Isabella Brooke Knightly and Austin Gamez-Knightly
In Memory of my Loving Husband, William F. Knightly Jr. Murdered by ILLEGAL Palliative Care at a Nashua, NH Hospital
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
The hostility extends to extended families
Sacramento CPS: The hostility extends to extended families
by Richard Wexler, published on June 21, 2010 at 6:15AM
Storyline: Child Welfare
Community Tags: california child abuse child welfare family preservation foster care kinship care sacramento county
In response to my column last week, about how Sacramento County is the child removal capital of California, an aunt who is providing foster care for a nephew raised several objections. Among other things, she argued that it was unfair of me to lump in relatives providing foster care, known as “kinship care,” with strangers in calculating Sacramento’s rate of removal.
In one sense she is right; it’s unfair - unfair to other counties, because it makes Sacramento look too good. When you look only at the proportion of children placed with total strangers, Sacramento actually fares even worse.
My previous column documented the extensive research on the inherent trauma of foster care - trauma that occurs even when the foster home is a good one, as the majority are. That trauma can be reduced, but not eliminated, if the child is placed with a relative instead of a stranger.
Study after study has shown the enormous benefits of kinship care.
Kinship care is still foster care, and even grandma is no substitute for leaving children in their own homes. But when that really isn’t safe, at least if a child is placed with a relative, or with an aunt, it’s likely to cushion the blow. The child is with someone he knows and loves. And odds are the placement is in his own neighborhood, so he doesn’t have to change schools and lose all his friends.
Kinship care also lessens one of the most damaging problems of foster care, moving children from foster home to foster home. People who love you are far less likely to give up on you than total strangers. So grandparents and other relatives are more likely to put up with behavior that might prompt strangers to either reach for the psychiatric medication or throw the child out.
Indeed that helps explain why in Florida, for example, where the child welfare agency is trying to crack down on the misuse and overuse of sometimes dangerous psychiatric medication on foster children, while 26 percent of institutionalized foster children and 21 percent of foster children placed with strangers are on such medication, only four percent of foster children are medicated when they are placed with relatives.
And there are more benefits to kinship care. A study by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia found that children placed in foster care with relatives had fewer behavior problems than children placed in stranger care.
Another study found that children in kinship care did far better than children in stranger care on multiple measures of safety, permanence and well being.
This is one of several studies showing the most important result of all: Kinship care is safer than stranger care.
But apparently the word hasn’t reached Sacramento County.
HOW COUNTIES USE KINSHIP CARE
San Francisco also has a dismal record for taking away children from their families – a record almost as bad as Sacramento. But at least San Francisco manages to place nearly one-third of those children immediately with a relative. Orange County does almost as well. Contra Costa and Alameda Counties place about one-quarter of children immediately with relatives. The statewide average is 17.4 percent.
In Sacramento the figure is only 9.3 percent – only seven of the counties ranked in the NCCPR California Rate-of-Removal Index do worse.
There is a similar discrepancy when one looks at the percentage of all foster children placed with relatives on any given day – not just those placed with relatives immediately.
San Francisco places half of such children with relatives, Orange County and Santa Clara County place more than 42 percent of foster children with relatives; Los Angeles, Alameda and Contra Costa counties all are over one-third – which is the statewide average.
In Sacramento County it’s 29.1 percent. Only eight of the ranked counties do worse.
I’ve updated the full NCCPR California Rate of Removal Index to include kinship care data for all the ranked counties. It’s available on our website here: http://www.nccpr.org/reports/2009californiaror.pdf
“A TREE HAS MORE THAN ONE BRANCH”
Because grandparents bring an extra ingredient to the mix – love – it should surprise no one that kinship care generally is safer than stranger care. So why is Sacramento County so reluctant to use it?
Sadly, it’s not unusual for child welfare systems that are deeply hostile to birth parents to extend the hostility to extended families. It’s all summed up in one pernicious little smear: “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” If mom is abusive, it is claimed, it must be because grandma has failed in some way.
For starters, this assumes that if mom is doing a poor job raising the children it has to be grandma’s fault. In fact, there are any number of times when a grandparent may raise four children under circumstances of poverty and need that many of us can’t possibly imagine, and have three of them become happy, healthy productive adults. The fourth is lost to the lure of the streets. When that grandmother then comes forward, at a time when finally she should be able to rest, and offers to take care of that child’s children, she should be treated as a hero, not a suspect.
And, as one of the nation’s leading experts on kinship care has said: “a tree has more than one branch.”
Unfortunately, some child welfare systems have sought to take advantage of the benefits of kinship care and pretend that it is not foster care at all. But make no mistake: When it is done because a child welfare agency demands it or a court orders it, kinship care is still foster care.
Indeed, the federal government counts such placements as foster care placements. Kinship care is still a blow to the child, and it is no substitute for safe, proven alternatives to keeping children in their own homes. That’s why, when calculating rates of removal, I will continue to “lump in” kinship care placements and stranger care placements.
Even if that makes Sacramento County look better than it deserves.
Former journalist Richard Wexler is Executive Director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, based in Alexandria Va. The full NCCPR California Rate of Removal Index and comprehensive recommendations for reforming child welfare in California and nationwide are available at www.nccpr.org Citations for the studies cited in this article are available on request.
http://www.sacramentopress.com/headline/30796/Sacramento_CPS_The_hostility_extends_to_extended_families
by Richard Wexler, published on June 21, 2010 at 6:15AM
Storyline: Child Welfare
Community Tags: california child abuse child welfare family preservation foster care kinship care sacramento county
In response to my column last week, about how Sacramento County is the child removal capital of California, an aunt who is providing foster care for a nephew raised several objections. Among other things, she argued that it was unfair of me to lump in relatives providing foster care, known as “kinship care,” with strangers in calculating Sacramento’s rate of removal.
In one sense she is right; it’s unfair - unfair to other counties, because it makes Sacramento look too good. When you look only at the proportion of children placed with total strangers, Sacramento actually fares even worse.
My previous column documented the extensive research on the inherent trauma of foster care - trauma that occurs even when the foster home is a good one, as the majority are. That trauma can be reduced, but not eliminated, if the child is placed with a relative instead of a stranger.
Study after study has shown the enormous benefits of kinship care.
Kinship care is still foster care, and even grandma is no substitute for leaving children in their own homes. But when that really isn’t safe, at least if a child is placed with a relative, or with an aunt, it’s likely to cushion the blow. The child is with someone he knows and loves. And odds are the placement is in his own neighborhood, so he doesn’t have to change schools and lose all his friends.
Kinship care also lessens one of the most damaging problems of foster care, moving children from foster home to foster home. People who love you are far less likely to give up on you than total strangers. So grandparents and other relatives are more likely to put up with behavior that might prompt strangers to either reach for the psychiatric medication or throw the child out.
Indeed that helps explain why in Florida, for example, where the child welfare agency is trying to crack down on the misuse and overuse of sometimes dangerous psychiatric medication on foster children, while 26 percent of institutionalized foster children and 21 percent of foster children placed with strangers are on such medication, only four percent of foster children are medicated when they are placed with relatives.
And there are more benefits to kinship care. A study by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia found that children placed in foster care with relatives had fewer behavior problems than children placed in stranger care.
Another study found that children in kinship care did far better than children in stranger care on multiple measures of safety, permanence and well being.
This is one of several studies showing the most important result of all: Kinship care is safer than stranger care.
But apparently the word hasn’t reached Sacramento County.
HOW COUNTIES USE KINSHIP CARE
San Francisco also has a dismal record for taking away children from their families – a record almost as bad as Sacramento. But at least San Francisco manages to place nearly one-third of those children immediately with a relative. Orange County does almost as well. Contra Costa and Alameda Counties place about one-quarter of children immediately with relatives. The statewide average is 17.4 percent.
In Sacramento the figure is only 9.3 percent – only seven of the counties ranked in the NCCPR California Rate-of-Removal Index do worse.
There is a similar discrepancy when one looks at the percentage of all foster children placed with relatives on any given day – not just those placed with relatives immediately.
San Francisco places half of such children with relatives, Orange County and Santa Clara County place more than 42 percent of foster children with relatives; Los Angeles, Alameda and Contra Costa counties all are over one-third – which is the statewide average.
In Sacramento County it’s 29.1 percent. Only eight of the ranked counties do worse.
