by Cris Beam
[>] is now awaiting federal review: E-mail correspondence with ACS press office, November 2012.
[>] when I was done, there were 400,540: The first figure is from September 30, fiscal year 2007, and the second from September 30, fiscal year 2011. The AFCARS Report, No. 19 (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Administration on Children, Youth and Families, Children’s Bureau, estimates as of July 2012). http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cb/resource/afcars-report-19.
[>] increased by 2.5 million, or 21 percent: Saki Knafo, “Bloomberg Budget: Slashed Children’s Services Contribute to National Crisis, Advocates Say,” Huffington Post, May 3, 2012. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/03/bloomberg-budget-cuts-child-care-after-school-programs_n_1475333.html.
[>] at or below the poverty line in 2008: The federal poverty level was $17,600 for a family of three in 2008. Keeping Track of New York City’s Children: 2010, 9th ed. (New York: Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York, 2010).
[>] Congressional Caucus on Foster Youth: The caucus is cochaired by Representative Karen Bass (D-CA), Representative Tom Marino (R-PA), Representative Jim McDermott (D-WA), and Representative Michele Bachmann (R-MN). They went to Los Angeles on the first stop of their listening tour and were headed to south Florida and two cities in other states. From Karen Bass’s Congressional Caucus on Foster Youth website: http://fosteryouthcaucus-karenbass.house.gov/.
Acknowledgments
So many kind, wise, and generous people contributed to this book; thank you, as Kecia would say, for rocking with me all the way.
My deepest gratitude goes to all the people on these pages: thank you for sharing these years of your lives, and for offering that most precious commodity—trust—even when it had been stolen before. Thank you, Fatimah, for the title. I hope you change your mind one day and write your book.
Many books helped me frame my thinking about foster care. Some of the most important were The Lost Children of Wilder by Nina Bernstein for its context and history of ACS, and Stephen O’Connor’s Orphan Trains for an even earlier look at New York City’s systemic removals of children. Jennifer Toth’s Orphans of the Living was a helpful narrative exploration of the ways foster kids’ rage and trauma compound over time. Shattered Bonds by Dorothy Roberts provided extra clarity on historical and current racism in the system, and Elizabeth Pleck’s Domestic Tyranny: The Making of American Social Policy Against Family Violence from Colonial Times to the Present provided exactly what its title promised.
Several people granted interviews or provided critical information for this book and yet weren’t directly quoted in its pages. Thank you to Velma Roberts, who sat with me for many hours in her Bronx kitchen and in her kids’ school, sharing her family’s story—living proof that foster and biological parents can work together. Thank you to Mary Chancie, who also brought me home to meet her adult children and to share with me the importance of adopting the kids who have already aged out. Mary and Velma, you give us all faith. Thank you to Lieutenant Pat Montagano at Safe Horizon’s Manhattan Advocacy Center, who explained to me the legal issues around child abuse and parent prosecution while we stood in a cell; and to Anna Owusu for talking extensively with me about preventive services. Thank you to Emily Banach for explaining hospital investigations. Thank you to Nora McCarthy at Rise magazine for your nuanced, humanitarian perspective on parents’ needs, and thank you to Stephanie Schwartz for explaining some of the legal details of family court. Thank you to Susan Grundberg for your early explanations of child welfare and its troubles, and for your take on teenagers in care. Thank you, Fall Willeboordse and Rabiya Tuma. Thank you, Madeleine George, for connecting me with Bayview, and for being a friend. Thank you to the press offices at ACS and OCFS for responding to my endless queries, and to the librarians at Columbia University, especially Jennifer Wertkin at Columbia Law Library. Columbia University also provided me with a graduate student fellow, Kyle Valenta, whose research and thoughtful criticism were very helpful.
I’m deeply grateful to the friends, colleagues, and child welfare experts who read various incarnations of the manuscript and provided vital feedback. Mike Arsham and Rick Barth each read a full draft in near-final form; thank you for your careful and conscientious critiques. Meehan Crist read a full early draft and helped me change direction. Wesley Brown, Richard Perry, Charlotte Carter, Carol Paik, Jennie Yabroff, and Kelly McMasters all read multiple chapters and sections and, with love and furious red pens, pushed this book further than I could have on my own. Thank you all so much.
Far and above, though, the best editor a writer could wish for is Andrea Schulz. Andrea, you have the unparalleled ability to recognize a book amid my wild clutter of ideas and false starts and abundant digressions. From the beginning, you’ve seen this book and helped me find its beating heart. Thank you also to Nicole Angeloro, Lisa Glover, Barbara Wood, and the entire brilliant team at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Thank you, Amy Williams, for leading me long ago to Andrea and for being agent par excellence.
