To the End of June : The Intimate Life of American Foster Care (9780547999531)
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14. Touching the Elephant
1. [>] put on the state’s list of failing schools in 2004: From insideschools.org, a division of the nonprofit Advocates for the Children of New York, which provides individual case assistance to families and children who need educational services. Insideschools.org provides independent monitoring of New York City’s public schools.
2. [>] “You’ve got women in prison making Victoria’s Secret bras”: It was widely reported that inmates in South Carolina were subcontracted to sew Victoria’s Secret garments in the 1990s, and several other corporations, including Nintendo, Starbucks, Microsoft, and Eddie Bauer, have also been known to utilize prison labor, wherein they get to pay workers well below minimum wage. See, for example, Beth Schwartzapfel, “Your Valentine, Made in Prison,” Prison Legal News, February 12, 2009, https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/(S(v5lg5m45z4zku255xtp5ndmf))/displayNews.aspx?newsid=216&AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1; and Caroline Winter, “What Do Prisoners Make for Victoria’s Secret?” Mother Jones, July/August 2008, http://motherjones.com/politics/2008/07/what-do-prisoners-make-victorias-secret.
3. [>] what happens to foster kids once they leave the system: Julie Bosman, “City Is Urged to Evaluate Foster Care,” The New York Times, April 15, 2010. The author of this article wrote that ACS would review the proposed bill, and as of this publication, the bill had yet to pass. It was referred to the Committee on General Welfare at a City Council meeting in April 2010 (from the New York City Council Meeting Minutes, City Hall, New York, April 14, 2010) and then didn’t seem to appear again.
15. Last Call
1. [>] it had admitted more than double that the year before: Mark Levine, “Saint Vincent’s Is the Lehman Brothers of Hospitals,” New York magazine, October 25, 2010. http://nymag.com/news/features/68991/.
Epilogue
1. [>] allowed all states to apply for flat-sum waivers from the government: President Obama signed the Child and Family Services Improvement and Innovation Act (Public Law 112–34) into law on September 30, 2011. Read the full text of the bill at http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112hr2883rds/pdf/BILLS-112hr2883rds.pdf.
2. [>] though more could still sign up: Child Welfare Title IV-E Waiver Demonstration Projects 2012–2014 Overview (Washington, D.C., National Conference of State Legislatures). http://www.ncsl.org/issues-research/human -services/child-welfare-title-ive-waiver-2012-thru-2014.aspx.
3. [>] is now awaiting federal review: E-mail correspondence with ACS press office, November 2012.
4. [>] 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.
5. [>] 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.
6. [>] 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).
7. [>] 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 T
olan, 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
AACWA. See Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (AACWA)
abandonment, [>]–[>], [>]. See also biological parents; multiple placements
Abramowitz, Alan, [>]
abuse. See child abuse; sexual abuse
accountability
Chaffee legislation and, [>]
foster care fee structure and, [>]–[>]
RTCs and, [>]
waiver system and, [>]
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, [>]
creation of, [>]
cultural competence and, [>]–[>]
family court hearings and, [>]–[>]
Green family and, [>]–[>], [>]
legal actions against, [>]–[>], [>]
merging of juvenile justice with foster care and, [>]–[>]
permanency principles, [>]
preventive services and, [>], [>]
relations between biological and foster parents and, [>]
removal decisions at, [>]–[>]
Special Services, [>]
teens after discharge and, [>], [>], [>], [>], [>]
tracking of foster kids and, [>]
waiver system and, [>]–[>]
adoption. See also Keane, Mary; permanency decision; You Gotta Believe! (YGB) program
application process for, [>]
of foster babies from addicted mothers, [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
foster kids who aren’t adopted and, [>] (see also aging out)
“foster-to-adopt” parents, [>]–[>], [>]
Juno scenario and, [>], [>]
time between parental termination and, [>], [>]
willing birth parents and, [>]
Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA, 1997), [>]–[>], [>], [>]
Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (AACWA), [>]
