Lerner made his remarks before sentencing Laura Sommerer, 34, to four years of probation for pleading guilty to child endangerment.
Even before the scathing grand-jury presentment in August resulted in criminal charges against Sommerer and eight others, including Danieal's parents, the girl's gruesome death had taken a toll among officials at the city Department of Human Services.
In October 2006, two months after Danieal's death, DHS Commissioner Cheryl Ransom-Garner resigned, her deputy was fired, and a regional state welfare director was demoted. Carmen Paris, the city's acting health commissioner when Danieal died, resigned days before the grand-jury report was made public.
After the criminal charges were filed, seven DHS administrators or supervisors were suspended without pay.
But only Sommerer and DHS caseworker Dana Poindexter, 52, her predecessor on the Kelly case, were criminally charged. Both were supposed to have ensured that contract caseworkers DHS hired visited Kelly's house twice weekly to make sure she was well. It was later learned that she had not been visited for almost two months before her death.
In January, state welfare officials recognized improvements at DHS by restoring its full operating license, although they warned that "much more work needs to be done."
Lerner said DHS's management problems had persisted through several mayoral administrations and said, "I hope things change. It's a terrible thing that it takes the example of a case like this, and the unrelenting glare of publicity, before those changes occur."
Sommerer's sentence was far less than the 3 1/2 to seven years in prison she could have received. The sentence was negotiated by Assistant District Attorney Edward McCann and defense attorney Nathan J. Andrisani. Both said it took into account her cooperation in the criminal probe and good works in the community.
