invisiblechildren-org

[invisiblechildren-org]

Drilling For Mass Murder & Arming Teachers

All across the country schools are arming teachers and practicing mass shootings and lock downs, traumatizing students & institutionalizing fear.

[invisiblechildren-org]

Race To The Bottom In California

From California, as if life for poor children were not difficult enough, State sponsored Indentured Servitude for children:

Lawsuit Seeks to Stop State Welfare Agencies from Illegally Forcing Children to Repay Money Paid to Parents MarketWatch     November 23, 2011

In a lawsuit filed today in Alameda County Superior Court, two girls, 14 and 19 years old, are asking the Court to call an immediate halt to California’s illegal practice of forcing children to repay the old welfare debts of their parents or guardians.

Please send me related stories.

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk  Info@invisiblechildren.org

 The county was threatening to cut this grant to repay almost $3,000 mistakenly paid to Irene’s mother in 1996-1998. “I don’t understand how the county can come after Irene for a debt that happened when she wasn’t even born,” said Ayers.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawsuit-seeks-to-stop-state-welfare-agencies-from-illegally-forcing-children-to-repay-money-paid-to-parents-2011-11-23

2)  I have spent thousands of hours in the presence of adoptive and foster parents, and only a few minutes of those hours were spent with people that did not need every nickel they had.   What kind of legislator would allow adoption child credits to be eliminated?  Heartless, Nearsighted, Very Spiritual:

Expiring tax credits add new obstacle to adoptions: Fears of ‘chilling effect’ accompany coming loss of financial help

Argus Leader     November 20, 2011

Congress’ financial involvement in encouraging adoptions appears to be nearing an end, a reality that some fear could discourage adoption in this state and country.

Families who adopted a child last year or this year and received more than $13,000 in tax credits because of it — whether they owed federal income tax or not — lose that benefit starting Jan. 1.

http://www.argusleader.com/article/20111121/NEWS/311210016/Expiring-tax-credits-add-new-obstacle-adoptions

3) Kentucky does not want its citizens to know how many deaths & near deaths child welfare is responsible for:

Lawmakers hope to hold hearing about Kentucky child-death records

Herald-Leader  November 17, 2011

http://www.kentucky.com/2011/11/16/1962216/lawmakers-hope-to-hold-hearing.html

KY ranks 41st in Child Poverty, 44th in Teen Deaths, & 42 in Child Abuse Deaths in the most recent collected data.

4)  Oklahoma; Why it’s not the social workers fault when a baby is found in a dumpster:

Expert challenges claims of progress at Oklahoma Department Of Human Services

News On 6  November 16, 2011

The Oklahoma Department of Human Services says it’s gotten better since a federal lawsuit was filed more than three years ago. But its own expert disagrees.

http://www.newson6.com/story/16060540/expert-challenges-claims-of-progress-at-oklahoma-dhs

5)  Pennsylvania (and Every Other State could) discover/s child sex abuse the most under-reported crime in the state.  As a long time guardian ad-Litem, I witnessed the most tragic cases of child sex abuse.  Many cases had years long adult on 4, 5, and 7 year old victims, most of which never were openly reported, none of which ever brought the perpetrator in front of a judge for the crimes committed.  When I wrote the book INVISIBLE CHILDREN  in 2005, there were 897 cases of child sex abuse reported in MN (I was one of 500 guardians, and I knew of 50 cases):

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review  November 18, 2011

Anne Bale, spokeswoman for the Department of Welfare, said on Thursday that the statewide child abuse reporting hot line logged 4,832 calls from Nov. 7-11 — the week after former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was charged with sexually abusing boys for a decade. That’s more than twice the number of calls the hot line receives during an average five-day period, she said.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/regional/s_767938.html

6)  Arizona flinches again at high profile child welfare deaths:

Arizona Republic  November 17, 2011

This is the third effort in the past eight years at some kind of child-welfare overhaul, each spurred by a spate of high-profile child deaths, including several that have been the subject of prior CPS reports.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/2011/11/16/20111116arizona-child-welfare-task-force-cps-past-failures.html

Arizona ranks 46th in births to teen moms, 40th in Late/No Prenatal care, 36th in Child Poverty, 38th in Teen Deaths & 39th in Child Abuse Deaths.

7)   How much money does New Hampshire save when more children are abused?  How much safer are your communities with more abused and neglected children being ignored?  How much better do schools perform with at risk children filling your classrooms (many of them on psychotropic medications and street drugs)?  The citizens will soon find out when services are cut to child protection agencies & service providers. Think Short Term.

NH: Rethinking prevention of child abuse and neglect ; Funding cuts put children & our future at risk

Concord Monitor (New Hampshire)     November 24, 2011

http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/294383/rethinking-prevention-of-child-abuse-and-neglect

  Illinois Catholics deny abused children foster / adoptive homes based on sexual orientation of parents:

Chicago Tribune  November 16, 2011

All religious agencies that declined to accommodate Illinois’ civil union law and refused to license same-sex couples as prospective foster parents no longer provide publicly funded foster care. A day after Catholic Charities across Illinois ended its historic partnership with the state, Evangelical Child and Family Agency in Wheaton confirmed that the state did not renew its foster care contract.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-evangelical-foster-care-gone-20111116,0,159896.story

My experience as a guardian ad-Litem taught me the terrific patience and sensitivity gay and lesbian couples bring to fostering and adopting.

People unfamiliar with the behavioral issues so often brought into the home by foster/adoptive children will find it hard to appreciate the skills it takes to parent and provide a safe home.  It seems wrong to me on several levels that a religious organization, would deny children that have suffered so much from having a family life, especially within a family that knows first-hand rejection, suffering, and the disconnect that comes from not being an accepted part of the family or society.

Religion should help and comfort people, not reject and punish.  We have plenty of that without religion.

From time to time KARA reports and comments on the state of child welfare and non-welfare in different states.

These reports are gleaned from newspapers around the nation with much credit being given to the Child Welfare Information Gateway Library.

Send me your newsworthy stories

RACE TO THE BOTTOM

Below are state Child Well-Being Rankings by Every Child Matters/Geography Matters:

Ranking 50th in births to teen moms and uninsured children: Texas (also 45th in child abuse deaths)

Ranking 50th in child welfare expenditures: South Carolina (also 48th in child mortality)

Ranking 50th in child poverty: Mississippi (also 49th in infant mortality, births to teen moms, and overall ranking)

Ranking 50th in child mortality: Louisiana (and 50th in overall ranking)

Ranking 50th in total tax burden of children well-being Oklahoma (also 48th in child abuse deaths)

Ranking 50th in teen deaths: Alaska (also 49th in child deaths)

Ranking 50th in child deaths: South Dakota (also 49th in juvenile incarceration)

[invisiblechildren-org]

Indiana Child Protection & The Highest Rate of Child Abuse In the Nation

(thank you anonymous Indiana Child Advocate)

This Indychannel.com news article points to Federal statistics showing that Indiana has one of the highest rates of child abuse and neglect in the nation.

“Some child advocates said they’ve seen some progress recently, but others said they are gravely concerned about recent abuse and neglect deaths and what they consider backsliding services”.

It was clear after talking with adoptive and foster families at their annual conference that Indiana’s failure to protect it’s children is due to the politicizing of children’s issues and not the hard work being done by foster & adoptive parents, educators, & social workers that are trying to provide homes, education, and services.

We all know that healthy children become healthy adults & contributing members of our community & that unhealthy children become preteen mothers & juvenile felons that cost our cities and states a fortune over a lifetime.

Wake up Indiana politicians.  Your citizens depend on you to understand basic humanity and economics.

Citizens, wake up your politicians (the children can’t do it without your help).

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate

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More Indiana Children Die From Abuse, Neglect, Report Says

CHILD ADVOCATES CHIDE BACKSLIDE IN CHILDREN’S SERVICES

POSTED: 10:24 am EDT October 31, 2011

UPDATED: 6:46 pm EDT November 1, 2011

INDIANAPOLIS — Federal statistics show that Indiana has one of the highest rates of child abuse and neglect in the nation, though Department of Child Services officials claim their statistics show progress. 

Recent cases of child abuse deaths are indicative of how some Indiana children fall through the cracks, and federal reports obtained by Call 6 Investigator Joanna Massee are counter to DCS claims that the child welfare system is improving.

Some child advocates said they’ve seen some progress recently, but others said they are gravely concerned about recent abuse and neglect deaths and what they consider backsliding services.

Deaths Of Children Spur Concern

The cases of Devin Parsons and Christian Choate highlight what many consider to be the failings of DCS.

Greensburg police found Parsons, 12, fatally beaten in June. His mother, Tasha Parsons, and her boyfriend, Waldo Jones, were subsequently charged with murder.

Randy Parsons, Devin’s great-uncle, said he wasn’t aware of the extent of abuse that police said went on in the boy’s home.

“You just never expect anything like that,” Parsons said, adding that he didn’t realize a DCS employee visited the boy’s home days before his death. “I think the job wasn’t finished.”

Christian Choate, 13, also had a long history with DCS before his death earlier this year. According to the agency’s records, Christian lived in a cage and received regular beatings during the last months of his life.

In May, investigators pulled Christian’s body from a shallow grave in Gary. His father, Riley Choate, and his stepmother, Kimberly Kubina, were charged with murder.

Records obtained by the Call 6 Investigators showed that the families of both children had a long history with DCS.

DCS Director James Payne said he thinks his agency is better at protecting children than ever before, and he cautioned against using child fatalities as a measuring stick.

