accordingly.
- Translate regulations into clear, repeatable, and practical internal procedures.
- Ensure branch operations remain properly staffed, supervised, and administratively supported.
Program Administration and Quality Assurance
- Provide administrative oversight of foster care, adoption, kinship, case management, placement, and foster home development services.
- Conduct routine quality-assurance reviews of child, foster home, personnel, caregiver, and training records.
- Review service plans, monthly contacts, case notes, assessments, incident reports, medication records, discharge documentation, and permanency records.
- Ensure documentation is timely, accurate, complete, and consistent with regulatory and contractual requirements.
- Develop tracking systems, compliance calendars, checklists, dashboards, and accountability processes.
- Identify systemic concerns and implement sustainable corrective strategies.
- Monitor key performance indicators related to placement stability, documentation, training, foster home development, licensing, and child outcomes.
- Provide leadership during serious incidents, investigations, placement disruptions, and compliance concerns.
Staff Leadership and Workforce Development
- Supervise, coach, and support case managers, foster home development staff, and other program personnel.
- Help build a dependable, high-performing team capable of supporting future agency growth.
- Establish clear performance expectations and measurable standards.
- Provide ongoing feedback, professional development, and corrective guidance when needed.
- Review caseloads, assignments, documentation quality, travel expectations, and completion of required duties.
- Assist with recruiting, interviewing, selecting, onboarding, and retaining qualified employees.
- Identify future supervisors and leaders within the organization and support their development.
- Lead or participate in case reviews, compliance meetings, home development meetings, and executive leadership meetings.
- Promote a professional culture centered on accountability, consistency, communication, teamwork, and child safety.
Foster Home Recruitment, Development, and Licensing
- Oversee the recruitment, screening, verification, licensing, and ongoing monitoring of foster and adoptive homes.
- Help develop strategies to increase the number of qualified foster and adoptive families.
- Ensure prospective caregivers remain engaged and consistently progress through the licensing process.
- Review home studies, home screening updates, background checks, references, inspections, training records, financial documents, and licensing materials.
- Determine whether prospective caregivers are appropriate for the agency and capable of meeting the needs of children in care.
- Monitor foster home capacity, annual updates, compliance status, variances, corrective actions, and closure documentation.
- Support the development of homes capable of serving sibling groups, teenagers, children with complex needs, and children requiring higher levels of care.
- Ensure foster parents receive all required pre-service and annual training.
- Support staff with entering and maintaining foster home information in CLASS and other required systems.
Training and Program Implementation
- Oversee required employee and caregiver training programs.
- Support implementation of T3C, TST-FC, trauma-informed care, evidence-based interventions, and other required practice models.
- Ensure compliance with training requirements related to behavior management, emergency behavior intervention, psychotropic medications, medical consent, abuse and neglect reporting, human trafficking, CPR, first aid, and other required subjects.
- Verify trainer qualifications, credentials, course content, attendance, testing, and certificates.
- Coordinate access to DFPS, agency, and external training portals.
- Evaluate training effectiveness and identify staff or caregiver coaching needs.
- Help build a strong internal training and professional development structure to support future growth.
Placements, Permanency, and Child Safety
- Support appropriate placement matching based on each child’s needs, history, sibling relationships, culture, level of care, permanency goals, and caregiver abilities.
- Ensure growth decisions remain centered on child safety, placement quality, and caregiver readiness.
- Monitor placement stability and support interventions when placements are at risk of disruption.
- Ensure children receive required medical, dental, behavioral health, educational, developmental, and permanency services.
- Promote trauma-informed, relationship-based, and developmentally appropriate caregiving.
- Ensure children’s rights, confidentiality, personal belongings, family connections, normalcy opportunities, and safety needs are protected.
- Collaborate with DFPS, Community-Based Care providers, attorneys, schools, courts, service providers, and other members of the child and family team.
Systems, Reporting, and Organizational Infrastructure
- Maintain working knowledge of CLASS, IMPACT, Casebook, training portals, and other child welfare systems.
- Improve administrative workflows and help implement efficient technology-supported processes.
- Review census data, placement activity, licensing progress, caseloads, training completion, incidents, and compliance indicators.
- Prepare reports for executive leadership, licensing entities, contracting partners, and the Board.
- Maintain organized administrative records, procedures, calendars, portal access information, and transition documentation.
- Help establish systems that remain effective as the agency adds employees, foster homes, branches, and children.
- Protect confidential information and ensure compliance with recordkeeping and information-security requirements.
