Foster-parents' domestic violence
Detective Victoria Reden's report on how Butler County can avoid another horrific foster-child death such as 3-year-old Marcus Fiesel's in August unflinchingly declares it was absolutely preventable.
She lays out more than 12 recommendations, but especially urges cross-reporting all cases of foster-family domestic violence to Children's Services, whether anyone is arrested or not. Her report ought to be circulated to agencies throughout Ohio and Kentucky.
Foster parent David Carroll was charged with domestic violence on his wife in June, a month after Marcus was entrusted to their care. Reden is convinced children are harmed when exposed to violence in the home, and believes had police officers reported David Carroll's domestic violence to Children's Services, Marcus would have been immediately removed from the Carrolls' care. Let's hope she's right about that.
Other recommendations such as making sure the agency ombudsman is truly independent, making random after-hours home visits and videotaping interviews with the families would make for a more transparent, secure system.
One overriding question is whether revised agency policies will be enough to protect abused or neglected children in the county's care. California mandates cross-reporting by law, and sets criminal penalties for failure to report.
posted by Tony Lang at 5:05 PM
4 Comments:
at 11:36 AM, November 27, 2006 
Anonymous said...
-
-
at 11:29 AM, November 28, 2006 
Anonymous said...
-
-
at 8:33 AM, November 29, 2006 
Anonymous said...
-
-
at 3:15 PM, November 29, 2006 
Anonymous said...
-
-
Post a Comment*The proposals are interesting and may have some positive effect. However, they strike me as quick fix proposals that will not have a significant impact on the quality of care children receive in foster homes. The difficulty with foster care right now is that although there are many outstanding foster parents, there are not sufficient good foster homes to meet the needs of all children in foster care. As a result, case workers are placing children in foster home that meet minimal licensing requirements, but are in many ways obviously deficient. The case workers already know that the foster homes are deficient. They use them because there have no other alternatives.
To address the foster home "crisis" children's services agency must recruit and retain high quality foster homes. "How can this be done?" is an excellent question with no easy or obvious answers. There are no quick fixes.
this is outstanding news. Now the prosecutors office can file charges and start imprisoning the money grubbing creeps running Lifeway, when can we expect to hear the follow up? or will we hear deafening silence?
To the writer who thought that Detective Reden’s proposals sounded like a “quick-fix” let me assure you that nothing is “quick” when it comes to the child protection system.
Like the tragic death of Marcus, everything that happens inside the system is slow, agonizing, and painful.
There are no “quick fixes” but there are many things that can be done that are not being done to reduce the risk to children.
One is a simple shift away from the cultural paradigm expressed in the writer’s observation, “…The case workers already know that the foster homes are deficient. They use them because there have no other alternatives.”
The paradigm that drives the current system and around which nearly every decision affecting children and families the system has jurisdiction over is “our primary mission is to take children from ‘bad’ parents.” The system acts as if once it removes children from a “bad” parent or situation that their job is done.
Those in the system need to understand that once they take custody or jurisdiction over a child or family their work is just beginning. Now the system has an obligation to be a “good” parent. This gets lost in bureaucracy as dysfunctional as the families it deals with daily.
The system removes children from parents everyday who stand in court and say that the reason they neglected their children was because they could not afford or were incapable of providing them the care and oversight they needed. Ironically, these parents are saying the same thing we hear from people inside the system---“we’d like to do a better job but we just don’t have the time or resources to do it.”
When a parent says this the system takes their child. When the system gives the same excuse for poor child care the child is sentenced to the slow, agnonizing and painful experience of languishing in an inadequate and harmful system for years. The system needs to focus on being a “good” parent rather than just not being a “real bad” parent.
It is not at all clear to me how you derived from my comments that I support a paradigm that, “our primary mission is to take children from ‘bad’ parents.” The system acts as if once it removes children from a “bad” parent or situation that their job is done."
The point of my comments was that while new oversight requirements may have some positive effect, they do not address the fundamental problem that there are not sufficient high quality foster homes to meet the needs of children in care. If we want to improve the quality of care children receive we need to tackle the problem of how we recruit and retain better foster parents. I perhaps should have added we also need to reduce the foster home population by doing a better job of reducing the need to remove children from their parents and getting them back home quicker. My original comments, however, are consistent with your observations, "The system needs to focus on being a “good” parent rather than just not being a “real bad” parent" and "those in the system need to understand that once they take custody or jurisdiction over a child or family their work is just beginning." It is not clear to me why you think we disagree.
* Our online blogs currently are hosted and operated by a third party, namely, Blogger.com. You are now leaving the Cincinnati.Com website and will be linked to Blogger.com's registration page. The Blogger.com site and its associated services are not controlled by Cincinnati.Com and different terms of use and privacy policy will apply to your use of the Blogger.com site and services.
By proceeding and/or registering with Blogger.com you agree and understand that Cincinnati.Com is not responsible for the Blogger.com site you are about to access or for any service you may use while on the Blogger.com site. << Home