“First of all, nobody in the system looks at fatalities as a measure of whether or not the system itself is doing a good job in helping protect children,” Payne said. “Often the fatalities occur without any contact before. Often they happen in circumstances that were unpredictable.”

Child Welfare Tracking Systems Inconsistent

Nationwide, child safety workers criticized an inconsistent tracking system for child deaths.

Because federal and state reports cover different time periods, the numbers don’t match, and that means the number of deaths can look like it’s going up in one report and down in another.

For example, the most recent Child Maltreatment Report released by the Department of Health and Human Services showed an increase in the number of child deaths from 2008 to 2009. The federal government counted 34 deaths in 2008 and 50 deaths in 2009. The federal year runs from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30.

The state’s most recent Child Abuse and Neglect Report of Child Fatalities showed a decrease in the number of child deaths from 2008 to 2009. The state government counted 46 deaths in 2008 and 38 deaths in 2009. The state year runs from July 1 through June 30.

Payne said a better way to evaluate the system is to look at statistics, such as fewer children being placed in residential treatment.

“The system is much better now,” Payne said.

DCS is focused on helping children thrive in the home because taking them out is very traumatic, Payne said.

But the cases that involved Devin and Christian indicate that leaving abused and neglected children in a home can also be devastating.

Child Advocates’ Opinion Mixed

Privately, leading child advocates and service providers told Massee they disagree with Payne’s claims that the system is improving. Publicly, they choose their words carefully if they say anything at all, fearing retaliation.

Massee asked Payne if the culture at DCS discourages criticism within the agency.

“I suspect there is at some level,” but not at the executive level, Payne responded.

David Sklar, who leads the Children’s Coalition of Indiana, an organization that works to support and lobby for children and families, said child advocates and service providers fear retaliation for voicing concerns about DCS.

“They’re afraid to advocate for those clients because they’re afraid that the state might look somewhere else to provide those contracts,” Sklar said.

Sklar added that advocates are also concerned that the state is spending fewer dollars on therapeutic services that help address and prevent child abuse and neglect.

“We are starting to see a backslide,” he said.

Last year, DCS gave back nearly $104 million to the state general fund, money that could have been used for children. Payne said the agency did not need the cash.

When Massee asked Payne about these spending decisions, he granted RTV6 unusual access to the agency, adamant that his system is working.

During a roundtable discussion with DCS employees, Massee asked case workers about the difficulties they face on the job.

Supervisor Melissa Clark said she has seen positive changes during her 17 years with DCS, but she also said the work comes with challenges.

“It can be a life and death decision that we’re making,” Clark said. “We do see some turnover. It is a stressful job. It’s emotional. We deal with the crying child that’s being removed from their parent.”

Denise Brightman said she has spent 21 years working with families and worries about making a mistake “every day.”

While workers such as Brightman and Clark can only control the cases assigned to them, State Rep. Bill Crawford, D-Indianapolis, said he is concerned with decisions being made at the top.

Crawford criticized the state’s decision to spend less on services for abused and neglected children in need.

“There are too many child advocates from around the state of Indiana who are crying foul,” Crawford said.

Child advocates said the unspent funds could be used for services such as counseling for young abuse victims, clothing and food for foster kids and toward other services for families, such as those in which Christian and Devin once belonged.

Speaking privately, one leading child advocate told Massee, “This needs to be a call to action. The system will succeed when the private sector and public sector work together.”

[invisiblechildren-org]

Foster Children V Psychotropic Medications (1/3)

A MN juvenile court judge shared the medication histories of all the very young children that passed through her courtroom over a years time. It was staggering.

The investigation in Georgia I estimate to indicate low to average use of mind altering medications for children in child protection systems.

These drugs are used to subdue children. More often than not the necessary therapies are non existent and the children suffer because of it. I have personally experienced the fully formed thoughts of suicide delivered by psychotropic medications when I was forced to take Topamax for migraine headache.

I have visited four year olds in suicide wards, and been asked by children in my caseload to please not make them take these drugs & I have written about the 7 year old foster boy that explained why Prozac drove him to hang himself (and leave a note saying so).

There is a growing body of evidence that therapy is critical in the event children are forced to take psychotropics.

Atlanta Journal Constitution article on the overuse of psychotropic medications on foster children;

http://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-politics-elections/georgia-launching-review-of-921678.html

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate

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By April Hunt The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Georgia taxpayers stand to save millions — and help foster children in the process — under a new review being developed for the medications given to kids in care.

A national foundation focused on child welfare is footing at least $75,000 of the bill to figure out the best way to conduct an independent clinic exam of children taking mind-altering drugs.

Better oversight of antidepressants, mood stabilizers and other psychotropic medications given to foster children is expected to reduce their usage — and their hefty price tag.

“You are going to save money, and you’re going to provide good medical care,” said Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver, D-Decatur.

The state spends $7.87 million a year on psychotropic medications, according to Medicaid records. More than a third of foster children are prescribed the drugs, compared with about 4 percent of the general youth population.

Oliver first tried to tackle the problem with a bill this past legislative session. Republicans and Democrats lauded the idea but raised questions about how to pay for setting up a program.

House Bill 23 was put on hold, open for review next year, once it became clear that Casey Family Programs would step forward with money to develop the pilot program.

The foundation is also providing staff to work with state mental health experts and child advocates to figure out what should flag a review, such as children on multiple medications that do the same thing or children too young to be on certain drugs.

“All too often medications can be the first and only solution, and that in and of itself isn’t a solution,” said Page Walley, a clinical psychologist who heads Casey’s strategic consulting arm. “Georgia is really taking the lead on this and could create a system that can be repeated across the nation.”

Those working on the system are expected to develop a draft plan by late summer. The team includes Human Services Commissioner Clyde Reese, Melissa Carter of the Barton Child Law and Policy Center at Emory University, and Michelle Barclay with the state Supreme Court.

Gov. Nathan Deal, himself a former juvenile court judge, also has met with the team and expressed an interest in the issue.

“The governor looks forward to seeing how [this] unfolds,” Deal spokeswoman Stephanie Mayfield said.

That level of attention alone could lead to changes. Georgia has so far avoided a high-profile death like that of a 7-year-old foster boy who killed himself in Florida while taking three powerful psychotropic medications. None of the drugs Gabriel Myers was on had had been approved for use in children.

Still, a 2010 investigation by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution revealed several companies operating foster care homes in the state had repeatedly used psychotropic medications to “subdue” children.

“If anything, we’ve now got people talking about how a child ends up on a third medication or what it means to be on multiple drugs,” Barclay said. “It’s a starting point. We’re going to experiment and see how far it goes.”

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[invisiblechildren-org]

Universal Rights Of The Child; All Talk No Action

There are two nations (of the 196 nations in the world) that have not ratified the Universal Rights of the Child.  Somalia and America.

Somalia, because it has no functioning government, and the U.S. because we will not stop training child soldiers*.

Americans are proud of and outspoken about spirituality, values, and freedom – making proclamations about human rights, women’s rights, and so on.

My twelve years in County child protection as a volunteer guardian ad-Litem (Court Appointed Special Advocate/CASA) has taught me hard lessons.

Beaten children, sexually abused children, starved and neglected children enter the child protection system every day.  Three million children a year are reported to child protection services in America.

Their numbers and stories are staggering.  It is so painful and so common.

We do not offer adequate help or protection to children that need it the most.

Worse, we don’t like to talk about it.  There is nothing that brings cold hard silence to a conversation than talking about my experiences with child sexual abuse or otherwise traumatized children.

When there is no discussion by those in the know,  few people outside the system can understand the issues which means the media and politicians that could draw attention don’t (or they are mixed up in their understanding and speaking which is actually worse).

So nothing changes.  In fact, during these lean times, programs for abused and neglected children are disappearing all over our nation and things are getting worse.   Our Voices Matter was powerful program that allowed foster and adoptive kids a voice has recently disappeared due to lack of support.  Many truly useful organizations are disappearing today because we don’t support children that need help the most.

From the courts, social workers, CASA programs, & health and other resources, to the foster and adoptive parents that work so hard to make life bearable for traumatized youth, child protection systems throughout this country are overwhelmed and unable to provide the services these children need.

Until I became part of the system, I had no idea that that 90% of the youth in juvenile Justice came through child protection, or that over 50% of youth in juvenile justice suffered from mental health issues with fully half that number diagnosed with multiple and severe mental health problems (the  same is most likely true of children in child protection).

Without professional help, how do you un-teach drug use or sex habits to a 9 year old that has been forced to practice these things at home?

My first visit to a four year old was at the suicide ward at Fairview hospital.  I’ve written about a seven year old foster child that hung himself and left a note (he hated the Prozac).   There is nothing like facing a very young self-hating, suicidal child to bring home the cold hard reality that the mental health services, consistent help from the county (her new parent) will not be there.  Knowing that her chances of recovering to lead a normal life are very, very, slim.  This has made me feel like I’m part of a crime.

As long as we don’t talk about it, no one can know about it.  Social workers are trained to not talk about it.  These children have NO Voice in the substance and direction of their own lives.  They suffer every day all day and we don’t want to hear about it.

Whether you are an abused child, foster/adoptive parent/social or health worker; empower yourself to start this conversation (and tell your friends/family to vote for child friendly initiatives**).

LET’S START TALKING

Support KARA’s efforts;  sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk

[invisiblechildren-org]

America's Children Occupy Wall Street

As states struggle, children’s issues are being politicized & our youngest citizens are being left out of the discussion in growing numbers.