Required Qualifications
- Current and active Texas Licensed Child-Placing Agency Administrator license in good standing.
- Bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university in social work, human services, psychology, counseling, public administration, business administration, child development, or a related field.
- Demonstrated experience working in a Texas child-placing agency, foster care program, adoption program, residential child care operation, or comparable child welfare setting.
- Strong working knowledge of Texas DFPS Minimum Standards for Child-Placing Agencies.
- Experience with licensing, quality assurance, compliance, case management oversight, foster home development, or contract monitoring.
- Demonstrated ability to supervise employees and manage multiple priorities.
- Strong written communication, documentation, organization, and problem-solving skills.
- Ability to evaluate operations, identify risks, and develop practical solutions.
- Valid Texas driver’s license, reliable transportation, and ability to travel between service areas.
- Ability to successfully complete all required background checks and employment clearances.
Preferred Qualifications
- Licensed Child Care Administrator credential in addition to the LCPAA license.
- Master’s degree in social work, counseling, public administration, business administration, or a related field.
- Five or more years of progressively responsible experience in foster care, adoption, residential child care, or child-placing agency operations.
- Previous experience as an LCPAA, assistant administrator, program director, compliance director, quality-assurance director, or senior child welfare leader.
- Experience helping an agency expand, rebuild, open new locations, increase census, or develop new programs.
- Experience with Community-Based Care contracts and provider relationships.
- Knowledge of T3C, TST-FC, trauma-informed care, and evidence-based interventions.
- Experience using CLASS, IMPACT, Casebook, or similar child welfare case-management systems.
- Experience leading an agency through licensing inspections, audits, corrective action plans, contract reviews, or heightened monitoring.
- Bilingual English and Spanish communication skills.
The Successful Candidate Will Be
- A builder who sees opportunity where others see obstacles.
- Interested in growing with the agency over the long term.
- Able to balance growth with compliance and child safety.
- Highly organized, dependable, and proactive.
- Confident in making difficult administrative and child-safety decisions.
- Able to hold employees accountable while coaching them toward success.
- Skilled at developing teams, systems, and procedures.
- Comfortable working directly with executive leadership.
- Capable of managing current responsibilities while planning for future expansion.
- Motivated by the opportunity to leave a meaningful and lasting impact.
- Committed to protecting children and strengthening foster and adoptive families.
Why Join Circle of Living Hope?
This position offers more than a job title. It provides the opportunity to help rebuild an established agency with a history of serving approximately 250 children.
The selected administrator will have the opportunity to:
- Help shape the future direction of the agency.
- Build and develop a strong program team.
- Improve systems and organizational infrastructure.
- Expand the agency’s foster and adoptive home network.
- Strengthen compliance and quality assurance.
- Help responsibly grow the agency’s census and community impact.
- Work closely with executive leadership.
- Develop professionally as the organization grows.
- Become part of an agency that values loyalty, innovation, accountability, and mission-driven leadership.
Compensation and Benefits
- Starting salary of $65,000 annually, with final compensation based on experience and qualifications.
- Paid time off and agency-recognized holidays.
- Professional development and required training support.
- Leadership role with significant influence over program development and agency growth.
- Opportunity for increased responsibility as the agency expands.
- Mission-centered work that directly impacts children, caregivers, and Texas communities.
Application Requirements
Qualified applicants should submit:
- A current résumé.
- A copy of their active Texas LCPAA license.
- A cover letter describing their child-placing agency leadership, compliance, and program-development experience.
- Three professional references.
- Salary expectations.
- Earliest available start date.
In the cover letter, applicants are encouraged to describe a program, department, or agency they helped rebuild, improve, expand, or strengthen.
Equal Employment Opportunity
Circle of Living Hope is an equal opportunity employer. Employment decisions are made without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, or any other status protected by applicable law.
Apply Today
Circle of Living Hope is entering an important season of rebuilding and growth.
We are seeking a licensed administrator who is ready to bring experience, structure, vision, and leadership to an agency with a strong history and significant future potential.
Join us as we rebuild our capacity, strengthen our programs, develop exceptional teams, and expand the number of children and families we are able to serve—with Patience, Love, and Understanding.
Job Type: Full-time
Pay: $50,000.00 - $75,000.00 per year
Benefits:
- Dental insurance
- Flexible schedule
- Health insurance
- Paid time off
- Vision insurance
Education:
Experience:
- LCPAA: 2 years (Required)
License/Certification:
- Driver's License (Required)
Willingness to travel:
Work Location: Hybrid remote in Houston, TX 77069
