AUSTIN -- Every Child Protective Services caseworker, supervisor and front-line administrator in Texas would get a $12,000 raise under a plan submitted to lawmakers late Thursday by state protective services chief Henry "Hank" Whitman.

Under fire for a series of failings by CPS -- among them, not asking for pay raises -- Whitman said higher salaries are a major piece of the puzzle as he tries to reduce sky-high turnover at the agency.

"Providing a salary increase will have a positive impact on retention," he wrote Senate Finance Committee Chairwoman Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound.

After a raucous hearing of her committee Wednesday, at which irate senators skewered Whitman for several hours, Nelson asked him for a pay-raise proposal and a plan for immediately finding at-risk children whom CPS workers haven't seen.

Some lawmakers of both parties may see Whitman's salary increases as too small to curtail a debilitating flow of exiting employees. In Dallas County, CPS child abuse investigators have been quitting at an annual rate of 57 percent, sending efforts to initially see kids and do proper casework into chaos.

Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound (Kelly Williams Photography)

Still, in asking for $12,000 across-the-board raises, Whitman doubled the Texas State Employees Union's request for a minimum bump per worker of $6,000 a year.

"I'm thrilled that we finally have a commissioner who's willing to ask for the agency needs," said child advocate Madeline McClure of Dallas, who's championed higher pay for CPS workers for more than a decade. "I hope ... the Legislature will answer the call."

Whitman, a former lawman whom Gov. Greg Abbott's social services czar named to head CPS' parent agency last spring, proposed raises for nearly 7,100 CPS caseworkers, special investigators, supervisors and program directors.

Conspicuously, they would not be provided for top officials at state headquarters, program administrators or the 10 regional directors who run field operations.

In June, Whitman's new team was embarrassed when a tentative proposal to raise regional directors' pay significantly was leaked to the media. At the time, he wasn't even talking publicly about raising caseworkers' pay -- which can be just under $35,000 for newly minted college graduates.

Whitman hastily spiked the regional director pay proposal.

His new plan would go a significant part of the way in reducing what has been a widening disparity between CPS workers and other public employees, such as teachers and police, who slog through some of the nastiest byproducts of family dysfunction, substance abuse, poverty and mental illness.

Child Protective Services caseworker Catherine Eberhardt calls in a report to her supervisor after investigating a report of a parent using methamphetamine August 2015 in Abilene. (2015 File Photo/Abilene Reporter-News)

In his letter, Whitman noted that just 3 ½ years ago, lawmakers were alarmed that CPS couldn't hold on to caseworkers in Midland-Odessa because the "fracking" boom there created labor shortages. The Legislature approved a CPS plan to pay its employees in the four-county area $12,000 more a year. It was called "locality pay" and it worked, cutting turnover from 43 percent in fiscal 2014 to 22 percent this year, Whitman said.

If state leaders give him the green light, the raises for existing employees would take effect Dec. 1 and cost $83.1 million, including federal funds, for the remaining nine months of this budget year, Whitman's letter said.

Recently, he asked for permission to hire an additional 550 caseworkers and special investigators, plus 279 support and supervisory staff and training and hiring specialists.Their nine-month raises would add $8.1 million to the mix, bringing total costs this year to $91.2 million.

Investigative caseworkers are paid an average of about $44,000, his letter said. Their salaries would go up to an average of nearly $56,000.

Similarly, the conservatorship workers who work with children removed from their birth families would see average salaries increase to about $52,000 from $40,000; and those of special investigators, who have law enforcement backgrounds, would jump to about $61,000 from an average of $49,000.

"I have received the plan and am reviewing it," Nelson said in a written statement. "Time is of the essence, so our work group is moving quickly to review the new recommendations. I have also asked the agency for daily updates on their efforts to address this crisis."

On Wednesday, Nelson appointed five senators, led by Georgetown Republican Charles Schwertner, to sort through Whitman's various requests and report to her full, 15 member panel.

With the state under pressure from a federal judge to improve foster care, Whitman mentioned in his letter that he wants to take some quick actions.

Among them: He wants his department to develop a program that trains a cadre of "highly skilled professional foster parents" to house and work with some of the highly traumatized teens who have been sleeping in CPS offices because state vendors won't take them. They would try to stabilize the children and move them to traditional foster families.

He also wants to hire a special vendor for an "integrated care coordination program" that would house and work with children who've bounced from placement to placement -- and many time, have wound up in psychiatric hospitals.

Also Thursday, special agents with the Texas Department of Public Safety began to help CPS locate nearly 2,900 children who have not been seen. Although workers at a state child abuse hotline and regional CPS personnel consider allegations the children have been mistreated as worth looking into, the agency hasn't made required initial contacts. Officials blame high turnover and a rising number of abuse allegations. But the delays are dangerous, experts say.

Initially at least, it was an operation of "very limited scope," said Patrick Crimmins, spokesman for CPS' parent agency, the Department of Family and Protective Services. The plainclothes investigators were asked to find 47 children deemed most at risk, Crimmins said.

With DPS' help, CPS found 26 of them -- 10 in Houston, 12 in Dallas and four in San Antonio, he said. None of the 26 was removed, he said.

As of Monday, there were 2,853 unseen children, with 516 of them deemed Priority 1, or "P1." That means the allegations of maltreatment pose an immediate risk and possibly could lead to serious injury or the child's death.

The total unseen represents a slight increase from the 2,844 children who had not been visited as of Oct. 17, 511 of them Priority 1.

As of Monday, there were 959 unseen children in the North Texas region. Of them, 137 were "P1s," down from 166 a week earlier.