Children have no lobby, no voice, & can’t fight back when a MN Governor* states that “children that are victims of failed personal responsibility are not my problem, nor are they the problem of the State Of Minnesota”.

There’s nothing a five year old can say to the governor of Indiana about the elimination of the state’s newborn screening fund (paid for by birth fees collected from parents), or the retroactive termination of adoption subsidies to the five hundred families that adopted special need children based on the promise that they would have assistance for their special needs children.

I doubt that a nine year old could clearly explain the problem facing California foster children because 1,000 state-licensed facilities match sex offenders’ addresses;

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/27/us/california-sex-offenders/

Will Nebraska’s five or ten year old old foster children be allowed to speak to the governor or at the state house about the total collapse of the states’s Privatized Child & Family Services, or what it is like to be abandoned by your birth family and the county in the same year?

http://www.northplattebulletin.com/index.asp?show=news&action=readStory&storyID=21588&pageID=3

More & more states are finding it useful to abdicate their responsibility to children & blame cost savings, immigrants, alcohol, or any number of flimsy excuses for why the government should not intervene.

The other industrialized nations are far more child friendly and a significant number of American states now compare unfavorably with third world nations.

Please share your ideas with KARA, Kids At Risk Action for making a louder, clearer voice for America’s children.  Pass this on to your friends & people you think should be more aware.  Submit your comments about what works and doesn’t work in your community.

*Tim Pawlenty

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate

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[invisiblechildren-org]

Child Abuse - You & Me

In 2005, there were 897 cases of child sex abuse reported in the state of MN.  I knew this because I was a volunteer guardian ad-Litem in MN & writing a book about it, INVISIBLE CHILDREN.

I was only one of five hundred MN guardians IN 2005, and knew this number to be just a fraction of the true number as I personally counted fifty sexually abused children in my caseload & the court system I was working in at the time.

Here’s what I’ve learned about child sex abuse in Minnesota & how it applies to child sex abuse at Penn State.

1)       No One Wants To Talk About It.  Even trained social workers are uncomfortable with this topic and reporting it can mean the fall-out impacting them – it’s easier to let it go.  I have witnessed non-reporting & under-reporting by people working in the field of policing, education, child protection & a friend who admitted years after the fact that he lived near a five year old girl that was being prostituted.  I tell the story in my book of a seven year old girl that was prostituted and not taken out of the home during 48 police calls to her home.

2)     No One Understands.  Very few people understand the lifelong impact the rape of a child has on that child and the adult that child becomes.  Suicides and dysfunctional lifelong lifestyles are common to untreated child rape victims. I have visited 4 year old’s in suicide wards & written about a 7 year old who hung himself and left a note.

3)      This May Surprise You; Our courts are almost incapable of dealing with child rape.  Children make a less than useless witnesses in their own defense.  Brain development of a child guarantees that a good defense attorney will “confuse the witness” which destroys the case.  I have attended conferences at both William Mitchell law school & Hamline University on this topic and listened to judges & prosecuting attorneys (the child’s defender) also admit to confusing the witness in these cases. *In none of the child rape cases in my caseload (about 25) were the molesters ever brought to trial (because the child is not a useful witness – no witness, no case).  If it is not seen and reported (it did not happen—see the problem?)

I predict that many of Jerry Sandusky’s sodomized victims will not come forward because of the serious stigma attached to rape and sex abuse in this nation.

A friend bought me lunch when I wrote INVISIBLE CHILDREN and told me why he had never talked about and would never report his being molested by a priest when he was a young boy.  He also told me what it was like to discover at age 45 the impact of that rape and how it had wrecked two marriages and three business partnerships before he realized his need for help.  He began therapy at 45 & now 70, still seeing the same therapist.

Americans don’t like to talk about sex in even a healthy manner & will further punish people that come forward to talk about it.  Boys almost never do, and only a small percentage of women do.  The stigma is real & we fear becoming part of a messy deal.  Then there’s the history of blaming the victim (even when she’s seven years old) makes reporting so much harder than it should be – see Penn State.

Children don’t have much of a chance in America.

Molesters like Sandusky destroy the lives of hundreds of children over their lifetime.  The child remains severely damaged year after year until help comes from somewhere (usually nowhere). I’ve said about several of the sex abuse children in my caseload that this child has never had a nice day in her life.

Anxiety, terror, Prozac & Ritalin are predictable parts of the life of an abused child.  They feel dirty and often blame themselves for the crime.  Not being able to function normally in school makes life miserable and too often criminal orsexually active & a preteen mother or father.  Just how does one un-teach sexual behavior to a nine year old without professional help?

Predicting the impact in human life years for each Sandusky type abuser, using my 70 year old friend as an example, if only 33 of my friends years are considered (from age 12 to 45), multiplied by just 100 victims (not a high estimate in a case like Sandusky’s) = 3300 years of damage & pain that is rarely reported and even more rarely treated.

In my 12 active years as a guardian ad-Litem, there was almost no effective therapy for the sexually abused children I worked with.

One sad family of four very young and sexually abused children, each had to be placed in separate foster homes because when they were together, the children would sexualize their behavior & at the time, nothing could be done about that.  These children were terribly abused in their birth homes & again by a court system that offered them a fig leaf.  The molester was left in the home and continued his evil behaviors.  The pain these children suffered was immense; the molester once kicked the seven year old so hard she went into convulsions.

How many children had been victimized by Sandusky before 1998 when he was first questioned by police for molesting a boy in a shower?  How many children did he molest from 1998 to today?

Child sex abuse in our communities  is a huge problem that affects many of the three million children reported to child protection services in America each year.  Cases like Sandusky are rarely identified and even more rarely reported.

Millions of children are impacted for life and this will continue until you and I began to better understand its impact and find our voice for reporting and helping children recover.

*I’ve had extensive arguments with a judge & my supervisor about a singular violent and extended rape of young children in a family and the cruelty of leaving this molester in the home (8 years later he was still practicing his criminal behaviors on a four year old boy).

**National  Center For Victims Of Crime www.ncvc.org

info@invisiblechildren.org

www.invisiblechildren.org

[invisiblechildren-org]

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2011/12/19/30-2-of-americas-youth-arrested-before-their-23rd-birthday/

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/us/nearly-a-third-of-americans-are-arrested-by-23-study-says.html?_r=1&hpw

Add this to the fact that American youth (as young as 11) are routinely charged as adults (25% nationally) and that cities around the nation arrest extremely high percentages of their minority populations (in 2001 Hennepin County – Minneapolis MN) arrested 44% of it’s adult Black Men – no duplicate arrests/58% of those men were rearrested for a second crime within two years making Minneapolis the Jail & Prison capital of the world.

Many states have funded their prison and jail systems at far greater rates of increase than their schools, daycare, or health systems, any of which could reduce the stresses driving the extreme growth in crime and courts.

A pathological lack of empathy is driving parts of our political body and ensures that generation after generation of dysfunctional families will continue to maintain the statistical truth that the U.S. has five percent of the world’s population and twenty five percent of the world’s prison population.  This scorched earth capitalism is now converting jails, prisons, and juvenile detention centers to money making operations with the attendant problems of brutal and illegal conditions(that have sent some judges to prison).

Add that to the mental health issues addressed in the thirty years of study conducted by Dr. Bruce Perry & his conclusion that 25% of Americans will be special needs people by the end of this generation, & the Federal Reserve Boards study and argument for investing in children begins to look like a pretty good return on capital (not to mention it’s the right thing to do).

Not addressing these issues can only continue to make our streets dangerous, schools fail, and quality of life a shadow of what it has been.

Support day care, educators, social workers and early child initiatives.  Make mental health programs a mainstay of the juvenile justice system.  It is a proven improvement over the punishment model.

Please send me related stories.

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk info@invisiblechildren.org

[invisiblechildren-org]

Indiana Fails Its Children-49th out of 50 State

I was impressed with the tenacity and commitment of Indiana’s foster and adoptive parents in the face of this state’s mean spirited children’s politics.

The evening before my talk I listened to story after story of the “fluid” nature of Department of Child Services policy, families not being allowed to question decisions or policy for fear of being blackballed, and what it’s like to watch long established, workable policies disappear to be replaced by whimsy and bullying.

Many families voiced that they were not allowed to get together and hold foster/adoption discussions without DCS present. This sounds like a constitutional violation of free speech to me (if you know an attorney, i think it is a fair question, or call Bob Olson, 651-690-3494)

On Saturday morning, at the end of my talk, there were more written questions than we could respond to, but it was perfectly clear that almost everyone had strong feelings about Indiana’s public policy about abused and neglected children being based on political ideology.

The State of Indiana today feels it a better investment to pay $75/day per inmate in its prison system than to pay foster families any more than $18/ day support fees for its children.

It is hard to feed a child for $18/ day and anything extra becomes a real burden to most Hoosier families. Is this what we think of children in America? Not my America.

Dear Indiana legislators, please recognize that most adoptive and foster families don’t come from the top one percent (see Wall Street Protesting).

I found it difficult to believe that the state’s newborn screening fund, collected from birth fees paid by parents, has been captured by the governor & directed back into the general fund instead of providing services and supplies for infants with birth disorders?

How cold and cruel are your state legislators?

How could Indiana retroactively terminate adoption subsidies to the five hundred families that adopted special needs children based on the promise that they would have assistance for their special needs children?

Ethically and economically, these are terrible decisions that will cost Indiana children & citizens for many years to come.

Before these cuts Indiana Ranked almost last, 49th out of the 50 states in not supporting child welfare, 37th in child mortality, 47th in juvenile incarceration, 32nd in child death from ages 1 to 14, & 33rd In births to teen moms (As listed by Child Well Being, Geography Matters).