I’ve updated the full NCCPR California Rate of Removal Index to include kinship care data for all the ranked counties. It’s available on our website here: http://www.nccpr.org/reports/2009californiaror.pdf
“A TREE HAS MORE THAN ONE BRANCH”
Because grandparents bring an extra ingredient to the mix – love – it should surprise no one that kinship care generally is safer than stranger care. So why is Sacramento County so reluctant to use it?
Sadly, it’s not unusual for child welfare systems that are deeply hostile to birth parents to extend the hostility to extended families. It’s all summed up in one pernicious little smear: “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” If mom is abusive, it is claimed, it must be because grandma has failed in some way.
For starters, this assumes that if mom is doing a poor job raising the children it has to be grandma’s fault. In fact, there are any number of times when a grandparent may raise four children under circumstances of poverty and need that many of us can’t possibly imagine, and have three of them become happy, healthy productive adults. The fourth is lost to the lure of the streets. When that grandmother then comes forward, at a time when finally she should be able to rest, and offers to take care of that child’s children, she should be treated as a hero, not a suspect.
And, as one of the nation’s leading experts on kinship care has said: “a tree has more than one branch.”
Unfortunately, some child welfare systems have sought to take advantage of the benefits of kinship care and pretend that it is not foster care at all. But make no mistake: When it is done because a child welfare agency demands it or a court orders it, kinship care is still foster care.
Indeed, the federal government counts such placements as foster care placements. Kinship care is still a blow to the child, and it is no substitute for safe, proven alternatives to keeping children in their own homes. That’s why, when calculating rates of removal, I will continue to “lump in” kinship care placements and stranger care placements.
Even if that makes Sacramento County look better than it deserves.
Former journalist Richard Wexler is Executive Director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, based in Alexandria Va. The full NCCPR California Rate of Removal Index and comprehensive recommendations for reforming child welfare in California and nationwide are available at www.nccpr.org Citations for the studies cited in this article are available on request.
http://www.sacramentopress.com/headline/30796/Sacramento_CPS_The_hostility_extends_to_extended_families
Work toward thriving, not fractured, families
Work toward thriving, not fractured, families
By REGGIE WILLIAMS, GUEST EDITORIAL
June 23, 2010 12:05 AM Posted in: Editorials
Reggie Williams
Reggie Williams was born in DeLand and raised in DeLeon Springs. He worked for Volusia County government for 29 years, where his last position was director of the Community Services Department. In March 2006, Williams became the district administrator for the Department of Children and Families for Volusia and Flagler Counties. In 2007, DCF reorganized, and his responsibility expanded to St. Johns and Putnam counties.
All of us with families, especially with children, have an inherent concern for their health and well-being. "Don't run with scissors," "Look both ways before you cross the street" and "Don't talk to strangers" are just a few of the common types of guidance we provide our children for their safety.
For the Department of Children and Families, it is one of the fundamental reasons for our existence, and, for many of the people who work here, it is their chosen profession. The department has helped tens of thousands of families over the years to overcome crises and obstacles in their lives to assist them with ensuring the safety of their children. Though only a few of the most severe situations with terrible consequences come to the public's attention through the media, the vast majority of families that interact with the department (and our many community partners) go on to provide a sound environment for their children to grow into healthy and productive adults.
In situations where it is found that risk to a child's safety is very high, the department may find it necessary to remove that child from his or her family until the family can address those issues that threaten the child and make it safe to return the child home. This decision is not taken lightly by the department. It involves the judicial system for oversight and traumatizes both the family and child.
What are the consequences of removing a child from their family?
Studies by two highly respected institutions -- the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Casey Family Program -- show:
· 44 percent of children who were in foster care were later arrested, compared with 14 percent of children who remained with their families.
· More than half of the girls in foster care will become teen mothers, compared to only one-third of other children.
· Children who grow up in foster care are 17 times more likely to be homeless.
Children who grow up in foster care are more likely to commit crimes, abuse drugs, drop out of school and be unemployed.
Regardless of the dismal outcomes of removing children from their families, there are times that removing a child is the only safe option. But we have come to realize that there are times when that act may do more harm than good. In recognizing this fact, the department has begun an initiative in our area to restructure the foster care system as it has existed for many years. We have collaborated with our Community Based Care organizations, which are responsible for foster care, and our community providers, who deliver many of the services to our families. This collaboration and partnership will change processes we have historically used to protect families, improving services. The new system of care will provide better risk assessment, shared decision-making, accelerated and more intensive services for shorter durations, and quicker, more successful conclusions for families.
Some of the specifics are:
· Integrated and expanded substance-abuse and mental-health services.
· Innovative training and expanded services for domestic violence .
· A service decision team that brings together experts from various agencies to assist in planning services for families and to look for ways to keep a family together.
· A family preservation function that provides a safe alternative to removing a child from the family by providing extremely intense services and family interaction. This service is of a much shorter duration than services traditionally delivered when a child is removed.
· An intensive family intervention function that provides extensive services and family interaction for more moderate-risk cases. Again, the duration of this service is much shorter than the traditional in-home service method.
· Use of family engagement practices to encourage families to participate in seeking solutions for themselves.
· An outreach function that will assist families in trouble or crisis even though it is determined that no abuse or neglect was evident with the family.
· Improved processes to stabilize families when children are returned from out-of-home care.
· Improved processes to more rapidly find permanent living arrangements such as relative custody or adoption for children who cannot reunify with their parents.
This is an ambitious undertaking and it will take not only the department's effort but the effort of our entire community to become truly successful. The collaboration we have experienced so far has been phenomenal and we are only at the beginning of this journey.
Over the next six months we will be meeting with groups of people throughout our service area, discussing the planned changes. We will solicit community input and support as to how we can further improve and restructure our system of care. The families we serve are our neighbors, our co-workers and our friends. The most effective approach to helping these children and families is one in which the whole community takes part, so that together, we can significantly improve children's lives.
The News-Journal has invited a variety of local folks to use this space to share their point of view about our greater community, its challenges, and its opportunities for success.
http://www.news-journalonline.com/opinion/editorials/2010/06/23/work-toward-thriving-not-fractured-families.html
By REGGIE WILLIAMS, GUEST EDITORIAL
June 23, 2010 12:05 AM Posted in: Editorials
Reggie Williams
Reggie Williams was born in DeLand and raised in DeLeon Springs. He worked for Volusia County government for 29 years, where his last position was director of the Community Services Department. In March 2006, Williams became the district administrator for the Department of Children and Families for Volusia and Flagler Counties. In 2007, DCF reorganized, and his responsibility expanded to St. Johns and Putnam counties.
All of us with families, especially with children, have an inherent concern for their health and well-being. "Don't run with scissors," "Look both ways before you cross the street" and "Don't talk to strangers" are just a few of the common types of guidance we provide our children for their safety.
For the Department of Children and Families, it is one of the fundamental reasons for our existence, and, for many of the people who work here, it is their chosen profession. The department has helped tens of thousands of families over the years to overcome crises and obstacles in their lives to assist them with ensuring the safety of their children. Though only a few of the most severe situations with terrible consequences come to the public's attention through the media, the vast majority of families that interact with the department (and our many community partners) go on to provide a sound environment for their children to grow into healthy and productive adults.
In situations where it is found that risk to a child's safety is very high, the department may find it necessary to remove that child from his or her family until the family can address those issues that threaten the child and make it safe to return the child home. This decision is not taken lightly by the department. It involves the judicial system for oversight and traumatizes both the family and child.
What are the consequences of removing a child from their family?
Studies by two highly respected institutions -- the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Casey Family Program -- show:
· 44 percent of children who were in foster care were later arrested, compared with 14 percent of children who remained with their families.
· More than half of the girls in foster care will become teen mothers, compared to only one-third of other children.
· Children who grow up in foster care are 17 times more likely to be homeless.
Children who grow up in foster care are more likely to commit crimes, abuse drugs, drop out of school and be unemployed.
Regardless of the dismal outcomes of removing children from their families, there are times that removing a child is the only safe option. But we have come to realize that there are times when that act may do more harm than good. In recognizing this fact, the department has begun an initiative in our area to restructure the foster care system as it has existed for many years. We have collaborated with our Community Based Care organizations, which are responsible for foster care, and our community providers, who deliver many of the services to our families. This collaboration and partnership will change processes we have historically used to protect families, improving services. The new system of care will provide better risk assessment, shared decision-making, accelerated and more intensive services for shorter durations, and quicker, more successful conclusions for families.
