ProPublica and The New Yorker have a long piece out today called, “When Foster Parents Don’t Want to Give Back the Baby.” The piece discusses foster parents who legally intervene in child dependency cases. It focuses on a case involving Colorado parents Fred and Alicia and their son Carter, who was born 2.5 months premature, weighed only 2.5 pounds, and suffered in utero exposure to meth and THC.
Carter came into care shortly after his birth. His parents, still apparently deep in addiction, failed for several months to face that addiction or take the steps necessary to become safe, trustworthy parents. But by the summer of 2020, perhaps a year after Carter’s birth, the story indicates that Fred and Alicia had done everything the dependency court asked of them. They had been clean for months, were visiting regularly, and were holding down stable jobs. But at some point thereafter — on the basis of an attachment and bonding study, the article suggests — Colorado’s child welfare agency moved to terminate Carter’s parental rights so he could be adopted by his foster parents, who had intervened in the action.
Despite the reports that Fred and Alicia were compliant with their case plan, Carter lingered in foster care for two more years, after which the agency again sought termination of parental rights based upon his long stay in foster care.
Long story short, the state finally gave up its efforts, Carter was reunited with his parents, and he seems to be doing well. But the article suggests that were it not for the foster parents, aided by a “biased” attachment study that suggested a weak bond between the parents and Carter, that the child would have been home sooner.
Other ProPublica pieces over the past year or two have been based on a template in which the journalist intends to demonstrate ways in which the State wrongly takes children from struggling parents. Here, the “meddling” foster parents, their attorney, and the attachment expert are the villains the State uses in its attack on Fred, Alicia, and Carter. I’d suggest that in most cases, reality is much different, and that having foster parent participation in cases is helpful.
First, having some level of participation by foster parents is good for the child and often good for the parents. Foster parents are often a source of support for the child’s parents, and many actively support the effort to return the child to his or her home. Foster parents can provide the court with valuable information about how the child is doing while in care. That’s why, under federal law, states are required to ensure that foster parents are notified of hearings in dependency cases and are offered the opportunity to be heard.
Second, in most states, the ability of a foster parent to formally intervene in a dependency case is either discretionary with the court or based on the fact that a child has been in the same foster home for a long period of time. Even where foster parents become parties to the case, their main purpose in doing so — as the Colorado Supreme Court has itself held — is to provide information about the child’s needs, not to direct the final outcome of the case.
Third, sometimes an assertive, caring foster parent can help push a case to permanency when the State agency is not doing what it should. Fred and Alicia’s case may be an example of this. Even though the article indicates the child would have been safe with them due to their ongoing sobriety and case plan compliance by the summer of 2020, the case dragged on for two more years, apparently due to the actions of the agency, not the foster parents.
Should states be careful about authorizing foster parents to intervene in child dependency and termination of parental rights cases? Certainly. In most situations, parents who have made serious parenting mistakes should have the opportunity to get the help they need to ensure their child is raised in his or her birth family. When parents take responsibility, the State has an obligation to assist that child in returning home as soon as it is safe to do so.
At the same time, there are circumstances in which foster parents become the child’s last line of defense and last chance for a safe, stable, and loving home. Among these are cases where children have suffered extreme abuse at the hands of their parents; cases in which parents are not taking responsibility and children have lingered without permanency for such a long period that the foster family is their only solid attachment; and cases in which the question is not whether the child will be reunited with parents but rather whether the child will find permanency in a foster home or be placed with relatives who have no prior connection to the child.
For these difficult cases, the question should not focus on what the parents want or what the foster parents want, but rather on what is necessary for the child’s mental and emotional health. When children can’t be reunited with family, the court needs to ensure they have stability and permanence with those adults to whom they are attached.
In other news:
Georgia Medicaid is rebidding its managed care contract for children in foster care and those on adoption assistance.
Lawyers in Texas’ class action child welfare litigation want the federal government to take over the state’s foster care system. If I were representing Texas, I might just say, “you think you can do a better job? Have at it.”
Maine’s child maltreatment rate is almost 20%, twice the national standard.
This report from Oklahoma is a reminder that if you want to help parents reunite with their children in out-of-home care, you’ve got to make sure they have access to services and the transportation necessary to get there.
California’s Governor Newsom vetoed a bill that would have ended the state’s practice of using children’s federal and other benefits to cover foster care costs.
Child advocates in Kansas are asking why five-year-old Zoey Felix wasn’t removed to foster care prior to her murder.
An Illinois child services worker was convicted for failing to protect a child beaten to death by his mother.
And if your child (or your husband, for example) wants a pet, you should say YES!
Thanks for reading, and please continue to pray for children and families who have been and will be harmed by Hamas’ attack on Israel and Israel’s efforts to eliminate future threats.