We are the people that once were the middle class, now being pounded on to make this nation work and bring it back to where it can be a friendly, safe place to live.

We know that healthy children become healthy citizens and that every cost benefit analysis shows conclusively that subsidizing healthy children is a far better investment than subsidizing malls or prisons.

It’s not only the ethical & right thing to do, it is the most economically sound, ethical, and right thing to do.

Thank you Indiana foster & adoption families for your commitment to the weakest and most vulnerable among us.

The tide will turn as the community wakes up to these serious & costly injustices to bring back a more child friendly public policy for Hoosier children. Support the Indiana Foster Care & Adoption Association in its efforts to bring Change to IndianaPass this on – written speech below –

Good morning, It is great to be here,

Speaking for abused and neglected children is one of the most important things that I do. Spreading critical information to raise awareness is a big first step in bring change to a troubled system.

Abused and neglected Children have no voice in the homes they are raised in, the courts that rule their lives, or the justice system that so many of them spend the rest of their days trying to Stay out of.

Children are not able to object when politicians use children’s issues as a political football. Did you know that social workers are trained not To Speak about child protection issues outside of their work day, and it appears that no one is allowed to criticize Indiana DCS.

No one talked or wrote about the 4 year old girl I visited in the suicide ward at Fairview hospital or her 7 year old sister with a vocabulary of fifty words that was kicked so hard by her 200 pound sex abuser that she went into convulsions.

After 12 years as an active volunteer GAL I’ve come to know hundreds of at risk children, adoptive & foster parents, teachers, social & healthcare workers, judges & juvenile justice workers.

I’ve met allot of great people trying hard to improve the lives of at risk children with little help, few resources, & almost no appreciation. Individually, we can feel overwhelmed by a cold system – I believe that together we can have an impact and bring the badly need change to how at risk children are treated in this state.

Abused and neglected children have no lobby, the media doesn’t understand them, and our own community and politicians don’t seem to care about their needs.

This lack of awareness is why the people, programs, and policies that could make a difference in their lives go unfunded WHILE the jails continue to fill, schools to fail, & communities to suffer.

We here in this room, can explain to our friends, our networks, politicians & media, our stories and the economic and social costs of bad public policy.

Nothing was made public about the 4 year old boy who was removed from his perfectly fine foster home by a judge and sent to live with the man who had a court order to stay away from young boys because of what he did to them.

Andy was tied to a bed, sexually abused, beaten, starved, and left alone for days at a time for four years before child protection services intervened in his life; only after a teacher reported his full body bruises.

He is still my friend 15 years later… he has AIDS and never received the mental health services that could have helped him lead a normal life.

The judge that gave Andy back to his father thought he was saving the county foster care money when in reality, Andy has gone on to cost the county millions of dollars in institutionalization and mental health services,

Not counting the pain and suffering HE has brought to so many of the people that have come into his life

OR THE FACT THAT ANDY WILL CONTINUE TO BE A SIGNIFICAN COST TO THE COUNTY AS LONG AS HE LIVES.

So not only was this a huge ethical and perhaps criminal failure on the part of my counties child protection system, it would have saved the state millions of dollars to treat the boy fairly. If more politicians understood this, children would be safer & counties more prosperous.

We are all mixed up when we think we’re saving money by not providing children with help and better options while they are still young.

America’s institutions are now creating exactly the opposite of what they were designed for and we are all suffering because of it.

Friends, this is a civil rights issue and a communications issue.

These children cannot speak for themselves AND WE MUST SPEAK FOR THEM… that’s why I’m here today.

IT IS Because Social workers are trained to not speak of child protection outside of their work-day That,

No one knows about MY CLIENT, the prostituted 7 year old who was left with her drug addicted prostitute mother even after 48 police calls to her home, or what the juvenile officer on the case said to me when I asked why.

Because there are no beat reporters at the Newspapers due to budget cuts, NO ONE understood why the 18 month old baby girl drowned in the bathtub after 11 police calls to her home… several reporters called me for an explanation, but the media went on to blame the social workers instead of our understaffed and under-resourced child protection system that I had spoken of.

A few months ago when a MN teenager stole the family car and drove to Iowa and pointlessly murdered two clerks… his mother was crucified in the press even though she had spent ten years trying to get her SON mental health care with no luck.

Instead of concentrating on the people, programs, and policies that would make these horrible events less likely to happen we attack the caregivers & the people doing the work while politicians make political hay blaming teachers, SOCIAL WORKERS, and the VERY institutions they are SUPPOSTED TO BE SUPPORTING.

Rather than openly discussing the issues seeking better answers, we are all caught up in blaming the people doing the work & making children’s lives and our communities more dangerous and unhappy.

Today there’s a new mental health center in Red Lake MN; but it was not there the day Jeff Weiss wrote about suicide and homicide and how his mother wished he’d never been born, or how the Prozac made him crazy just a few days before he murdered his grandfather and fourteen others and took his own life.

He too had been asking for help for a long time. The center was built in response to Jeff’s tragedy just months after the violence occurred. The community agreed completely that the NEW MENTAL HEALTH center was necessary and had no trouble finding the money to build it.

Most of us in this room know what needs to change but we don’t know how to make change happen. We are so busy providing care and safety to children that there just doesn’t seem to time for anything else and we don’t feel that individually we can make a big difference in public policy.

We all experience how frustrating it is — to be a part of or work with underfunded programs AND overworked service providers. We are afraid of speaking out for fear of being blacklisted by a harsh and unfair system that changes its policies based on the current administrations political ideology.

This is not fair to children, nor is it fair to the families that raise them.

WE WATCH the steady stream of at risk children slip through the cracks – into preteen pregnancy and the JUSTICE SYSTEM.

The media’s confusion, politicians dis-interest, and public apathy is why there is a lack of funding and support for early childhood programs, reasonable foster care rates, day care, & mental health SERVICES for children.

Perhaps I’m an optimist, but I believe that it is this basic MISUNDERSTANDING that explains why millions of America’s non-birth family caregivers get so little support for the serious problems facing the children they care for.

What should be a central theme of media concentration & public policy discussion INSTEAD is printed IN the back pages of the newspaper until a baby is found beaten to death and then RATHER THAN SUPPORTING programs that would lessen the potential for that act to be repeated, we blame social workers and build one more jail cell.

MN’s PREVIOUS governor TIM PAWLENTY has stated that, “children that are the victims of failed personal responsibility are not my problem nor are they the problem of the state of MN”

Wording much like this is part of his political party’s public policy platform. There should be no question as to which party is trying to dissolve the safety net for children in this nation.

Compared to the rest of the industrialized world, those 23 other nations with 200 year old democracies and solid infrastructures, America has fallen behind in almost all the quality of life indices for children these past 20 years.

A number of U.S. states are now comparable to third world nations in teen deaths, child mortality, child poverty and juvenile incarceration. We now lead the whole world in juvenile crime & sexually transmitted diseases among our youth.

Federally, the “Imminent Harm Doctrine” is the only law that protects children in America. This statute allows children whose lives are in imminent danger to be removed from a home. Because of this, children spend far too long in abusive and neglectful homes without services or a chance to escape.

WE NEED TO DO MORE TO PROTECT CHILDREN FROM VIOLENCE AND DEPRIVATION.

The World Health Organization defines torture as extended exposure to violence and deprivation.

Too many children in America live for years in abusive homes and suffer from extended exposure to violence and deprivation. We are just now beginning to fully understand the life-long consequences of child abuse. Did you know that;

Children in the child protection system suffer from post-traumatic stress at twice the rate soldiers returning from Iraq do.

MN Supreme Court Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz has stated that 90% of the youth in juvenile justice have passed through child protection in MN.

Nationally, 50 to 75% of the youth in juvenile justice suffer from diagnosable mental illness & that fully half of that number have multiple, chronic, and serious diagnosis.

Almost all adult felons have passed through juvenile justice .

The reason I talk about this is that Marion Wright Edelman Founder of the Children’s Defense Fund, has been telling us for years that the majority of At Risk Children are in a pipeline to prison. Few of us know how serious this is; 80% of youth aging out of foster care are leading dysfunctional lives.

The United States has 5% of the world’s population & almost 25% of the world’s prison population

25% of America’s juvenile offenders are tried as adults.

As far as guns & getting shot; it’s safer to be an on duty cop in America than it is a teenager.

I am convinced our citizens and politicians simply don’t understand the depth and scope of the problem, nor the economic and social consequences of not supporting early childhood programs, daycare, and early learning.

We, who work with, live with and love at risk children must become empowered to be a voice for children if change is going to happen.

We must learn to speak with a clear and unified voice to represent the children that have no voice.

Until we understand and bring voice to the problems of abused & neglected children, the media will continue to blame social workers when a baby is found in a dumpster, jail & prison cells will be built instead of classrooms & our communities will remain high crime areas.

In a move much like just happened under past Governor Pawlenty in MN, your Governor has cut over a hundred million dollars from child services and diverted the money to pay bonuses to state workers that slashed programs.

20 million dollars was taken from the Healthy Families Program leaving over 4400 first time parents of at risk children without support services; A PROGRAM PROVEN TO BE 95% EFFECTIVE IN HELPING NEW PARENTS SUCCEED.

Thousands of Hoosier children will not be receiving mental health or addiction services, abused and neglected children will be left in the home without treatment or counseling and reducing education spending by more than 300 million dollars leaves many kindergarten classes at 1/2 day and INDIANA schools will continue to struggle for the most basic necessities. How could the Indiana’s state newborn screening fund, collected from birth fees paid by parents, be directed back into the general fund instead of providing services and supplies for infants with birth disorders?