Some of the specifics are:
· Integrated and expanded substance-abuse and mental-health services.
· Innovative training and expanded services for domestic violence .
· A service decision team that brings together experts from various agencies to assist in planning services for families and to look for ways to keep a family together.
· A family preservation function that provides a safe alternative to removing a child from the family by providing extremely intense services and family interaction. This service is of a much shorter duration than services traditionally delivered when a child is removed.
· An intensive family intervention function that provides extensive services and family interaction for more moderate-risk cases. Again, the duration of this service is much shorter than the traditional in-home service method.
· Use of family engagement practices to encourage families to participate in seeking solutions for themselves.
· An outreach function that will assist families in trouble or crisis even though it is determined that no abuse or neglect was evident with the family.
· Improved processes to stabilize families when children are returned from out-of-home care.
· Improved processes to more rapidly find permanent living arrangements such as relative custody or adoption for children who cannot reunify with their parents.
This is an ambitious undertaking and it will take not only the department's effort but the effort of our entire community to become truly successful. The collaboration we have experienced so far has been phenomenal and we are only at the beginning of this journey.
Over the next six months we will be meeting with groups of people throughout our service area, discussing the planned changes. We will solicit community input and support as to how we can further improve and restructure our system of care. The families we serve are our neighbors, our co-workers and our friends. The most effective approach to helping these children and families is one in which the whole community takes part, so that together, we can significantly improve children's lives.
The News-Journal has invited a variety of local folks to use this space to share their point of view about our greater community, its challenges, and its opportunities for success.
http://www.news-journalonline.com/opinion/editorials/2010/06/23/work-toward-thriving-not-fractured-families.html
Foster care fraught with private abuses, public excuses
Foster care fraught with private abuses, public excuses
AJC investigation: Children needing homes get placed in harm’s way with few repercussions
By Alan Judd
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Georgia officials decided last year that a rules violation by a private foster care agency was so egregious it warranted one of the toughest possible penalties.
Bita Honarvar, bhonarvar@ajc.com Melissa Carter is director of the Georgia Office of the Child Advocate for the Protection of Children.
The agency, state records show, had inappropriately placed two children in the same foster home. One was a 17-year-old who had engaged in incest and other sexual activity. The other was 8, autistic and mute, with a history of being abused and an IQ of 16. The boys at first shared a bedroom; ultimately, they shared a bed.
The foster agency’s punishment: a $300 fine.
What happened at the Trek Program, a foster agency based in Fort Oglethorpe, and how the state responded illustrate the scope of problems in Georgia’s growing system of publicly funded but privately operated foster care, according to an investigation by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The newspaper reviewed more than 1,500 reports of state inspections and investigations, which provide an astonishing narrative of stark conditions and inadequate oversight in small foster homes and large group facilities alike.
Fights. Sexual assaults. Consensual sex between young teens. Abuse by foster parents and group home employees. Escapes. Suicide attempts. All occur with regularity at many of Georgia’s 336 private foster care agencies, the Journal-Constitution’s examination found.
One agency, for example, repeatedly used anti-psychotic drugs to subdue misbehaving children. Another tried to rid residents of “demons” through forced exorcism.
Yet the state office that oversees foster care consistently excuses serious, repeated rules violations that jeopardize children’s health and safety.
Since 2008, officials have issued 1,107 citations to 300 of the 336 private agencies. Most cases involved multiple violations of foster care rules. But the state imposed fines or other penalties — what it calls “adverse actions” — in just 83, or 7 percent, of those citations. The median fine: $500.
Of the 336 private foster care agencies, 100 receive direct state funding; last year’s total exceeded $55 million. Even among those agencies, violations are common. In the past two years, the state has cited 91 of the 100 agencies — while continuing to pay them for housing foster children.
Like many other states, Georgia increasingly relies on private agencies — not-for-profit organizations, for the most part — to place children in foster homes or group homes and to oversee much of their care. Many of the children have been diagnosed with mental illnesses, behavioral disorders, or both. Some enter foster care through the state’s social services system to protect them from abusive or neglectful parents. Others come through juvenile courts after getting in trouble with the law.
About 4,000 children, roughly half those in state care, reside in privately owned facilities. A decade ago, private agencies cared for no more than 10 percent of Georgia’s foster children.
State oversight, however, has not kept pace with the growth in private care.
In Fulton and DeKalb counties, Georgia’s most populous, half the children in foster care did not receive the required two visits a month from state workers in 2009, court-appointed monitors said in a recent report. In addition, the monitors said, state officials inspected the operations of one-third as many private foster agencies last year as in 2008.
And while half the foster children in the two counties live in private facilities, the monitors told a judge, they account for three-fourths of substantiated maltreatment cases in foster homes. (The state recently countered that 37 percent of the maltreatment occurred outside foster homes.)
“These are just the cases that actually get identified, investigated and substantiated as abuse,” said Ira Lustbader, associate director of Children’s Rights Inc., a New York-based advocacy group involved in the federal lawsuit that led to the monitors’ appointment.
“If the state is going to utilize the private sector, they have to have mechanisms in place” to ensure children’s safety, Lustbader said. “In the end, it’s all about the quality of the state’s oversight.”
State officials, however, say regulating foster care agencies is a complicated undertaking, one that involves using both persuasion and the specter of serious penalties to combat substandard treatment.
“It is not the goal to put people out of business,” said Keith Bostick, director of the state Office of Residential Child Care. “We want to do as much as we can to try to keep kids safe. But it is a balancing act.”
Dena Smith, spokeswoman for the Department of Human Services, which oversees the regulatory office, added: “Many times there are agencies or providers that, with a soft nudge, they can get back into compliance.”
But many foster care providers complain that enforcement is too aggressive, too focused on administrative requirements that don’t directly affect how children are treated.
“The regulations are good regulations,” said Normer Adams, executive director of the Georgia Association of Homes and Services for Children, an industry lobbying group. “But sometimes the citations are really tedious. Most of the violations don’t threaten the health or safety of a child.”
Regardless, in most instances, the state merely tells private agencies to correct deficiencies. Sometimes it also threatens an “adverse action.” But many agencies continue to violate the rules, with little or no consequence.
Drugs and demons
One day last April, an employee of the Mercy’s Door group home near Dalton approached a resident with a plan for his redemption: exorcism.
The employee took the boy to an office, where four other staff members were waiting, the boy later told a state inspector. They sat the boy in a chair and encircled him, hands joined, saying they would “exorcise the demons out” of him, he told the inspector.
“In Jesus’ name,” the boy quoted a staff member as saying, “remove the demons.”
Employees at Mercy’s Door required residents to attend daily “devotionals,” where they claimed to “rebuke demons of depression” and spoke in tongues, according to a second boy, who witnessed part of the exorcism rite. When another resident, an atheist, left his room, the boy said, staff members prayed over his bed. The staff, according to one resident, believed that “everyone has demons inside of them.”
The boy targeted by the exorcism said two staff members rubbed olive oil on his forehead and spoke about “four angels and rings of fire” — an apparent reference to Revelation’s prophesy that 144,000 people will be “sealed” and spared in Earth’s inevitable destruction. The boy said he was told he had been “bought for a price and adopted by Jesus.”
At one point, two of the facility’s employees later said, the boy became distraught. “Why,” he asked, jumping out of his chair, “can’t you be Baptist?”
In a brief telephone interview, the facility’s director, Veronica Alcerro, declined to comment.
A state investigation confirmed the boy’s story about the exorcism — and found that an employee of the group home, which received $62,416 in state money last year, had lied to an inspector.
But while the state cited Mercy’s Door for rules violations, it assessed no penalty.
In May 2008, the state cited Morningstar Treatment Services, which operates the Youth Estate group home outside Brunswick, for repeatedly using anti-psychotic drugs to control residents who would “act up.” A similar citation had been issued the previous October.
Regulators described the shots as an improper form of chemical restraint, used “as a means of convenience” for the facility’s staff.
One resident, for instance, was drugged for “non-compliance,” according to an incident report prepared by Morningstar. The resident had argued over serving an in-school suspension, so a nurse gave the child Ativan, an anti-psychotic, and Benadryl, an over-the-counter antihistamine also used as a sedative. After “lying on the bench for a little while,” the incident report said, the child completed the suspension “without fighting it.”
The state ordered Morningstar to revise its medication policy, and the agency said it would.
Ten months later, however, state inspectors learned that Morningstar was still using medication to discipline or control residents.
