Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 26, 1991 TAG: 9103260469
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LARRY D. JACKSON
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
The American Public Welfare Association, founded in 1930, represents human-service departments in all 50 states, about 800 city and county social-service departments, and 5,000 human-services professionals. After two years' work, the association's National Commission on Child Welfare and Family Preservation has released recommendations for reforming our child-welfare system.
Last year, state agencies received 2.4 million reports of child abuse and neglect, more than twice the 1980 level. In Virginia, such reports have increased by 60 percent over the past 10 years.
In 1989, some 360,000 American children were in substitute care, a 30 percent increase over 1986. Nearly 6,000 Virginia children were in foster care in 1989, a 33 percent increase over 1986.
Nearly all states report difficulty in recruiting and keeping child-welfare staff. Overburdened with huge caseloads, workers often have insufficient training and preparation, and face rapid burnout.
Our child-welfare system is pressuring the social-services system as a whole. Many child-protection cases represent general social or parenting problems, such as drug and alcohol abuse, teen pregnancy, runaways and parent-child conflicts.
The commission's proposals address many of those issues:
"Supporting Families for Healthy Child Development" proposes to offer families an array of prevention programs in their own neighborhoods. Locally controlled, these programs would provide opportunities for healthy growth to prevent the need for services more intrusive and expensive.
"Assisting Families and Children in Need" would help families with problems, with the goal of strengthening these families before their problems become severe. Assistance must be organized to help the family as a whole, rather than compartmentalized into specific problems, as our systems are today.
For these first two components, we call for a federal commitment of resources, preferably as challenge grants to states to promote developing community-based family service programs. These grants would require state and local commitments, including private resources in public-private partnerships.
"Protecting Abused and Neglected Children" is the element most resembling today's system. We propose agreement on a common definition of child maltreatment, and expansion of the array of services available to protect children.
A family-focused approach would require the child-welfare community to acknowledge that when a child needs help, the actual client is the entire family and not just the child. While protective services for children must remain a public responsibility, the entire community must share our concern.
Families with problems must receive earlier, more appropriate services; until the first two components are in place, our child-protection system will continue to be little more than a crisis-driven emergency room for children and families.
Virginia already is taking specific steps to improve our human-services system. Two of many initiatives illustrate different ways we are working to improve our services.
An interagency network, "Community Services for Youth and Families," will focus on serving children and their families as a unit in their home communities. This effort involves numerous state and local agencies, and draws on private organizations as well.
Also, we have recognized that inadequate preparation and skills development contribute not only to our child-welfare system's weaknesses but also to staff turnover. Therefore, last fall the Virginia Department of Social Services joined with Virginia Commonwealth University to establish an innovative statewide training system for social-service professionals.
Virginians are fortunate to have a governor who enthusiastically supports - even in these difficult economic times - these and other prevention-oriented services. In his "Agenda for Virginia," Gov. L. Douglas Wilder says: "I understand the savings we can realize if we solve problems before they become crises. For that reason, my health and human resources agenda emphasizes preventive programs for children and families."
State human-service commissioners will continue to push for national legislation to improve our services to children and families. Just as Virginia's own Employment Services Program grew into a major component of our implementation of the Family Support Act of 1988, so will our new efforts enable us to play a leading role in reforming our child-welfare system.
Reforms do not result from the efforts of governors and other state leaders alone. We must have the support of other voters and taxpayers. Together we can persuade Congress to transform our child-welfare system into a community-based, family-service system.
by CNB