How could Indiana retroactively Terminate adoption subsidies to the 500 families that adopted special needs children based on the promise that they would have assistance for their special needs children?

Ethically and Economically these are terrible decisions that will cost Indiana children & citizens for many years to come.

Before these cuts Indiana Ranked almost last, 49th out of the 50 states in not supporting child welfare, 37th in child mortality, 47th in juvenile incarceration, 32nd in child death from ages 1 to 14, & 33rd In births to teen moms (As listed by Child Well Being, Geography Matter).

The U.S. Federal Reserve bank, under Art Rolnick IN MN, studied the economics of early learning and proved that the return on investment for early childhood programs are far better than subsidizing real estate or businesses (or giving bonuses to state workers for cutting needed programs).

There is no question that early childhood programs provide counties, cities, and states real savings and healthier citizens.

So why was one of my last official duties as a GAL was to remove 4 young children from a father who was guilty of nothing other than not being able to afford day care? Because our last governor redirected those dedicated funds back into the general fund.

WHICH MADE SUBSIDIZED DAYCARE ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE TO OBTAIN IN MN.

Did my state think it was saving money by forcing these children into foster homes rather than helping a poor working man pay for day care?

I’m a businessman; I’ve run the numbers and it costs way more money to take children out of the home and place them in foster homes than it does to help dad with day care payments, and it makes the families lives broken and miserable.

This was just like the false savings the judge thought would come from taking Andy out of a perfectly fine foster home & giving him to his criminally abusive father & WHAT REALLY HAPPENED DESTROYED THE BOY & COST THE COUNTY MILLIONS OF DOLLARS.

It’s not only morally reprehensible and the wrong thing to do, it is the most expensive, morally reprehensible and wrong thing to do.

Our institutions are now creating exactly the opposite of what they were designed to create. Before I leave this slide, I would like to draw your attention to the resource websites listed and say a few words about them;

www.Aha.mn

(Adoptees Have Answers) a national program with terrific model in MN… worth study and consideration; Involves the youth & families in powerful networks and programs & communication. Wonderful people & a powerful program for adoptive and foster families.

www.AVAhealth.org (Academy on Violence & Abuse) founded by an emergency room doctor who recognized that most of his emergency room patients had been abused children. Dr. Bruce Perry Study; 25% of Americans to be special needs people by the end of this generation…

www.invisiblechildren.org KARA Kids At Risk Action (KARA) public advocacy for abused and neglected children.

Your networking connection to Indiana Foster and Adoption resources.

www.ifcaa.org Is Your organization…, join it.

Please raise your voices and become a member of the Indiana Foster care & Adoption Association

Use these resources to find information and to get our message out. Tell your friends and circles of influence that you need their support & share this information with them. By all means communicate between conferences.

NOTE; You will find source material for what I have said here today both at the invisiblechildren.org blog and also in theINVISIBLECHILDREN book that you can download for free on the website, or borrow one of the copies I have provided for my talk today.

(Transition; 2 slides), Mental health,

like it’s meant to be talked about… like any other health. How to get it, how to keep it. DR READ SULEK SAYS IT WELL;

Transition; children coping,

JUDGE Heidi schellhas,

Early in my GAL career, Judge Shellhas shared with me pages and pages of psychotropic drugs proscribed to 5, 7, & 9 year olds in her courtroom over a one year period…  She was very disturbed by this trend and we know that this policy is dangerous and needs to change.

Dr Read Sulek.The ability to cope as the best definition of mental health;

Dr. Sulek HAS created a 3 part, economically sound model for providing mental health care to schools.

It is A TERRIFIC NATIONAL MODEL… INSTEAD;

Because of lack of funding, MOST CHILDREN ARE PRESCRIBED PSYCHOTROPIC MEDICATIONS WITH LITTLE OR NO THERAPY TODAY.

33% of Georgia Foster Youth on psychotropics,

Most states would find this to be a fair estimate if they were too keep track also.

Many states have abandoned mental health services for children, more and more states are now sending all MISBEHAVING HIGH SCHOOL youth to jail INSTEAD OF TO THE COUNSELORS OFFICE for help with behavior problems.

Transitiion; Because of the media’s misunderstanding &the politicians willingness to make children’s issues into cold hard politics, there is confusion, distraction, deprecating, dividing and blaming where there should be cooperation & concern for three year olds living in dangerous circumstances.

We must stand up to those politicians that are making political hay on the backs of children’s issues.

WE NEED TO BE UNITED AND SUPPORTIVE OF THE PEOPLE DOING THE WORK AND NOT REWARD THOSE WHO ARE deliberately misleading and destructive & furthering their political careers at the cost of thousands of young lives.

THERE IS Not a religion in the world that abandons the weakest and most vulnerable among us.

Recruit your friends to this cause.

Transition; These Key issues ARE written about extensively on the invisiblechildren.org website;

AS A PEOPLE WE DON’T LIKE TO TALK ABOUT;

1) Torture/Trauma/MENTAL HEALTH, SEX ABUSE,

THE World health org DEFINES TORTURE AS; EXTENDED EXPOSTURE TO VIOLENCE AND DEPRIVATION

MN IS NOW investigating 202 violent child deaths THIS LAST YEAR; over half OF THEM WERE beaten or shaken to death… SOME OF YOU MAY REMEMBER THE Boy who died locked in a cage HERE IN INDIANA last year;

ALMOST ALL STATES ARE SUFFERING BIG INCREASES IN EARLY CHILD HOMICIDE & ACCIDENTAL DEATH.

DID YOU KNOW THAT 10% OF ALL SEVERE CHILD BURNS ARE DELIBERATELY INFLICTED?

2) Ready to learn vs. ready to FAIL,

Why are per child education costs HIGHER IN U.S. ? BECAUSE more and more OF AMERICA’S CHILDREN ARE NOT READY TO LEARN when they get to school. Until this changes the costs will continue to rise and schools will continue to fail. Don’t blame the teachers.

Weigh the cost of doubling down on the cost of teaching reading to third graders… (my volunteer work began when I saw several states using failed 3RD GRADE READING TEST SCORES to predict the need for prison space ten years out).

75% of inmates illiterate, ALMOST 20 % COMPLETELY ILLITERATE; We know the economic and social costs of not graduating & that being able to read by the 3rd grade is critical to making it in school and making it in life.

Better and more available daycare and supporting education are critical if this is to be solved.

3) Pschotropics vs. Therapy,

Ritalin is a cocaine derivative that was banned in Sweden in 1968 because of suicides.

In America, psychotropic medications seem to be about all we have to offer troubled youth as there are virtually no mental health services available in most states.

Like in OHIO, all misbehaving youth are sent to jail.

In 2005, when I wrote the book INVISIBLECHILDREN, there were only13 child psychiatrists in my entire state – with one of them practicing in my county.

SHE WAS TERRIBLY OVERWHELMED AND COULD ONLY PROVIDE brief periods of her time to 5, 7, & 9 year olds that had been raped and beaten.

In most systems, the COUNTY PAYS RIDICULOUSLY LOW RATES AND THEN DOESN’T PAY THE BILL on time or in full.

Many service providers have just quit being available where they are most needed.

There is a huge need for consistent and high quality mental health services for youth in America. It would pay for itself in just a few years; our children deserve better.

Missouri model/Children’s Defense Fund reference.

4) Punishment model vs. Restorative Justice & studies that should be explained to every policy maker;

On the invisiblechildren.ORG website, our Century College volunteer intern David mast Wrote about a study of 254 youth that committed 220,000 crimes over 12 months, THINK ABOUT this is stunning…. What is this costing our community?

In the Ramsey County ACE study4 YEARS AGO, over 70% of the violent and serious crime caused by youth IN ST PAUL MN, were committed by juveniles from fewer than 4% of the families within the community.

We know who these children are and what they need, it would be much better investment to help them gain the skills they need to live rather than preparing them for a lifetime of incarceration.

I have written extensively on the fact that 25% of American juveniles are tried as adults in the U.S. EACH YEAR.

THIS MEANS THAT 200,000 youth ARE tried IN THE CRIMINIAL JUSTICE SYSTEM.. each year, ONCE THEY ENTER THE SYSTEM most of them remain forever.

WE ARE building Too many prisons and not enough schools and health services. THE PRISON LOBBY IS STRONG. The children’s lobby is us. WE MUST GET STRONG

Economics of failure;

Nebraska tried to privatize its entire child protection system and failed completely just last month, with devastating results for the children of Nebraska.

A FEW MONTHS AGO, A Pennsylvania JUDGE was sentenced to many years in prison for receiving payments for each juvenile he committed to THE STATE’S privatized detention system (many if not most of the youth he sentenced were innocent). HE RUINED MANY YOUNG LIVES. The judge’s prison sentence will not benefit the incarcerated youth or change their lives.

PRIVATIZING CHILD PROTECTION, JUVENILE JUSTICE & CRIMINAL JUSTICE APPEARS TO BE A DANGEROUS TREND IN OUR NATION.

I have many stories of abusive privatized juvenile system failures in MN and am convinced that unless facilities are well monitored, staffs better trained, and management not directed by political ideology or religious beliefs, that children will continue to suffer as I have experienced in child protection as a CASA guardian ad-Litem.

Two of my stories are absolutely indefensible near death experiences for my child clients while in the custody of private care providers.