A nurse sedated one child for “being out of area.” Another resident was given a blend of Benadryl, Ativan and Haldol, another anti-psychotic, for “agitation, destruction and self-abuse.” Yet another received Valium for “agitation and aggression”; when the child still didn’t calm down, a nurse gave him the powerful anti-psychotic drug Thorazine.
In those instances, as in others, inspectors noted, “there was no valid prescription for the medications given.”
Staff members told inspectors that without the shots, “they would not be able to handle some of the residents,” according to a state report.
The four dozen or so residents at Morningstar typically have IQs between 40 and 70 and emotional and behavioral disorders, said Barry Kerr, the agency’s chief executive.
Morningstar has been “very aggressive” in reducing the use of drugs to manage residents’ behavior, Kerr said. The medicines, he said, have been used only “when we did not have another alternative.”
After Morningstar’s second citation, the state gave the agency a stern warning: “Based on repeat rule violations and failure to comply with an accepted plan of correction, adverse action may be initiated.”
About a week later, the state did act against Morningstar.
It imposed a $450 fine.
‘Eyes on the situation’
At least once a year, Rachel Neal shows up unannounced at each of the 80 or so foster care facilities that comprise her portfolio as a state inspector.
She carries a lengthy list of rules that each must follow: a minimum number of training hours for employees, up-to-date inspections for vehicles that transport foster children, and on and on.
Most violations get a written citation and are corrected within weeks. But when she discovers dangerous situations, such as toxic materials left within the reach of children, Neal expects instant remedies.
“Usually, they’ll be like, ‘OK, Ms. Neal, that will be dealt with immediately,’ ” she said during a tour of The Bridge, a group home in northwest Atlanta. “We make sure before I leave that that hazard will be fixed.”
Even during standard inspections, Neal said, “a lot of times you may come across something else” that endangers children or otherwise violates state rules. She said she may deviate from the routine “if I hear something, or see something, or read something in a file.”
But Neal and other inspectors spend relatively little time at each foster care facility. State case workers — assigned to a different division of the Department of Human Services — are supposed to visit each child they oversee twice a month. But they may not always look for problems affecting children supervised by other case workers, said Melissa Carter, the state’s child advocate.
“They are our eyes on the situation,” Carter said. “If I’m a case manager and I’m responsible for little Susie, I just go in and take a look at little Susie. It could be that other children were seen and other problems could have been detected.”
‘Minimal information’
In early 2007, the state took custody of an autistic child who had been neglected and abused in his home. The boy was “greatly at risk” of more maltreatment, case workers wrote, and would have to be “safeguarded from abuse.”
The state then delegated the boy’s protection to a private agency: Trek, a nonprofit program operated by the Lookout Mountain Community Services Board in North Georgia. Trek, in turn, placed the child in a foster home with which it contracted.
In March 2009, the state asked Trek to handle another child with profound troubles: a 17-year-old with a long, repulsive sexual history. The agency chose the same home where it had put the autistic child.
No one, however, told the foster parents about the 17-year-old’s experiences with incest and pornography. Or about his “sexual inappropriateness” with a stepparent. Or about what a therapist described as his “distorted sexual beliefs”: that children aren’t hurt if adults molest them, for example, and it’s OK for an older child to initiate sex with a younger one.
Trek provided “very minimal information,” the foster parents would later tell a state inspector. When they asked to see the 17-year-old’s psychological evaluations, the foster parents said, a Trek case worker demurred, saying only that the child had “never sexually acted out in previous placements.”
The foster parents moved the 17-year-old into a bedroom with the 8-year-old autistic boy. About a month later, the night of April 7, a cry transmitted by a baby monitor awoke one of the foster parents. He went to the boys’ bedroom, where he found the 17-year-old in bed with the younger child. The older boy was masturbating and had one hand in the 8-year-old’s pants.
The state cited Trek for failing to “prepare the foster family for the placement ... by anticipating adjustments and problems that may arise.” The previous month, the agency had received two similar citations. And a month later, the state assessed the $300 fine.
John Brewer, Trek’s program director, declined to comment on the case. But he said Trek tries to comply with state rules.
“They’ve always looked for specific things and make sure we follow through,” Brewer said. “We do get cited occasionally, and we try to correct those things.”
No one told
The state has cited numerous agencies that withheld critical information from foster parents.
For instance, state officials found that Benchmark Family Services of Jonesboro knew a child it placed in a foster home was supposed to receive therapy for sexual misbehavior. But no one, records show, told the foster family.
Soon, the child “inappropriately touched” another student at school, according to state reports. At the foster home, he groped another child.
The state cited the agency, but imposed no penalty.
A child placed in 2008 by another agency, Choices for Life of Georgia, based in Valdosta, had entered foster care after having sex with a cousin. He was not supposed to sleep, bathe, undress or be alone with younger children.
Again, no one told the foster family. Within weeks, the boy had molested at least one of the younger children in the home.
The state cited the agency, but imposed no penalty.
Foster parents need information about children in their care, said Beth Locker, policy director for Voices for Georgia’s Children, an Atlanta-based advocacy group.
“When that doesn’t happen,” Locker said, “it’s hard to know whether it’s a breakdown in communication, or a genuine concern about the privacy of a child’s family, or a concern about the cost of providing needed services.”
Sometimes, however, foster parents exacerbate harm already done to the children they supervise.
Choices for Life is one of several agencies cited for not preventing foster parents from using corporal punishment or other prohibited disciplinary methods. Last year, regulators said, the agency “failed to take appropriate corrective action” after learning a child had been spanked, and injured, by her foster parent. The child reported the spanking in December 2008, but Choices for Life left her in the foster home for 42 days.
The state imposed no penalty. It rarely does unless it finds a series of serious violations.
Inspectors documented numerous deficiencies in oversight by Bethany Christian Services of Atlanta, for instance. One of the agency’s foster parents left a child who uses a wheelchair home alone several times. Once, a social worker came by and found the wheelchair upstairs and the child on the basement floor, unable to get up and lying in his own waste.
Two other foster parents with Bethany forced a child to swallow a Benadryl tablet. The foster parents, the child said, called it a “sleep vitamin.”
From 20 investigations and four other inspections since May 2008, the state has cited Bethany Christian eight times for a total of 27 rules violations.
Just once, however, did the state impose a penalty: a $500 fine this January.
----------------------
Differing solutions
More regulation or less? Experts and children’s advocates are divided in their suggestions for improving Georgia’s foster care system.
Those who support tougher enforcement of foster care rules suggest that:
● More state case workers are needed so each child in foster care can be visited at least twice each month, as required by a settlement agreement in a lawsuit over conditions in foster care.
● The state should be more diligent in searching for relatives to care for children taken into protective custody.
● State officials could more closely monitor private agencies that operate group homes or place children in foster homes; inspections of those agencies dropped dramatically in 2009.
● The state could increase funding to replace case workers and other regulators, whose numbers have declined through attrition, retirement and other factors.
Those who say less-stringent oversight would help privately operated foster care agencies propose that:
● The state could eliminate what one report called “disparities in degrees of regulation and disparate treatment” of state-supervised foster homes and those overseen by private agencies. Problems in state-operated homes, the report said, may be addressed by case workers “who personally know and have worked with the foster parents.”
● Privately operated foster homes could be regulated by social workers, rather than inspectors with more of an enforcement mentality.
● A single, independent body — not affiliated with the Department of Human Services, which funds foster care — could oversee all foster care providers.
Sources: Court-appointed monitors’ report to U.S. District Court, Georgia Office of the Child Advocate’s 2008 annual report, AJC research
How we got the story
For this series of articles exploring Georgia’s increasing reliance on private agencies to operate the state’s child welfare system, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution examined more than 1,500 state reports and other public documents and interviewed foster care providers, state officials and children’s advocates.
Today: Substandard conditions in privately operated foster care settings seldom incur penalties.
Monday: A riot at a North Georgia group home for foster children was the culmination of a long slide into chaos — and of the state’s failure to intervene.
Next Sunday: Breakdowns in multistate adoptions arranged by a private agency from Georgia largely escape the attention of state regulators.
April 26: Private adoption and foster care agencies are supposed to be not-for-profit organizations. That doesn’t stop some agency officials from turning child welfare into a lucrative enterprise.
http://www.ajc.com/news/foster-care-fraught-with-469486.html
AJC investigation: Children needing homes get placed in harm’s way with few repercussions
By Alan Judd
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Georgia officials decided last year that a rules violation by a private foster care agency was so egregious it warranted one of the toughest possible penalties.
