Who will look out for the kids?

I was listening to the talk radio today on my way home.  The DJ was discussing a case that hit the news today, a child, five years old, beat repeatedly by her sperm and egg donors.  She had something like 100 bruises on her butt and back. 

ONEFUCKINGHUNDRED bruises. 

The DJ then went on to discuss with several callers the current state of the Arizona Department of Child Protective Services (CSP).  The DJ and callers were basically lamenting the sad state of CPS and the fact that this little girl will be in and out of foster homes and probably, more than likely, sent to live with a relative and then, eventually, depending on the jail time of the parents, she will be sent back to live with her parents.  The DJ was inflamed.  He pulled in another employee of the radio station, who is a foster care provider and they were discussing the state of CPS and how these kids are all shuffled around and back and forth between foster and relative and foster and parent.  The callers, radio guy and foster parent were all complaining about the fact that there is a standing family reunification policy, which basically holds that children should be reunited with their parents eventually, and the programs are set up so that reunification is always the goal. 

Now, my ears perked up at this because long time readers of this blog, and my other blog know that I was a foster care provider from 1998 until I moved to Arizona in 2005.  I took in relatives at first, then I became a provider for a private company in Utah. 

I believe all CPS programs, regardless of the state they govern, are flawed.  Seriously flawed.  Wasn?t it Florida where the little foster care girl was missing for years before her case worker noticed?  Then in Arizona there is the kid who was returned to her biological father, the convicted sex offender.  In Utah there were too many cases like this to cite.  In my own personal experience, my nephew was sent to live with his biological father, a man he had met once.  He was seven years old.  The first two years, he lived with his bio father?s parents.  The next five years he was shuffled between bio father?s parents, brother, and bio father.  By the time he was 14, his bio father was having him tie off his arm so dad could shoot heroin.  That nephew now lives in California with my other sister.  You can read his story here.  See No. 7.  As the attorney general assigned to the case told me, the state prefers family reunification and bio parents whenever possible. 

When we had foster kids, the goal was always to reunite them with their parents, even when that was not the healthiest thing to do, for the parent or the child.  I had one boy, his only offense EVER was being with a group of other kids and breaking into a school.  He was charged with burglary and sent to live with us.  He was a fantastic kid.  Never had problems in school, did his homework, did the dishes, great with my kids, good with my dogs.  He was a dream of a foster child.  He was 15 years old.  His mom was a recovering heroine addict.  His father had since remarried and didn?t have room in his life for his three kids, his focus was on the new wife.  After six months of living with us, this kid was scheduled to go home to bio mom.  The Man and I fought hard to have the kid stay with us until his mom was ready.  The system wanted no part of it.  I went all the way to the top of the company we fostered for and it did no good.  No body wanted to hear it. There were guidelines and rules.  Period.  The week before the kid was scheduled to go home, he went to the local grocery store and stole some hair gel and deodorant.  He had money in his pocket.  He knew they were following him in the store.  He did it anyway.  I got to the store, talked to the manager (the store was two blocks from our house, it was a small family grocery store and they all knew me).  I went upstairs to where they were holding my kid.  I knew why he did it.  He confirmed it.  He was afraid to go home.  He didn?t think his mother was ready.  He was afraid she would relapse under the pressure of getting her kids back (his brother and sister were going home too).

Personally, I think that serious overhauls of the child welfare system are needed in this country.  All levels of the system.  I don?t think that social workers should be allowed to be child social workers unless they have children or have been around them (nieces/nephews, younger siblings, etc).  Hell, I don?t think that anyone working with children in a child welfare manner (social worker, tracker, probation officer, etc.) should be able to do so unless they have children or have been around them.  There is no book in this world that can prepare a person on how to deal with a child or their issues.  There is no set of rules that can be universally applied to any given situation.  My foster kids had a tracker (a person who met with them weekly, set goals, reported to the court, etc.), a very nice lady, who had no children, and she had no connection to the fosters AT ALL.  She couldn?t identify with them. She didn?t understand the things that some kids go through.  For her, it was all about what she learned in class and what this book or that book said.  She (and many others like her) have no understanding of the real world, its dynamics or how the family unit behaves. 

I understand the need and goal for eventual family reunification.  However, there are some people who just shouldn?t be parents and have no right to their children.  There are also countless number of parents out there, who would love to have their children close to them, love to hold them, be with them, and yet, for whatever reason, they are separated from each other.  The courts don?t always make the correct choice.  Social workers don?t always know what they are doing or how to correctly handle a situation.  The parents aren?t always perfect.  People make mistakes, and sometimes they learn from those mistakes.  We are flawed by our very nature.  Things aren?t always how they look on the surface.  There is no by the book solution to any situation.  It is so much more complex than that.  Sadly, until the overhaul on all levels takes place,  and more attention is paid to detail, it is the children who will suffer by this continued rush for family reunification, absent consideration of each and every fact, each and every stone turned over, each and every situation examined, and each and every issue considered on an individual basis.

(putting away my soapbox now)