ONE, A 35 MILE WALK HOME IN A T SHIRT ON A 10 DEGREE NIGHT BECAUSE HE WAS CAST OUTSIDE FOR SWEARING (HE WAS AND IS MENTALLY CHALLANGED), this organization was staffed by undereducated and undertrained young people grossly unqualified for the work they were doing.

THE SECOND EXAMPLE WAS A SUICIDE WATCH FACILITY THAT LIED TO ME ABOUT ITS EXPERTISE AND ABILITY TO DEAL WITH SUICIDE AND INSTEAD OF HELPING A SUICIDAL YOUTH, MADE HIS LIFE MUCH WORSE. This was a religious organization that put its own ideology in front of the needs of the child.

CHILD PROTECTION is a public health crisis & needs to be treated as such;

Dr. Bruce Perry is right 25% of Americans will be special needs people by the end of this generation (I personally believe that it has already happened).

Each new generation of abused and neglected children are now parenting their own next generation of at risk children…,

We must ask our policy makers, WHAT DOES 30 to 40 years of institutionalization COST? WHAT IS THE cost of crime IN AMERICA EACH YEAR? 1.6 trillion is the insurance industries estimate in insurable losses.

JUST A FEW IMPORTANT FINAL FACTS BEFORE I MOVE ONTO WHAT WE CAN DO TO change all this.

In my homestate, MINNESOTA, our share of Iraq war is twenty six Billion dollars OVER THE NEXT 2 YEARS, THIS IS money that we have.

BUT WE DID NOT HAVE 6 Billion dollars FOR OUR SCHOOLS, ROADS, CHILDREN, AND HEALTH CARE THIS LAST LEGISLATIVE SESSION.

David strand, a KARA board member, has ACTUALLY made public policy on children’s issues in Finland OVER A TEN YEAR PERIOD WHILE HE LIVED THERE….and he talks about the huge difference

BETWEEN HOW THE REST OF THE INDUSTRIALIZED WORLD TREATS CHILDREN & HOW AMERICA IS TREATING its children

THE DANES HAVE DENTAL CHAIRS IN THIRD GRAD CLASSROOMS, SUBSIDIES FOR CHILDREN TO INSURE SAFETY, AND A GOOD EDUCATION, HEALTHCARE AND MENTAL HEALTH CARE ARE FREE FOR CHILDREN in most ADVANCED nations,

Did you know that; Day care workers are among the lowest paid workers in America?

Earning about the same as food service workers THAT ARE THE LOWEST PAID WORKERS IN THE U.S.

(in the rest of the industrialized world day care workers are well respected, well qualified, and well paid for the work they do enhancing the lives of their nation’s children). The current assault on teachers & the dismantling of unions is a terrible development.

Think about it; Foster and adoptive families are being denigrated by the same politicians, who are blaming teachers for a failing education system and social workers when a baby is found dead or brutalized.

All because they won’t support the institutions these people must work in. What’s it like to be a teacher with 3 or 4 very troublesome Prozac children in a classroom of 35 or 40 students and not be able to control a classroom?

What’s it like to oversee twenty or thirty very troubled families as a social worker and have bad things happen?

What’s it like to have very disturbed foster children in a foster or adoptive home and worry about violence or terrible behavior problems with no help from the county?

Instead of supporting children and their caregivers in these circumstances, many politicians are destroying systems that work and damning the people that do the work.

Economically & socially it’s the opposite of sound policy making.

THE REST OF THE WORLD SEEMS TO KNOW THE VALUE OF HEALTHY CITIZENS.

One of our next big political fights is going to be raising the standards and availability of daycare in the U.S. Be on the right side of this argument.

MAKE SURE YOUR FRIENDS UNDERSTAND these issues also. Building awareness among our friends & circles of influence is a critical first step.

For as much talk as we have about the importance of children in this nation, we have not been putting our money where our mouth is. Let’s become a unified voice for children & change this.

What can we do?

In closing I’m making a personal request of you today to do 3 things that will make a big difference for our children and communities.

1) Find and understand an issue important to you & talk about it with your friends & neighbors. The more we learn and talk about these issues, the more comfortable we become in our conversations and the more likely we will be to speak out; Remember, The squeaky wheel gets the grease… no squeaky wheel, no grease & nothing changes – information is powerful.

2) Vote – and convince your friends vote.. tell them about your issue… tell them that not voting means less day care, fewer early learning programs, and far less support for children and education. 3) FINALLY, call your state representative, senator, and governor and tell them who you are, what you want, and why you want it. You pay their salaries, and they have to listen to you. Unless they hear from us on a regular basis, there IS simply no awareness of the pain being visited on these children

Be the one in your family to understand how public policy can be impacted.

Become empowered to be a voice for children.

Continue this discussion at our blog at invisiblechildren.org &

PLEASE LET ME KNOW YOUR RESPONSE TO THIS TALK & MAKE SUGGESTIONS THAT I MIGHT IMPROVE IT.

Thank you for the work you do and your commitment to at risk children

KNOW THAT WE CAN IMPROVE THE LIVES OF AT RISK CHILDREN BY STICKING TOGETHER AND SAYING OUR PIECE.

If we are successful as foster and adoption parents, we change the lives of a few children.

If we can come together and speak as a group, we will change the lives of thousands of children AND THEIR CHILDREN for many years to come. I WILL NOW TAKE YOUR QUESTIONS. ******

Support the Indiana Foster Care & Adoption Association in our efforts to bring back sensible public policy for at risk children and the families that care for them.

Indiana Foster Care and Adoption Association 509 East National Avenue Suite A Indianapolis, IN 46227

info@ifcaa.org

www.ifcaa.org

Office: 317- 308-6555

Please pass this blog onto your circles of influence & those people you feel might respond to the politicizing of special needs and at risk children.

[invisiblechildren-org]

Help, The Cry Of a Child

EMAIL KARA

Message Dear Mike, I’m writing to you in hope that you would be able to help or answer some questions.

My brother Matt has been in prison for the last 5 years. His wife is now in Anoka County jail.

She has been in and out of jail for the last 5 years. They have 2 children ages 4 and 7 who are currently living with us.

I have cared for the boys on and off for the last 5 years. The longest period of time they lived with us was in 2008 and it was for 6 months.

Mom has been in and out of jail, more times than I can keep track. I’ve tried to get social service involved because she is a drug user and doing real harm to her children.

While she is in jail the boys do not officially have a legal guardian.

The 7 year old lives with us during the school year and he is a very bright little boy.

My husband and I have tried to do the “right” thing and care for the little boys.

We have 4 biological children and at times it is very difficult to manage our household.

Just recently mom went back to jail and I wanted to become a foster care parent to our nephews.

I was seeking financial assistance in order to pay for pre-school/daycare for the boys.

I had hoped for some financial help with daycare for the boys but, there is a 2 + year waiting list.

Which brings me to today.

In order for me receive foster care assistance I have to call the police and to have the boys put into child protective services.

This sounds scary and drastic when I just need a little financial assistance to help our family afford daycare for our nephews.

Is it possible that the only way we can have help with day care is to put the boys into a police car and make them live in a group home or with a strange family?

This does not seem right.

Any advice you could give would greatly be appreciated. Sincerely, H TDear H,

You and your nephews are the reason invisiblechildren.org exists.

It is because the only people that know about how this system works seems to be the people caught inside of it.

There are no easy answers I’m afraid. Budgets are tight and our last Governor cut things back so badly that I was charged with taking children away from a father who could not afford day care (when I was an active guardian ad-litem).

It could be that a signed note recommending you as foster parents from your sister in law (and brother?) might be helpful in getting some help from the system, but I can’t be too optimist

Nationally, there are about seven million grandparents and other relatives caring for children in the U.S. with very little assistance from any government body.

In the words of Tim Pawlenty, “children that are victims of failed personal responsibility are not my problem, nor are they the problem of the state of Minnesota”.

http://www.mkca.org/ MN kinship org might have some ideas for you as they work with grandparents and other family members

another wonderful local organization is MN Adoptive Resources; http://www.facebook.com/pages/Minnesota-Adoption-Resource-Network-Adoptees-Have-Answers/309580442719

Please call your state representative (and the Governors office) and send them the email (or this link) that you sent to me and talk about this to your friends and neighbors.

There are far too few resources available for children’s needs. If you don’t call, things will stay this way.

Thank you for your commitment to children.

My very best wishes,

MikeT

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk

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Support CASA guardian ad-Litems

Please join me in learning more about Minnesota volunteer guardian ad-Litems (CASA volunteers).  For many years now, I have been an active participant in the program and can attest to the powerful impact that it has had in the lives of abused and neglected children in our state.  I was one of 500 guardians and oversaw the family and court proceedings of 50 children.  Some of those children still contact me 15 years later (in many cases, I was the only caring adult that remained in their life).

Please visit the CASA website www.casamn.org & make your friends and circle of influence aware of the good work CASA does.

The mission of CASA Minnesota is to broadly support volunteer advocacy on behalf of abused and neglected children in our state. We believe that every abused and neglected child in Minnesota court proceedings should have a volunteer advocate working for their best interests. In pursuit of this goal, we do the following:

Assist in the recruitment and retention of Minnesota volunteer guardians ad litem

Provide initial and continuing education and support to Minnesota volunteer guardians ad litem

Increase public awareness about child welfare and guardians ad litem

Provide a network for communication among Minnesota volunteer guardians ad litem

Advocate for legislative change, public policies and best practices that enhance the quality of advocacy and care for abused and neglected children

www.invisiblechildren.org     info@invisiblechildren.org

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http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2012/01/14/what-is-it-we-don%e2%80%99t-understand-about-fostering-conditions-almost-ensuring-criminality/

- which guarantees a public outcry for more police & prisons, acting stupid when our streets turn dangerous, and so surprised when our schools fail because these children are now in their 4th, 5th, & 6th generation of dysfunctional families with terrible behavior problems that make classroom performance almost impossible (think Prozac, Ritalin, Zoloft)?