I’m enormously grateful to the Corporation of Yaddo for twice providing me the incalculable gift of time and space to write. Thank you also to the Point Foundation for your early support and to the Lambda Literary Foundation for supporting me and other queer writers.
For five long years, my family of friends has been with me as I built and unbuilt and rebuilt this book. Thank you for bearing with me. Especially Teresa Dinaburg Dias, Lisa Hanauer, Gemma Baumer, Batyah Shtrum, Sharon Krum, Mark Hollander, Ellis Avery, Sharon Marcus, Alison Smith, Cindy Tolan, Rachel Sedor, Kit Rachlin, Remy Steiner, Trista Sordillo, Heart Montalbano, and Dorla McIntosh. And Robin Goldman, Aunt Mary, Sophie, and Sami. Thank you also to Claire Hertz, who saved me more than once.
And then to my immediate family: to my daughter, Christina, who survived foster care and taught me to be a parent, thank you for staying so true. And Lo, my beloved Lo: nobody knows better than you the sacrifice of shacking up with a book in progress. Thank you for your patience, your encouragement, and your unshakable faith in me and my work, and for sailing us through it all. I love you.
Index
A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z
A
AACWA. See Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (AACWA)
abandonment, 55–56, 136. See also biological parents; multiple placements
Abramowitz, Alan, 164
abuse. See child abuse; sexual abuse
accountability
Chaffee legislation and, 203
foster care fee structure and, 163–64
RTCs and, 126
waiver system and, 66
ACF. See U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF)
ACLU. See American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Children’s Rights Project
ACS. See Administration for Children’s Services
ADHD. See Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
Administration for Children’s Services (ACS)
agency review process at, 150
creation of, 25
cultural competence and, 261–62
family court hearings and, 70–72
Green family and, 5–7, 161
legal actions against, 26–28, 284
merging of juvenile justice with foster care and, 133–34
permanency principles, 292
preventive services and, 68, 271
relations between biological and foster parents and, 40
removal decisions at, 20–28
Special Services, 59
teens after discharge and, 192, 199, 205, 210, 292
tracking of foster kids and, 247
waiver system and, 260–61
adoption. See also Keane, Mary; permanency decision; You Gotta Believe! (YGB) program
application process for, 78
of foster babies from addicted mo
thers, 73–74, 76–82
foster kids who aren’t adopted and, 43 (see also aging out)
“foster-to-adopt” parents, 15–17, 79
Juno scenario and, 74, 78
time between parental termination and, 55, 275
willing birth parents and, 7
Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA, 1997), 43–45, 46, 140
Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (AACWA), 45
AFDC. See Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program
African Americans. See also race discrimination
abuse and, 63
as foster moms, 106–8
historical social policy and, 85, 87
overrepresentation in foster care, 61–63
agencies. See also Edwin Gould; Miracle Makers
contracts with ACS, 6–7
drug treatment and, 66–68
flat-sum waivers and, 260–61
foster parents as interchangeable and, 161–62
funding of, 162–64, 208, 260–61
recruitment of foster parents by, 74–76, 80, 92
relationships between birth and foster parents and, 39–40
review process for, 150
tracking of foster kids and, 102, 163, 166, 192, 247, 294
training of foster parents by, 103
aging out. See also independent living programs (ILPs)
Dominique and, 185
Keane’s home and, 206–8, 211–12
payments for, 121, 209–10, 211
self-perceptions of teens and, 216–17
Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program, 87–88
Ainsworth, Mary, 36
alcohol abuse, 64, 68, 277
Alicia (foster child), xi, xii
Allen (Green foster baby), 8, 9–14
biological father of, 38–42, 48–50
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Children’s Rights Project, 46–47
American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, 65
anger of foster kids. See also multiple placements; trust
with system, 99–100
teen attitudes and, 111, 175, 186
Annie E. Casey Foundation, 40. See also Casey Family Programs
Anthony (Green foster son), 12, 48–49, 170, 171, 180–81, 243, 247
adoption of, 180, 181
Anthony (Mary’s foster son), 215–16, 218–21
Arsham, Mike, 51, 274