Bita Honarvar, bhonarvar@ajc.com Melissa Carter is director of the Georgia Office of the Child Advocate for the Protection of Children.
The agency, state records show, had inappropriately placed two children in the same foster home. One was a 17-year-old who had engaged in incest and other sexual activity. The other was 8, autistic and mute, with a history of being abused and an IQ of 16. The boys at first shared a bedroom; ultimately, they shared a bed.
The foster agency’s punishment: a $300 fine.
What happened at the Trek Program, a foster agency based in Fort Oglethorpe, and how the state responded illustrate the scope of problems in Georgia’s growing system of publicly funded but privately operated foster care, according to an investigation by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The newspaper reviewed more than 1,500 reports of state inspections and investigations, which provide an astonishing narrative of stark conditions and inadequate oversight in small foster homes and large group facilities alike.
Fights. Sexual assaults. Consensual sex between young teens. Abuse by foster parents and group home employees. Escapes. Suicide attempts. All occur with regularity at many of Georgia’s 336 private foster care agencies, the Journal-Constitution’s examination found.
One agency, for example, repeatedly used anti-psychotic drugs to subdue misbehaving children. Another tried to rid residents of “demons” through forced exorcism.
Yet the state office that oversees foster care consistently excuses serious, repeated rules violations that jeopardize children’s health and safety.
Since 2008, officials have issued 1,107 citations to 300 of the 336 private agencies. Most cases involved multiple violations of foster care rules. But the state imposed fines or other penalties — what it calls “adverse actions” — in just 83, or 7 percent, of those citations. The median fine: $500.
Of the 336 private foster care agencies, 100 receive direct state funding; last year’s total exceeded $55 million. Even among those agencies, violations are common. In the past two years, the state has cited 91 of the 100 agencies — while continuing to pay them for housing foster children.
Like many other states, Georgia increasingly relies on private agencies — not-for-profit organizations, for the most part — to place children in foster homes or group homes and to oversee much of their care. Many of the children have been diagnosed with mental illnesses, behavioral disorders, or both. Some enter foster care through the state’s social services system to protect them from abusive or neglectful parents. Others come through juvenile courts after getting in trouble with the law.
About 4,000 children, roughly half those in state care, reside in privately owned facilities. A decade ago, private agencies cared for no more than 10 percent of Georgia’s foster children.
State oversight, however, has not kept pace with the growth in private care.
In Fulton and DeKalb counties, Georgia’s most populous, half the children in foster care did not receive the required two visits a month from state workers in 2009, court-appointed monitors said in a recent report. In addition, the monitors said, state officials inspected the operations of one-third as many private foster agencies last year as in 2008.
And while half the foster children in the two counties live in private facilities, the monitors told a judge, they account for three-fourths of substantiated maltreatment cases in foster homes. (The state recently countered that 37 percent of the maltreatment occurred outside foster homes.)
“These are just the cases that actually get identified, investigated and substantiated as abuse,” said Ira Lustbader, associate director of Children’s Rights Inc., a New York-based advocacy group involved in the federal lawsuit that led to the monitors’ appointment.
“If the state is going to utilize the private sector, they have to have mechanisms in place” to ensure children’s safety, Lustbader said. “In the end, it’s all about the quality of the state’s oversight.”
State officials, however, say regulating foster care agencies is a complicated undertaking, one that involves using both persuasion and the specter of serious penalties to combat substandard treatment.
“It is not the goal to put people out of business,” said Keith Bostick, director of the state Office of Residential Child Care. “We want to do as much as we can to try to keep kids safe. But it is a balancing act.”
Dena Smith, spokeswoman for the Department of Human Services, which oversees the regulatory office, added: “Many times there are agencies or providers that, with a soft nudge, they can get back into compliance.”
But many foster care providers complain that enforcement is too aggressive, too focused on administrative requirements that don’t directly affect how children are treated.
“The regulations are good regulations,” said Normer Adams, executive director of the Georgia Association of Homes and Services for Children, an industry lobbying group. “But sometimes the citations are really tedious. Most of the violations don’t threaten the health or safety of a child.”
Regardless, in most instances, the state merely tells private agencies to correct deficiencies. Sometimes it also threatens an “adverse action.” But many agencies continue to violate the rules, with little or no consequence.
Drugs and demons
One day last April, an employee of the Mercy’s Door group home near Dalton approached a resident with a plan for his redemption: exorcism.
The employee took the boy to an office, where four other staff members were waiting, the boy later told a state inspector. They sat the boy in a chair and encircled him, hands joined, saying they would “exorcise the demons out” of him, he told the inspector.
“In Jesus’ name,” the boy quoted a staff member as saying, “remove the demons.”
Employees at Mercy’s Door required residents to attend daily “devotionals,” where they claimed to “rebuke demons of depression” and spoke in tongues, according to a second boy, who witnessed part of the exorcism rite. When another resident, an atheist, left his room, the boy said, staff members prayed over his bed. The staff, according to one resident, believed that “everyone has demons inside of them.”
The boy targeted by the exorcism said two staff members rubbed olive oil on his forehead and spoke about “four angels and rings of fire” — an apparent reference to Revelation’s prophesy that 144,000 people will be “sealed” and spared in Earth’s inevitable destruction. The boy said he was told he had been “bought for a price and adopted by Jesus.”
At one point, two of the facility’s employees later said, the boy became distraught. “Why,” he asked, jumping out of his chair, “can’t you be Baptist?”
In a brief telephone interview, the facility’s director, Veronica Alcerro, declined to comment.
A state investigation confirmed the boy’s story about the exorcism — and found that an employee of the group home, which received $62,416 in state money last year, had lied to an inspector.
But while the state cited Mercy’s Door for rules violations, it assessed no penalty.
In May 2008, the state cited Morningstar Treatment Services, which operates the Youth Estate group home outside Brunswick, for repeatedly using anti-psychotic drugs to control residents who would “act up.” A similar citation had been issued the previous October.
Regulators described the shots as an improper form of chemical restraint, used “as a means of convenience” for the facility’s staff.
One resident, for instance, was drugged for “non-compliance,” according to an incident report prepared by Morningstar. The resident had argued over serving an in-school suspension, so a nurse gave the child Ativan, an anti-psychotic, and Benadryl, an over-the-counter antihistamine also used as a sedative. After “lying on the bench for a little while,” the incident report said, the child completed the suspension “without fighting it.”
The state ordered Morningstar to revise its medication policy, and the agency said it would.
Ten months later, however, state inspectors learned that Morningstar was still using medication to discipline or control residents.
A nurse sedated one child for “being out of area.” Another resident was given a blend of Benadryl, Ativan and Haldol, another anti-psychotic, for “agitation, destruction and self-abuse.” Yet another received Valium for “agitation and aggression”; when the child still didn’t calm down, a nurse gave him the powerful anti-psychotic drug Thorazine.
In those instances, as in others, inspectors noted, “there was no valid prescription for the medications given.”
Staff members told inspectors that without the shots, “they would not be able to handle some of the residents,” according to a state report.
The four dozen or so residents at Morningstar typically have IQs between 40 and 70 and emotional and behavioral disorders, said Barry Kerr, the agency’s chief executive.
Morningstar has been “very aggressive” in reducing the use of drugs to manage residents’ behavior, Kerr said. The medicines, he said, have been used only “when we did not have another alternative.”
After Morningstar’s second citation, the state gave the agency a stern warning: “Based on repeat rule violations and failure to comply with an accepted plan of correction, adverse action may be initiated.”
About a week later, the state did act against Morningstar.
It imposed a $450 fine.
‘Eyes on the situation’
At least once a year, Rachel Neal shows up unannounced at each of the 80 or so foster care facilities that comprise her portfolio as a state inspector.
She carries a lengthy list of rules that each must follow: a minimum number of training hours for employees, up-to-date inspections for vehicles that transport foster children, and on and on.
Most violations get a written citation and are corrected within weeks. But when she discovers dangerous situations, such as toxic materials left within the reach of children, Neal expects instant remedies.
“Usually, they’ll be like, ‘OK, Ms. Neal, that will be dealt with immediately,’ ” she said during a tour of The Bridge, a group home in northwest Atlanta. “We make sure before I leave that that hazard will be fixed.”