Attorney, successful businessman, & ACLU president Vance Opperman gave a spirited and informative talk at the Stone Arch DFL meeting in Minneapolis this morning.  He is a very smart and insightful fellow with a terrific grasp of so many critical issues, but not this one.

Unfortunately, like 99% of the nation, he has very little comprehension of why America has 25% of the world’s prisonpopulation, charges 25% of juvenile justice youth in adult criminal court, and is the world leader with five to ten times the murder and crime rates of any other *industrialized nation (for many years now).

On the plus side, Vance did speak to the African American Men’s Study & the importance of the institutionalized racist fact that 50% of Black Men are either in prison, on the way to prison, or on parole.

But when I asked him a question about how to solve the conundrum of preteen moms and adolescent felons, he said he was not very familiar with the issues.

I had hoped that Senator Amy Klobuchar would back me up.  She was in the audience and had worked in juvenile court when I was a guardian ad-Litem and she saw what I saw when she was a public defense lawyer in the court system that is child protection in our community.

Senator Klobuchar was in the Juvenile Court system when MN Supreme Court Chief Justice stated that 90% of the youth in Juvenile justice had come through Child Protective Services & the same time Hennepin County arrested 44% of the adult Black Men (2001, with no duplicate arrests).  Google “Rich Stanek Resigns” to find out more about how the appointed Police Commissioner made that happen.

Unfortunately, I did not get to ask the question about preteen mom’s (Industrialized World’s Leader) and STD’s (another World Leading category for America).

If communities were to foster conditions that lead to healthy children; our streets would be safer, more kids would graduate, we’d save money on police, prisons, and insurance.  It would also make for a happier and more knowledgeable citizenry, save tax dollars, and it would be the right thing to do.

* there are 24 other industrialized nations with great wealth and advanced infrastructures that the U.S. has compared itself to for many years.  Recently, due to America’s poor rankings, some journalists have begun comparing this nation to third world and emerging economies.

Please send me related stories.

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk

www.invisiblechildren.org  info@invisiblechildren.org

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Nebraska's Privatized Child & Family Services Collapse

This is a truly sad commentary on the condition of child care in Nebraska;http://www.northplattebulletin.com/index.asp?show=news&action=readStory&storyID=21588&pageID=3

A few years ago, one of my guardian ad-Litem cases walked about thirty miles on a ten degree night when he was sent outside wearing only jeans and a T shirt at a privatized juvenile detention center.

That he did not die or suffer permanent physical damage was a miracle.

Last year, a Pennsylvania judge was incarcerated for sending youth to prison for profit (he behaved as a commissioned salesman – selling innocent youth into jail).

The following article brings to light the commonality of for profit youth prisons and I think the abundance of meanness and poor management that combine to further damage the lives of America’s youth.

Reading the Class Action lawsuit that this report is based on is moving, and deserves to be made known to a larger public audience. That this nation supports the intensity of abuse to youth that it does explains the crime rates, prison rates (13 million prison and jail releases last year) and failing schools.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://www.bettermsreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Walnut-Grove-Complaint1.pdf

Federal Lawsuit Seeks to End Years of Physical, Sexual Abuse of Teenage Inmates

Please send me related stories.

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate  info@invisiblechildren.org   www.invisiblechildren.orgState’s child, family welfare reforms collapse

by George Lauby (North Platte Bulletin) – 10/1/2011

Gov. Dave Heineman

First, three top private companies backed out of their deals to provide child and family welfare services in Nebraska.

Second, the Nebraska State Auditor found severe financial problems with the two-year-old “privatized” program.

Third, the man at the top resigned.

That was how a sweeping state welfare reform collapsed in just two years.

Director Todd Reckling announced his resignation one week after a state audit of the program’s finances reported serious problems.

Reckling, 44, said he is resigning for health reasons effective Oct. 14. Already thin, he had been losing weight, coworkers told an Omaha news reporter.

Reckling was in charge of Nebraska’s controversial child welfare privatization, which put the child welfare system in the hands of five privately-owned “lead” agencies.

The system-wide reform was aimed at decreasing the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services’s hand, while allowing the department to retain oversight.

The idea was capitalism and competition, with government supervision, would drive costs down while ensuring the quality of care stayed high.

It never worked in most of Nebraska.

Early on, trouble appeared. Only one company applied to lead the programs in central and western Nebraska, so there was no competition.

Small-scale group homes for vulnerable children were closed in western and central Nebraska, such as the Alliance Boys Ranch, North Platte’s Boy’s and Girl’s Home and two Salvation Army group homes.

When the North Platte group homes closed, employees told the Bulletin that the program was taking a giant step backward — eliminating existing programs and moving already alienated children to new and strange places.

Officials, including Reckling, were reassuring. When the Salvation Army homes closed, officials said children would be cared for in an expanded Boys and Girls Home in North Platte, or in Cedars Home near Broken Bow.

But those homes closed too.

In contrast to small group homes, the Nebraska division of children and family services is a large unit — employing more than 1,800 people.

It is the largest of six state health and human services divisions, including not only child welfare and juvenile services, but also adult protective services, economic assistance/welfare programs, the refugee program and child support enforcement activities.

As the privatization got underway, Reckling signed contracts with five large companies in 2009 to oversee those programs. The state program came to be called “Families Matter.”

The program suffered an astonishing drop out rate at the top level. By October 2010, three of the five lead companies had withdrawn, including the agency handling all of central and western Nebraska, the Boys and Girls Home.

Prompted by complaints, Nebraska State Auditors investigated the Families Matter program during the summer, and released their findings Sept. 7.

They found the costs of the program had gone up 27 percent in two years, with millions of dollars improperly accounted. At the same time, the top agencies said they didn’t have enough money to operate.

The audit made headlines all over the state. Democrats pointed blame at Gov. Dave Heineman, who made no comment for several days. But eight days after the audit was released, Reckling announced his resignation and Heineman spoke.

Heineman said the state will continue trying to privatize Nebraska’s child welfare system, but must do better.

“I want to help our children and families, but this reform effort has not been easy to implement,” he said in a news conference. “We can and we must do better.”

“I believe in accountability, so I’m not going to make excuses for what has occurred. I expect better results and I expect them soon,” he said.

Heineman expressed special disappointment with Boys and Girls Home of Sioux City, Iowa, which failed to pay subcontractors after it dropped out of the program last October.

Boys and Girls Home was in charge of central and western Nebraska, including North Platte.

Heineman said BGH’s failure to pay its bills was “irresponsible and very disappointing.”

And he compared the failure to a bad performance on the football field.

“I think we have the right idea, but we’ve got to execute it better,” Heineman said. “It’s like a football team. If you don’t execute the play, you don’t score a touchdown. Well, we’ve lost a lot of yards here lately because we’re not executing as well as we should have. But I still believe we can make this work.”

When the BGH pulled out, local providers scrambled to come up with alternatives. The North Platte School District created an educational program for students in grades 6-12 during the school year, hiring a teacher and an aide and setting up a classroom at the high school.

The county sheriff made plans to transport kids across the state to the nearest place, in Columbus.

In June, Family Skill Building Services re-opened one of the Salvation Army homes that had been closed during the reshuffling and now operates the Nebraska Youth Center, a home for about a dozen boys on the north side of town.

Not in these parts

Sen. Tom Hansen of North Platte said privatization shouldn’t be tried again now in central and western Nebraska, and never have been tried throughout the state in the first place.

“It probably should have been done on a smaller level (in southeastern Nebraska). Out here, we don’t have a lot of providers,” Hansen said. “Out here, Boys and Girls Home was the only bidder for lead agency. Looking back, that was a clue that we had a problem.”

Profiteering

It seems logical that the Boys and Girls Home building on 2300 E. Second might reopen for vulnerable children under better management, but the price of the empty building is too high, Hansen said. The Boys and Girls Home, Inc. inherited the building, and is now asking $1 million for it, even though its taxable value is about $400,000.

Among the financial scandals, as private agencies failed to deliver and collapsed, foster parents were not paid or were underpaid, especially those with children with special needs, Hansen said.

Foster parents dropped out in droves. For example, the number of foster homes in Dawson County dwindled from 45 to 11, according to the Legislature’s Health and Human Services Committee. “There are lots of upset foster parents,” Hansen said. “These are wards of the state. The state needs to take responsibility.”

State auditors also found that some subcontractors – smaller companies with workers on the front lines – hired workers with no experience or education and paid them around $10 an hour.

However, the subcontractors turned around and billed the state $47 an hour for the work.

Staggering along

How it is all reformed will “depend on what the governor wants to do,” Hansen said, but he and some other senators think the HHS child and family division should be separated from the overall HHS department, so authorities can keep better watch.

Auditors complained of their struggle to get facts and figures from HHS, even though state law explicitly requires state departments to open their books for a public audit.

Hansen has often experienced the same problems — it is difficult for legislators to study the HHS operation, even a legislator such as Hansen on the health and human services or appropriations committees, which have the duty to oversee the HHS.

Hansen said breaking up the Health and Human Services department would make it more transparent.

“As legislators, we don’t think we’re being very accountable,” he said.