AFDC. See Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program
African Americans. See also race discrimination
abuse and, [>]
as foster moms, [>]–[>]
historical social policy and, [>], [>]
overrepresentation in foster care, [>]–[>]
agencies. See also Edwin Gould; Miracle Makers
contracts with ACS, [>]–[>]
drug treatment and, [>]–[>]
flat-sum waivers and, [>]–[>]
foster parents as interchangeable and, [>]–[>]
funding of, [>]–[>], [>], [>]–[>]
recruitment of foster parents by, [>]–[>], [>], [>]
relationships between birth and foster parents and, [>]–[>]
review process for, [>]
tracking of foster kids and, [>], [>], [>], [>], [>], [>]
training of foster parents by, [>]
aging out. See also independent living programs (ILPs)
Dominique and, [>]
Keane’s home and, [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
payments for, [>], [>]–[>], [>]
self-perceptions of teens and, [>]–[>]
Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program, [>]–[>]
Ainsworth, Mary, [>]
alcohol abuse, [>], [>], [>]
Alicia (foster child), [>], [>]
Allen (Green foster baby), [>], [>]–[>]
biological father of, [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Children’s Rights Project, [>]–[>]
American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, [>]
anger of foster kids. See also multiple placements; trust
with system, [>]–[>]
teen attitudes and, [>], [>], [>]
Annie E. Casey Foundation, [>]. See also Casey Family Programs
Anthony (Green foster son), [>], [>]–[>], [>], [>], [>]–[>], [>], [>]
adoption of, [>], [>]
Anthony (Mary’s foster son), [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
Arsham, Mike, [>], [>]
ASFA. See Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA, 1997)
attachment, [>], [>], [>]. See also “just staying” with foster kids; love
agency disregard for, [>]–[>]
caseworkers and, [>], [>]–[>]
as disordered, [>]–[>]
failed placements and, [>]
foster parent recruitment and, [>]–[>]
“healing agents” and, [>]
identity and, [>]
Kecia’s views on, [>]–[>]
lack of mothering and, [>]–[>]
permanency decisions and, [>]–[>]
temporary nature of foster care and, [>]–[>]
therapists and, [>]–[>]
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), [>]
author’s personal experiences
as child, [>]–[>]
as foster parent, [>]–[>] (see also Quiñonez, Christina)
her biological mother and, [>], [>]–[>]
autistic children. See Russell (Green foster son)
Barth, Richard, [>], [>]
Bartholet, Elizabeth, [>]
battered child syndrome, [>]
Bayview Correctional Facility, [>], [>], [>], [>], [>]
BCW. See Bureau of Child Welfare (BCW)
bed-wetting, [>]
bereavement, in foster children, [>]–[>]
biological parents. See also parental termination; entries for specific parents and foster kids
child’s experience of loss of, [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
family team conferencing and, [>]–[>]
foster parent contact with, [>]–[>]
as “healing agents,” [>]
kids’ reconnections with, [>], [>], [>]–[>]
mentoring of, [>]–[>], [>]
parent advocates and, [>], [>]
Bowlby, John, [>]
Brooklyn Family Court, [>]–[>]
Brown, Nixmary, [>]–[>]
Bruce (foster parent). See Green, Bruce; Wright, Bruce
Bureau of Child Welfare (BCW), [>]. See also ACS (Administration for Children’s Services)
Butterworth, Bob, [>]
Caitlin (mother of Oliver), [>], [>], [>]–[>], [>]–[>], [>]
“caring agencies,” [>]–[>]
Carrington (foster baby), [>]
caseworkers. See also investigators; Smalls, Tolightha
Dominique and, [>], [>]–[>]
foster moms’ experiences with, [>], [>]
placements by, [>]–[>], [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
teens approaching discharge and, [>]
training of, [>]–[>], [>]
trust of foster kids and, [>], [>]–[>]
Casey Family Programs, [>]–[>], [>]
“Chaffee laws.” See John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Program (“Chaffee laws”)
Chanel (Green foster daughter), [>]–[>], [>], [>], [>]–[>], [>], [>], [>]
Charlap, Lo, [>]–[>]
child abuse
class differences in policy and, [>]–[>]
definition of abuse and, [>], [>]–[>]
ethnic differences and, [>]
in foster homes, [>], [>], [>]–[>], [>]
in group h
omes, [>]–[>]
history of legislation on, [>]–[>], [>]–[>]
reasons behind, [>]–[>]
recognition of, [>]
societal “discovery” of, [>], [>]
statistics on, [>], [>]
Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (federal law), [>]
child fatalities, [>]–[>]
child protection specialists. See caseworkers; investigators
Child Protective Services (CPS), [>], [>], [>]–[>]
Children of Incarcerated Parents program, [>]
Children’s Rights, [>]–[>]
“child savers,” [>]