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Lawsuit May Finally Hold Failing Child Welfare Agencies Accountable
By admin, Section From The Wires
By
Wendy McElroy, FOX News
For years, child welfare agencies have been stained by accounts of children beaten, starved and murdered while in foster care. Once dismissed as aberrations or blamed on a single social worker, the incidents are increasingly recognized as the tragic consequences of systemic failure. A recent lawsuit filed in Los Angeles, Calif., places blame squarely on the system. Last September, Los Angeles County supervisors celebrated the reunion of Melinda Smith and her estranged father as vindication of a new program within the Department of Children and Family Services (DCF), which aimed at reuniting families. Last week, Melinda (now 17-years-old) and her father Thomas Marion Smith filed suit against the county for its 10-year failure to bring them together. The lawsuit alleges that social workers who knew Melinda was deteriorating in DCS custody nevertheless blocked her father from even knowing she had been removed from her mother's care and was "in the system." (Thomas says he tried repeatedly to locate Melinda, whom he thought was still living with her mother.) Meanwhile, the county blames the "lost decade" on a communications breakdown. Is this case an aberration, or does it point to a common practice: the exclusion of non-resident fathers from the foster care system? A study released this April suggests an answer.
What
About the Dads? Child Welfare Agencies' Efforts to Identify, Locate, and Involve
Nonresident Fathers was prepared for the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Service by The Urban Institute. The study
"examined nonresident fathers as placement resources"
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Related Links+ By Wendy McElroy, FOX News+ father Thomas Marion Smith filed suit against the county for its 10-year failure to bring them together + the county blames the "lost decade" on a communications breakdown + What About the Dads? Child Welfare Agencies' Efforts to Identify, Locate, and Involve Nonresident Fathers + U.S. Department of Health and Human Service + More on Family Services + Also by admin |
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