Even during standard inspections, Neal said, “a lot of times you may come across something else” that endangers children or otherwise violates state rules. She said she may deviate from the routine “if I hear something, or see something, or read something in a file.”
But Neal and other inspectors spend relatively little time at each foster care facility. State case workers — assigned to a different division of the Department of Human Services — are supposed to visit each child they oversee twice a month. But they may not always look for problems affecting children supervised by other case workers, said Melissa Carter, the state’s child advocate.
“They are our eyes on the situation,” Carter said. “If I’m a case manager and I’m responsible for little Susie, I just go in and take a look at little Susie. It could be that other children were seen and other problems could have been detected.”
‘Minimal information’
In early 2007, the state took custody of an autistic child who had been neglected and abused in his home. The boy was “greatly at risk” of more maltreatment, case workers wrote, and would have to be “safeguarded from abuse.”
The state then delegated the boy’s protection to a private agency: Trek, a nonprofit program operated by the Lookout Mountain Community Services Board in North Georgia. Trek, in turn, placed the child in a foster home with which it contracted.
In March 2009, the state asked Trek to handle another child with profound troubles: a 17-year-old with a long, repulsive sexual history. The agency chose the same home where it had put the autistic child.
No one, however, told the foster parents about the 17-year-old’s experiences with incest and pornography. Or about his “sexual inappropriateness” with a stepparent. Or about what a therapist described as his “distorted sexual beliefs”: that children aren’t hurt if adults molest them, for example, and it’s OK for an older child to initiate sex with a younger one.
Trek provided “very minimal information,” the foster parents would later tell a state inspector. When they asked to see the 17-year-old’s psychological evaluations, the foster parents said, a Trek case worker demurred, saying only that the child had “never sexually acted out in previous placements.”
The foster parents moved the 17-year-old into a bedroom with the 8-year-old autistic boy. About a month later, the night of April 7, a cry transmitted by a baby monitor awoke one of the foster parents. He went to the boys’ bedroom, where he found the 17-year-old in bed with the younger child. The older boy was masturbating and had one hand in the 8-year-old’s pants.
The state cited Trek for failing to “prepare the foster family for the placement ... by anticipating adjustments and problems that may arise.” The previous month, the agency had received two similar citations. And a month later, the state assessed the $300 fine.
John Brewer, Trek’s program director, declined to comment on the case. But he said Trek tries to comply with state rules.
“They’ve always looked for specific things and make sure we follow through,” Brewer said. “We do get cited occasionally, and we try to correct those things.”
No one told
The state has cited numerous agencies that withheld critical information from foster parents.
For instance, state officials found that Benchmark Family Services of Jonesboro knew a child it placed in a foster home was supposed to receive therapy for sexual misbehavior. But no one, records show, told the foster family.
Soon, the child “inappropriately touched” another student at school, according to state reports. At the foster home, he groped another child.
The state cited the agency, but imposed no penalty.
A child placed in 2008 by another agency, Choices for Life of Georgia, based in Valdosta, had entered foster care after having sex with a cousin. He was not supposed to sleep, bathe, undress or be alone with younger children.
Again, no one told the foster family. Within weeks, the boy had molested at least one of the younger children in the home.
The state cited the agency, but imposed no penalty.
Foster parents need information about children in their care, said Beth Locker, policy director for Voices for Georgia’s Children, an Atlanta-based advocacy group.
“When that doesn’t happen,” Locker said, “it’s hard to know whether it’s a breakdown in communication, or a genuine concern about the privacy of a child’s family, or a concern about the cost of providing needed services.”
Sometimes, however, foster parents exacerbate harm already done to the children they supervise.
Choices for Life is one of several agencies cited for not preventing foster parents from using corporal punishment or other prohibited disciplinary methods. Last year, regulators said, the agency “failed to take appropriate corrective action” after learning a child had been spanked, and injured, by her foster parent. The child reported the spanking in December 2008, but Choices for Life left her in the foster home for 42 days.
The state imposed no penalty. It rarely does unless it finds a series of serious violations.
Inspectors documented numerous deficiencies in oversight by Bethany Christian Services of Atlanta, for instance. One of the agency’s foster parents left a child who uses a wheelchair home alone several times. Once, a social worker came by and found the wheelchair upstairs and the child on the basement floor, unable to get up and lying in his own waste.
Two other foster parents with Bethany forced a child to swallow a Benadryl tablet. The foster parents, the child said, called it a “sleep vitamin.”
From 20 investigations and four other inspections since May 2008, the state has cited Bethany Christian eight times for a total of 27 rules violations.
Just once, however, did the state impose a penalty: a $500 fine this January.
----------------------
Differing solutions
More regulation or less? Experts and children’s advocates are divided in their suggestions for improving Georgia’s foster care system.
Those who support tougher enforcement of foster care rules suggest that:
● More state case workers are needed so each child in foster care can be visited at least twice each month, as required by a settlement agreement in a lawsuit over conditions in foster care.
● The state should be more diligent in searching for relatives to care for children taken into protective custody.
● State officials could more closely monitor private agencies that operate group homes or place children in foster homes; inspections of those agencies dropped dramatically in 2009.
● The state could increase funding to replace case workers and other regulators, whose numbers have declined through attrition, retirement and other factors.
Those who say less-stringent oversight would help privately operated foster care agencies propose that:
● The state could eliminate what one report called “disparities in degrees of regulation and disparate treatment” of state-supervised foster homes and those overseen by private agencies. Problems in state-operated homes, the report said, may be addressed by case workers “who personally know and have worked with the foster parents.”
● Privately operated foster homes could be regulated by social workers, rather than inspectors with more of an enforcement mentality.
● A single, independent body — not affiliated with the Department of Human Services, which funds foster care — could oversee all foster care providers.
Sources: Court-appointed monitors’ report to U.S. District Court, Georgia Office of the Child Advocate’s 2008 annual report, AJC research
How we got the story
For this series of articles exploring Georgia’s increasing reliance on private agencies to operate the state’s child welfare system, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution examined more than 1,500 state reports and other public documents and interviewed foster care providers, state officials and children’s advocates.
Today: Substandard conditions in privately operated foster care settings seldom incur penalties.
Monday: A riot at a North Georgia group home for foster children was the culmination of a long slide into chaos — and of the state’s failure to intervene.
Next Sunday: Breakdowns in multistate adoptions arranged by a private agency from Georgia largely escape the attention of state regulators.
April 26: Private adoption and foster care agencies are supposed to be not-for-profit organizations. That doesn’t stop some agency officials from turning child welfare into a lucrative enterprise.
http://www.ajc.com/news/foster-care-fraught-with-469486.html
Open Letter to the State of NH-Another Grandmother Screwed Over by the State Of NH!
I received a very disturbing e-mail this morning from another Grandmother screwed over by the State of NH, who asked me to post her letter to my blog. Another grandmother not allowed to raise her grandson, because the State of NH is so greedy and inhumane. I find we have a lot in common when it comes to DCYF. I was told by Maggie Bishop that I chose my dying daughter over my grandson. My daughter who was arrested for something stupid she did AFTER DCYF stole her child. Maggie Bishop told me I should have left my daughter in jail to die. When I asked her if it were her child, is that what she would do, she said yes, thats exactly what she would do. Then she asked why my daughter isn't dead.
This grandmother was told she chose her daughter and unborn grandchild over her grandson, because she put up the money for a REAL Lawyer. This is one crude excuse for a human being. I doubt she even has any kids, as most of the worker's who try to tell parents how to raise their children, don't even have any of their own. Isn't it time DCYF came up with some new excuses? Since when is it a crime to try to help ALL your children and grandchildren? DCYF and the courts order psychological evaluations of parent's? Maybe is time DCYF worker's were ordered these evaluations before being placed in jobs that are SUPPOSED to "Preserve Families". When will OUR Government ever get it right? When will Families be allowed to raise their own families, without Government interference? Some children ARE abused and neglected. These are the children DCYF is supposed to be protecting, but their not. Their too busy raking in the money off of children stolen ILLEGALLY!