ASFA. See Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA, 1997)
attachment, 35, 272, 273. See also “just staying” with foster kids; love
agency disregard for, 157–64
caseworkers and, 149, 150–51
as disordered, 144–49
failed placements and, 89
foster parent recruitment and, 75–76
“healing agents” and, 154
identity and, 146
Kecia’s views on, 144–49
lack of mothering and, 218–20
permanency decisions and, 35–37
temporary nature of foster care and, 14–15
therapists and, 153–54
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), 35
author’s personal experiences
as child, xii–xiv
as foster parent, xiv–xvii (see also Quiñonez, Christina)
her biological mother and, 54, 219–20
autistic children. See Russell (Green foster son)
B
Barth, Richard, 269, 273
Bartholet, Elizabeth, 51
battered child syndrome, 24
Bayview Correctional Facility, 58, 135, 136, 144, 145
BCW. See Bureau of Child Welfare (BCW)
bed-wetting, 118
bereavement, in foster children, 90–94
biological parents. See also parental termination; entries for specific parents and foster kids
child’s experience of loss of, 90–94, 218–20
family team conferencing and, 10–12
foster parent contact with, 80–82
as “healing agents,” 154
kids’ reconnections with, 179, 194, 245–46
mentoring of, 39–40, 273
parent advocates and, 106, 108
Bowlby, John, 36
Brooklyn Family Court, 69–72
Brown, Nixmary, 26–27
Bruce (foster parent). See Green, Bruce; Wright, Bruce
Bureau of Child Welfare (BCW), 59. See also ACS (Administration for Children’s Services)
Butterworth, Bob, 165
C
Caitlin (mother of Oliver), 15, 17, 18–19, 50–53, 80
“caring agencies,” 86–87
Carrington (foster baby), 83
caseworkers. See also investigators; Smalls, Tolightha
Dominique and, 255, 257–58
foster moms’ experiences with, 107, 108
placements by, 14–15, 103–4, 124–25
teens approaching discharge and, 202
training of, 20–22, 168
trust of foster kids and, 149, 150–51
Casey Family Programs, 93–94, 167
“Chaffee laws.” See John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Program (“Chaffee laws”)
Chanel (Green foster daughter), 8–9, 109, 113, 172–73, 177, 192, 249
Charlap, Lo, 35–36
child abuse
class differences in policy and, 85–86
definition of abuse and, 18, 23–24
ethnic differences and, 63
in foster homes, xi, 103, 118–19, 265
in group homes, 54–55
history of legislation on, 23–24, 84–89
reasons behind, 28–29
recognition of, 55
societal “discovery” of, 24, 88
statistics on, 268, 271
Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (federal law), 19
child fatalities, 25–28
child protection specialists. See caseworkers; investigators
Child Protective Services (CPS), xi, xiii, 16–17
Children of Incarcerated Parents program, 140
Children’s Rights, 46–47
“child savers,” 85
Child Welfare Administration, 25. See also ACS (Administration for Children’s Services)
Child Welfare Organizing Project (CWOP), 51, 68, 179, 262, 267
child welfare system
costs of, xii, xiv, 266
criteria for success of, xvi
fee structure in, 162–66, 169–70
“just staying” as goal in, 259
legal actions against, 26–28, 268
length of stay in foster care, xi–xii, 275
negative outcomes and, xi–xii
reform of, 268
social policy lines in, 84–89
training of staff in, 20–22, 128, 168
tricking the system and, xv–xvi
types of placements in, 124–25, 137
working the system and, 121–22
Civil Rights Act (1964), 88
Clarence (Green foster son), 123–24
class disparities, xiv, 85–86. See also race discrimination
Clinton, Bill (U.S. president), 43, 46
cocaine. See crack cocaine
college, 93, 114
Casey group and, 93
Chafee programs and, 203, 204
foster kids’ hopes for, 114, 193, 196, 197, 209, 216
“concurrency planning,” 44
Congressional Caucus on Foster Youth, 263
costs
of foster care, xii, xiv, 105, 266, 283
for institutionalized placements, 131, 283
Cournos, Francine, 90–93, 150, 152, 154, 162, 230, 261
CPS. See Child Protective Services (CPS)
crack cocaine
adoption of “addicted” newborns and, 73–74
drug testing of newborns and, 61, 64, 65
foster care roles and, 45–46
newborn removal and, 60–61
outcomes for babies and, 64–65, 278
criminality. See also incarcerated parents; juvenile justice and foster care, merging of
attachment disorders and, 146–48
link between child welfare and, 132–34, 135–36, 137
mixed population at RTCs and, 127, 129
Cruz, Jonathan, 126–31, 212–13, 218–21
Cruz-Katz, Spencer, 20–22
Cuomo, Mario (New York governor), 271
CWOP. See Child Welfare Organizing Project (CWOP)
D
David (Green foster son), 200, 242–43