Local critics

Counselors, clients, parents and foster parents have long expressed dissatisfaction with HHS services.

Ongoing dissatisfaction led them to go to lengths to arrange a meeting in early August with Todd Reckling and other state officials.

Lisa Zlomke of North Platte’s Aurora Counseling and Jenny Olson of Liberty House in North Platte attended. The meeting was arranged by Melanie Williams-Smotherman, the owner of Family Advocacy Movement, headquartered in Lincoln.

The meeting lasted three-and-a-half hours, and “we had the ability to share examples of specific cases to illustrate points and to show three short videos during that time, including two regarding the harmful practice of drugging foster care children – which is becoming quite routine,” Williams-Smotherman said afterwards.

At the meeting, Williams-Smotherman said the number of Nebraska children taken from parents and put into the foster care and group home system is too high.

Most of those cases do not involve abuse, she said, but rather alleged neglect, she said.

Richard Wexler of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform in Alexandria, Va. also says that too many children are taken from too many homes in the state.

According to the organization’s numbers, Nebraska removed 3,373 children from their natural homes last year. That’s nearly 7.5 of every 1,000 children, based on 2009 population numbers.

The national average is 3.4 per 1,000.

The only state that rates higher than Nebraska, according to Wexler, is West Virginia with a rate of 7.7.

Zlomke and Olson also said that HHS officials in the North Platte region do not contract services with private companies such as theirs.

Zlomke and Olson allege that Region II officials keep welfare recipients – particularly those with mental and behavioral disabilities — in a tight circle of select caregivers who really don’t have any competition, don’t do a good job, but are well paid.

This report was first published in the Sept. 21 print issue of the North Platte Bulletin.

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http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2011/12/31/it-costs-way-less-to-hire-68-million-settlement-proposed-for-10-children-fraudulently-adopted-and-abused/

How many disabled & abandoned children would lead better lives if just a fraction of this proposed settlement had been spent providing children properly supported social workers & resources instead of charging multi-million dollar penalties to a government entity.

Like the settlement that was paid to the birth parents of the child lost forever (literally “disappeared”)  in the Nevadafoster care system, or the dozens of brutal deaths children have suffered over the years in this nation where inadequate child protection services exist & social workers are regularly blamed when children are brutalized when in fact they are working in conditions that almost ensure that at risk children will pay the price for a counties / states malfeasance.

It would be far less expensive (see the studies & long term costs) and the right thing to do to see that foster & adoptiveparents were well funded, well regulated, and early childhood programs set up to insure that every child had a chance to have a meaningful life in America.

Until then, let’s sue the pants off of states and counties that refuse to care for children.

New York Times Dec 29th article on 68 Million Dollar Settlement Proposal

Info@invisiblechildren.org   www.invisiblechildren.org

[invisiblechildren-org]

Rights Of The Child

Annual Justice Week Cretin Derham HS – An Important Educational Event – Feb 9-13 – 2012 Common People Creating Uncommon Change.

This is the most tuned in high school I am aware of-digging deeply into social justice issues from Africa’s child soldiers to American juvenile justice.   I will speak to classes on Weds the 15th.

From time to time high schools, colleges, & other organizations invite me to speak at their events.

 www.invisiblechildren.org

[invisiblechildren-org]

43 Child Deaths Due Policy Violations In Colorado Social Services

As horrible as the news is, let’s thank Reporter Jordan Steffen of the Denver Post for his diligence in pursuing these sad cases.

As a CASA guardian ad-litem with many years in child protection I’ve met many terribly abused children that have fallen through the cracks of overwhelmed child protection workers (and they never make the papers).

In my world, 99% of the abused and neglected children go unnoticed except to the overworked & under-resourced social workers and under- appreciated adoptive/foster parents.

Part of the problem is that since newspapers have been in decline, the old beat reporters just don’t exist anymore (at least in my community) & the topic is painful.

It hurts to confront the cruel reality that our communities deliberately visit on these children.

To appreciate the meanness of some states I point to (Mitch Daniels) Indiana’s stealing (redirecting) the funding promised to parents that adopted abandoned special needs children (after these children had been adopted) & Minnesota’s fiscally irresponsible de-funding of subsidized daycare which forced the county to place children in foster homes because their father’s job did not pay enough to afford daycare.

It costs way more to place children in foster care than it would have to subsidize his daycare payments.

It cost Hennepin County millions of dollars to pay for the care of the four year old boy the court thought would be better off with his father even though dad had a court order to stay away from young boys because of what he did to them.  My client is now is now 23, has AIDS, and has been in over 30 foster homes and he will be a ward of the state until he dies.  He was been tied to a bed, starved, beaten, sexually abused and left alone for days at a time from 4 to 7 years of age.  That never made the paper.  Nor did the four year old girl who I visited in the suicide ward of Fairview hospital (her sister’s story was much worse).

If you read Jordan’s reporting, it will be easy to hate the social workers involved.  Please remember that under-training & under-funding combined with giant case loads, makes their task impossible.

Like blaming teachers for failed schools or cops for full prisons, it’s the wrong place to focus.

We did this; our state legislators, governors, and the mean spirited political hate fest that rallies around fear and war at the direct cost to American children.

When a baby is found in a dumpster, the mother has horrible mental health issues & needs help, but our communities have accepted that we just don’t support young mom’s or their troubled children.

It’s all wrong and we know it.  It is up to us to talk about these issues and bother our media and legislators until positive change happens.

Policy violations in Colorado social-services system found amid deaths of 43 children

POSTED: 01/29/2012 01:00:00 AM MST UPDATED: 01/29/2012 01:57:06 PM MST

By Jordan Steffen The Denver Post

  (Denver Post file photos)

RELATED

Jan 27:

Candelight vigil held for 3-year-old Caleb Pacheco

Jan 26:

Mother allegedly said son was dead months before discovery

Jan 25:

Mother told ex-boyfriend her son was dead months before the 3-year-old was found

In the past five years, 43 Colorado children died from abuse or neglect after entering the child welfare program. Every one of those deaths was marked by a policy violation or sparked concern in the way the case was handled by county social workers.

Investigations completed by the Colorado Department of Human Services since 2007 indicate that social workers in 18 counties repeatedly failed to complete basic functions — such as interviews or follow-ups on assessments — in 43 cases where a child later died from abuse or neglect.

In 40 percent of those deaths — 17 children — county social workers failed to start or did not accept an assessment after a referral warranted an

PHOTOS: CALEB PACHECO MEMORIAL

  View more images of the makeshift memorial for Caleb Pacheco in Sterling.

investigation for abuse or neglect.The state department opens an investigation whenever a child’s death is a result of abuse or neglect and there was contact with the county child welfare system during the two years before the child’s death, said spokeswoman Liz McDonough.

Before 2011, an investigation was opened if a child entered the system five years before the death.

Human Services’ latest investigation will be into the death of 3-year-old Caleb Pacheco, whose body was found tucked underneath a Sterling mobile home last week. His mother, Juanita Kinzie, 24, is in custody and faces one count of first-degree murder in her son’s death.

In 2011, 21 child-fatality reports were launched in Colorado. Two have been completed. Reports become public after they are finished and if they show policy violations or concerns. The Denver Post obtained all 43 public reports completed in the past five years.

Most of the reports included multiple referrals and assessments.

According to The Post’s findings:

There were 27 instances in which county social workers failed to contact, interview or follow up with victims, caregivers, reporting parties or other adults involved in an referral.

There were 32 instances in which social workers did not document unsafe conditions, prior incidents or other concerns in their assessments.

There were 33 occasions during which assessments were not started in a timely manner, were completed incorrectly or left open beyond the allotted time frame.

In five cases, social workers failed to account for other children or caregivers living in the home, and communication difficulties across county departments and other systems — such as law enforcement — hindered an investigation in five cases.

One of the reports was on 7-year-old Chandler Grafner, who was starved by his foster parents, Jon Phillips and Sarah Berry, in 2007.In December, a federal judge ruled that the Denver social workers who were involved with his case were not immune from a lawsuit filed by the boy’s relatives. Phillips was sentenced to life in Chandler’s death and Berry to 48 years.Caleb’s family members say they last saw the boy in January 2011. During the year he was missing, the boy’s family said they called social services in three counties more than 70 times.

Human Services cannot release details about Caleb’s case or confirm whether his family contacted county departments because the investigation into the boy’s death is ongoing, and a Logan County judge issued a gag order in the case, McDonough said.

Dr. Kim Bundy-Fazioli, an associate professor at Colorado State University’s School of Social Work, said the family’s claims about unanswered calls for help are a concern.

“When families aren’t making progress, there is a lot of chaos, and it can be overwhelming for case workers and service providers,” Bundy-Fazioli said.

“You never know who to interview or who to trust, but it’s not an excuse not to intervene.”

Bundy-Fazioli also was concerned about decreased funding for county programs and increased caseloads for overwhelmed social workers, who often have to make judgment calls on high-priority cases and investigations.

Each of Colorado’s 64 county departments are being asked to do more with less, said Becky Miller Updike, ombudsman with the Office of Colorado’s Child Protection. Often, families in the most dire situations are also more transient, making it harder to track children through school systems and other county departments.

“We have to cut back dollars from our counties every year, causing us to ask them to do more with less,” Miller Updike said.

Jordan Steffen: 303-954-1794 orjsteffen@denverpost.com

Follow Jordan Steffen on Twitter.

Read more:Policy violations in Colorado social-services system found amid deaths of 43 children – The Denver Posthttp://www.denverpost.com/frontpage/ci_19844865#ixzz1l2oc8FUn