Here is the letter I received about another so-called DCYF protected child, ruined for life by DCYF:
Today is one of the saddest days of my life, today my daughter is surrendering her rights to her 9 year old son. DCYF has won!!!! They have beaten her down and punished her far beyond what any prison can do. It has been 2 years since she has seen or even spoken to her Son, would it have been to much to ask that she have one last chance to hug him and try to explain what is happening? My grandsons father is dead, so now he has no parents. DCYF believes placing him in a Poly amorous, dirty ( the foster parents believe personal hygiene is a choice). I can say with 100% certainty that 99% of the population would not want sit next to the foster father on a hot day. I have unfortunately. I also am not going to be able to be as much of an advocate for my grandson as DCYF is paying his foster father approx $10,000 to adopt him. My grandson receives Soc Sec of about $700.00 per month. do you think that $ is a motivating factor here, I do. Once the adoption is done then the foster father can go back to the life style he loves, having random people staying in his home, paying him, to pay his mortgage. No back ground checks, people he has met off the Internet. Is this an open invitation for a child molester to come and stay with them and have a ready victim? I think so. Shelley Randell ( Att. for DCYF), Amy Ousterhout (CPSW for DCYF) , Tom Hebert (CASA GAL), Judge Gordon of the Franklin Family court you should all be ashamed of your selves. I dare say if this were your grandchild you would not want this kind of placement for them. DCYF has trashed me for standing by my daughter and fighting for my grandson, Maggie Bishop told me that if I really loved my grandson I would have turned my back on my daughter and her unborn baby. This would have given them another blond, blue eyed, baby boy to sell. It sickens me that the people charged with protecting children are the most corrupt I have ever seen. I never knew how bad the system is, I wouldn't have believed in our country these things could happen. Yet now i know they happen all the time, the victim are just silent, scared little kids. Where is the outrage? what do I do next as a grandmother? Wait for my grandson to be the victim of the next monster to enter his life, sit back quietly and wait to try to pick up the pieces of a broken life? I'm at a loss. Lea VanTassel
This grandmother was told she chose her daughter and unborn grandchild over her grandson, because she put up the money for a REAL Lawyer. This is one crude excuse for a human being. I doubt she even has any kids, as most of the worker's who try to tell parents how to raise their children, don't even have any of their own. Isn't it time DCYF came up with some new excuses? Since when is it a crime to try to help ALL your children and grandchildren? DCYF and the courts order psychological evaluations of parent's? Maybe is time DCYF worker's were ordered these evaluations before being placed in jobs that are SUPPOSED to "Preserve Families". When will OUR Government ever get it right? When will Families be allowed to raise their own families, without Government interference? Some children ARE abused and neglected. These are the children DCYF is supposed to be protecting, but their not. Their too busy raking in the money off of children stolen ILLEGALLY!
Here is the letter I received about another so-called DCYF protected child, ruined for life by DCYF:
Today is one of the saddest days of my life, today my daughter is surrendering her rights to her 9 year old son. DCYF has won!!!! They have beaten her down and punished her far beyond what any prison can do. It has been 2 years since she has seen or even spoken to her Son, would it have been to much to ask that she have one last chance to hug him and try to explain what is happening? My grandsons father is dead, so now he has no parents. DCYF believes placing him in a Poly amorous, dirty ( the foster parents believe personal hygiene is a choice). I can say with 100% certainty that 99% of the population would not want sit next to the foster father on a hot day. I have unfortunately. I also am not going to be able to be as much of an advocate for my grandson as DCYF is paying his foster father approx $10,000 to adopt him. My grandson receives Soc Sec of about $700.00 per month. do you think that $ is a motivating factor here, I do. Once the adoption is done then the foster father can go back to the life style he loves, having random people staying in his home, paying him, to pay his mortgage. No back ground checks, people he has met off the Internet. Is this an open invitation for a child molester to come and stay with them and have a ready victim? I think so. Shelley Randell ( Att. for DCYF), Amy Ousterhout (CPSW for DCYF) , Tom Hebert (CASA GAL), Judge Gordon of the Franklin Family court you should all be ashamed of your selves. I dare say if this were your grandchild you would not want this kind of placement for them. DCYF has trashed me for standing by my daughter and fighting for my grandson, Maggie Bishop told me that if I really loved my grandson I would have turned my back on my daughter and her unborn baby. This would have given them another blond, blue eyed, baby boy to sell. It sickens me that the people charged with protecting children are the most corrupt I have ever seen. I never knew how bad the system is, I wouldn't have believed in our country these things could happen. Yet now i know they happen all the time, the victim are just silent, scared little kids. Where is the outrage? what do I do next as a grandmother? Wait for my grandson to be the victim of the next monster to enter his life, sit back quietly and wait to try to pick up the pieces of a broken life? I'm at a loss. Lea VanTassel
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Edited-Nashua, NH DCYF Tell's The Truth For Once, or Did They? Austin Knightly Was Adopted By Strangers! Contradictory Documentation Included
My husband and I are the grandparent's of Austin Ricardo Gamez-Knightly, born January 25th, 2000, in Nashua, NH. He and his mother lived with us in our home from the day of Austin's birth, until after he was three years old. His mother had a daughter in 2002 and later married her father. The four of them moved, but close enough so we still saw Austin every day and he also spent every weekend with us. Even after he started school, he was with us every day, after school and evenings, yet DCYF felt Austin was worth more to them in a non-relative placement than with the grandparent's he spent his life with. The grandparent's he called Mom and Dad all his life. The grandparent's he missed so much, that he tried to hang himself at age six in the foster stranger's home.
If Supervisor Tracy Gubbins hadn't denied me a foster care license, they still would have gotten their federal bonus money. But screwing over families is all their good for. They would rather have Austin in pain all his life than be with the grandparent's he loves. It's all about the money. The day they put Austin on psychiatric medication, was the day they decided he would never come home. That they could make big money off him on drugs and even bigger money off him after lying to the people they con into adoption of a very unhappy little boy.
I'm sure Austin has been brainwashed just like the rest of the stolen kid's. I'm sure they told him his Grammie and Grampie didn't want him and that they didn't want to visit him. Truth isn't part of their vocabulary, which comes to the point of my post.
My husband and I were finally allowed a home study, after many calls and letter's to the DHHS Commissioner. It was started in June of 2008 and never finished until April of 2009. And a half-assed home study it was. No financial report's, no home inspection, no criminal records check or anything else. Although they did see a swimming pool in the yard. It's just too bad there wasn't one.
After many false statement's in the home study, which we learned from a former caseworker, were the work of Tracy Gubbins who has screwed us over from day one, we were denied placement.
It's funny but the three caseworker's we met with wanted Austin placed with us. They knew he would be better off with us than anywhere else. It's too bad the new Nashua district manager doesn't throw Tracy out on her rearend. Out in the gutter where she belong's. She is the one person, besides one of their Lawyer's, that is giving the Nashua office a bad name.
In August of 2009 I filed an appeal with the Administrative appeals unit in Concord,. No-one told us we could file an appeal, but the information was in the foster care book's I received when I took the classes.
First off, I spoke to the Manager of Administrative hearings on the phone. He told me his office does not do appeals for negative home studies. He said they never have. Then I received a letter September 25, 2009 from the Manager. He informed me that he received an e-mail from Lorraine Bartlett which said Probate Court said I had "No standing" in the rights of my grandson. It say's "To initiate an appeal under RSA 126-A:5,VII and department rule He-C 200, one must have standing, meaning in general terms that your rights, benefits or privileges must be affected by the decision being appealed." Anyone in their right mind knows my rights ARE being affected, along with Austin's. He also stated that Lorraine Bartlett stated in the e-mail that the home study was done only to assist my husband and I,"to better understand the reason's why DCYF would not support a permanent placement with us".
Then why don't the e-mails from Maggie Bishop state that fact? Why were we told by the three caseworker's we had nothing to worry about? That Austin would be placed with us? How cruel can anyone be, giving us such false hope, knowing we bought Austin a bed and set up his room with all his favorite pictures and toy's? The other statement by Lorraine Bartlett in the e-mail was Austin's name was already changed. Since when is it legal to change a childs name before he's adopted? Since when does DCYF abide by the Law? THEY DON"T!!!
Here's one from Maggie Bishop:
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Ms. Knightly,
I have been in tough with the local District Office regarding your email
below. It is my understanding that they are currently involved with
assessing your home as a possible placement resource. Please know that when
it is at all possible and in the best interest of the a child we do
advocate for relative placements. It is for that reason that the office is
pursuing the home study you referenced below. Once they have completed the
process they will get back in touch with you.
Please see the contradictory statement made by Lorraine Bartlett below, which states Austin's grandparent's were afforded a Home Study to show why DCYF would NOT support permanent placement with his grandparents: Since when does the state pay for Home Studies to show people why they AREN'T a good placement?
