Remove Domestic Violence Remove Foster Care Remove Welfare
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Seven children and all she needed was a van: large families and the blindness of the child welfare establishment

Child Welfare Monitor

But today’s post focuses on one particularly jarring vignette–the story of a mother, her seven children, and a van–and what it means about how child welfare policy is made and discussed today. David Reed, the Deputy Director of Child Welfare Services in Indiana, introduced the story of this family in his testimony.

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The fundamental misconception at the heart of the Family First Act

Child Welfare Monitor

States have been hard-put to devise plans for implementing the new services because the bill was designed to fix a problem that did not exist–the alleged absence of child welfare services designed to help families stay together. Sometimes, in order to prevent the need for foster care, mom and dad might need a little help.

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Maine Child Welfare Advisory Panel charts a better way forward

NCCPR Child Welfare Blog

At last: A group involved in oversight of Maine child welfare that shows a real understanding of the problems. The Maine Child Welfare Advisory Panel (MCWAP) Citizen Review Panel has produced a report with six recommendations. Note that often these programs have the full support of state or local child welfare agencies.

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A New York State “child welfare” agency can curb one family policing horror with the stroke of a pen. Do they have the guts?

NCCPR Child Welfare Blog

The number of ways family policing agencies (a more accurate term than “child welfare” agencies) can hurt the children they are mandated to protect is limited only by their imagination – and, unfortunately, this is the one area where they show any imagination at all. OCFS theoretically performs oversight.

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Maine’s child welfare ombudsman is dangerously wrong

NCCPR Child Welfare Blog

Maine's first child welfare ombudsman, Dean Crocker, understood the lessons from the tragic death of Logan Marr, who was taken when her family poverty was confused with "neglect" and killed in foster care. For starters, Maine should join the many states in which child welfare court hearings are open.

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If there’s another foster-care panic in NYC, it’s on The New York Times

NCCPR Child Welfare Blog

So the public was primed to scapegoat family preservation when Nixzmary Brown died in January, 2006 – leading to a foster-care panic , a sharp sudden increase in the number of children torn from everyone they know and love and consigned to the chaos of foster care. The panic was welcomed by the Times.

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Massachusetts pilots the most promising reform in child welfare. Guess who’s trying to undercut it.

NCCPR Child Welfare Blog

This is the model that’s proven so successful in New York City – where a comprehensive evaluation found that it reduced time in foster care with no compromise of safety. Cara, who asked to keep her last name private, said she had already been in touch with a domestic violence organization about her ex.