As much as family is an importmant natural resource that we try to maintain
for children there are sometimes barriers specific to a child and their
circumstances that prevent placement as an option. It is for that reason
that a home study and assessment of all the factors impacting a child must
be consider prior to a placement decision.
I am confident that the Nashua office will conduct a thorough review of
your specific circumstances and provide you with the information as soon as
possible.
Maggie Bishop
Director
Division For Children Youth&Families
(603)271-4440
09/02/2008 01:44 PM
And Another
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Mrs. Knightly,
Thank you for taking the time to send me your concerns. I do stand by my
statements relative to the importance of relatives and that they indeed,
are a priority option for children. I will be reviewing the circumstances
outlined below and will get back to you as soon as possible. I just wanted
to assure you that I received your email.
Maggie Bishop
Director
Division For Children Youth&Families
(603)271-4440
09/02/2008 01:44 PM
The only thing DCYF hasn't lied about is telling us our grandson was being adopted. I went to city hall today and found out he HAS been adopted. At least that's what I was told, but I don't believe anything that comes out of the mouth's of DCYF. Maybe DCYF gave City Hall order's on what to tell me. I wouldn't put it past them!
If Supervisor Tracy Gubbins hadn't denied me a foster care license, they still would have gotten their federal bonus money. But screwing over families is all their good for. They would rather have Austin in pain all his life than be with the grandparent's he loves. It's all about the money. The day they put Austin on psychiatric medication, was the day they decided he would never come home. That they could make big money off him on drugs and even bigger money off him after lying to the people they con into adoption of a very unhappy little boy.
I'm sure Austin has been brainwashed just like the rest of the stolen kid's. I'm sure they told him his Grammie and Grampie didn't want him and that they didn't want to visit him. Truth isn't part of their vocabulary, which comes to the point of my post.
My husband and I were finally allowed a home study, after many calls and letter's to the DHHS Commissioner. It was started in June of 2008 and never finished until April of 2009. And a half-assed home study it was. No financial report's, no home inspection, no criminal records check or anything else. Although they did see a swimming pool in the yard. It's just too bad there wasn't one.
After many false statement's in the home study, which we learned from a former caseworker, were the work of Tracy Gubbins who has screwed us over from day one, we were denied placement.
It's funny but the three caseworker's we met with wanted Austin placed with us. They knew he would be better off with us than anywhere else. It's too bad the new Nashua district manager doesn't throw Tracy out on her rearend. Out in the gutter where she belong's. She is the one person, besides one of their Lawyer's, that is giving the Nashua office a bad name.
In August of 2009 I filed an appeal with the Administrative appeals unit in Concord,. No-one told us we could file an appeal, but the information was in the foster care book's I received when I took the classes.
First off, I spoke to the Manager of Administrative hearings on the phone. He told me his office does not do appeals for negative home studies. He said they never have. Then I received a letter September 25, 2009 from the Manager. He informed me that he received an e-mail from Lorraine Bartlett which said Probate Court said I had "No standing" in the rights of my grandson. It say's "To initiate an appeal under RSA 126-A:5,VII and department rule He-C 200, one must have standing, meaning in general terms that your rights, benefits or privileges must be affected by the decision being appealed." Anyone in their right mind knows my rights ARE being affected, along with Austin's. He also stated that Lorraine Bartlett stated in the e-mail that the home study was done only to assist my husband and I,"to better understand the reason's why DCYF would not support a permanent placement with us".
Then why don't the e-mails from Maggie Bishop state that fact? Why were we told by the three caseworker's we had nothing to worry about? That Austin would be placed with us? How cruel can anyone be, giving us such false hope, knowing we bought Austin a bed and set up his room with all his favorite pictures and toy's? The other statement by Lorraine Bartlett in the e-mail was Austin's name was already changed. Since when is it legal to change a childs name before he's adopted? Since when does DCYF abide by the Law? THEY DON"T!!!
Here's one from Maggie Bishop:
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Ms. Knightly,
I have been in tough with the local District Office regarding your email
below. It is my understanding that they are currently involved with
assessing your home as a possible placement resource. Please know that when
it is at all possible and in the best interest of the a child we do
advocate for relative placements. It is for that reason that the office is
pursuing the home study you referenced below. Once they have completed the
process they will get back in touch with you.
Please see the contradictory statement made by Lorraine Bartlett below, which states Austin's grandparent's were afforded a Home Study to show why DCYF would NOT support permanent placement with his grandparents: Since when does the state pay for Home Studies to show people why they AREN'T a good placement?
As much as family is an importmant natural resource that we try to maintain
for children there are sometimes barriers specific to a child and their
circumstances that prevent placement as an option. It is for that reason
that a home study and assessment of all the factors impacting a child must
be consider prior to a placement decision.
I am confident that the Nashua office will conduct a thorough review of
your specific circumstances and provide you with the information as soon as
possible.
Maggie Bishop
Director
Division For Children Youth&Families
(603)271-4440
09/02/2008 01:44 PM
And Another
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Mrs. Knightly,
Thank you for taking the time to send me your concerns. I do stand by my
statements relative to the importance of relatives and that they indeed,
are a priority option for children. I will be reviewing the circumstances
outlined below and will get back to you as soon as possible. I just wanted
to assure you that I received your email.
Maggie Bishop
Director
Division For Children Youth&Families
(603)271-4440
09/02/2008 01:44 PM
The only thing DCYF hasn't lied about is telling us our grandson was being adopted. I went to city hall today and found out he HAS been adopted. At least that's what I was told, but I don't believe anything that comes out of the mouth's of DCYF. Maybe DCYF gave City Hall order's on what to tell me. I wouldn't put it past them!
The Truth about Foster Care From a Foster Stranger
Out of the mouth of a Foster Stranger, how parent's are screwed over by the system. From day one, the parent's don't have a chance in hell!
MONDAY, JUNE 21, 2010
I Don't Understand, or Maybe I do.
The little boys that I have right now are doing well and settling in very nicely. They are happy and healthy and secure and really beginning to attach. Good things all. They are visiting with their birth mom pretty liberally, although supervised. She seems to be making progress as well. Unfortunately her situation is such that she is not going to get her boys back. There is too much unhealthiness in her life. Even if she maintains her sobriety, she has way too much other bad stuff and not enough of anything good to parent anyone. I know this. The worker knows this. The judge knows this, as do the attorneys. I'm pretty sure everyone involved in this case knows it, except for mom. Everyone talks about it, but not to her. No one has told her and no one will tell her. Why not? Why not just tell it like it is and allow her to maintain some control over the situation? Why not allow her to relinquish and make some choices about where her boys end up? She could ask for post adoption contact agreement so she could have continued contact. Why let her believe that she is working toward reunification when everyone is just going through the motions? Once they terminate the adoptive family will be advised not to maintain contact. They almost alway advise it in our county regardless of the birth family situation. We have been told repeatedly that contact with Ella's family is not appropriate (and she did ultimately relinquish)
If I admit it, I know why it is this way. It's to protect the county from lawsuits.
Posted by Susan at 9:06 PM
http://fostercarespacewarp.blogspot.com/
MONDAY, JUNE 21, 2010
I Don't Understand, or Maybe I do.
The little boys that I have right now are doing well and settling in very nicely. They are happy and healthy and secure and really beginning to attach. Good things all. They are visiting with their birth mom pretty liberally, although supervised. She seems to be making progress as well. Unfortunately her situation is such that she is not going to get her boys back. There is too much unhealthiness in her life. Even if she maintains her sobriety, she has way too much other bad stuff and not enough of anything good to parent anyone. I know this. The worker knows this. The judge knows this, as do the attorneys. I'm pretty sure everyone involved in this case knows it, except for mom. Everyone talks about it, but not to her. No one has told her and no one will tell her. Why not? Why not just tell it like it is and allow her to maintain some control over the situation? Why not allow her to relinquish and make some choices about where her boys end up? She could ask for post adoption contact agreement so she could have continued contact. Why let her believe that she is working toward reunification when everyone is just going through the motions? Once they terminate the adoptive family will be advised not to maintain contact. They almost alway advise it in our county regardless of the birth family situation. We have been told repeatedly that contact with Ella's family is not appropriate (and she did ultimately relinquish)
If I admit it, I know why it is this way. It's to protect the county from lawsuits.
Posted by Susan at 9:06 PM
http://fostercarespacewarp.blogspot.com/
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