ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, March 13, 1997 TAG: 9703130017
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-14 EDITION: METRO
Children who grow up without a father's strong presence are more likely to suffer a host of problems. Society suffers, too. Virginia Gov. George Allen's Fatherhood Initiative could help.
EFFORTS to prevent unwed teen pregnancy usually focus lopsidedly on females. So, too, do welfare-reform efforts.
Sure, you say. Females bear the babies. They're usually the recipients of welfare assistance to families.
But these mothers bear only half the responsibility for their children, and for a morass of problems afflicting those children - and society. The other half clearly belongs to the fathers. Virginia Gov. George Allen will do hundreds of kids a great service if he can bring more of the dads to accountability.
Allen's Fatherhood Initiative aims to do so by persuading fathers, wed and unwed, of their critical importance to the lives and health of their children. Through educational and outreach programs in many communities, it aims, too, to give men needed fathering skills: Just because a guy knows how to make a baby and can pass a DNA-dad test doesn't mean he knows how to be a good father.
Is this a worthwhile use of public funds? You bet.
The absence of many fathers, and the failure of many others to play a positive role in their children's upbringing, is costing taxpayers incalculable sums.
The state's modest investment in this initiative - about $400,000 so far - could produce tremendous savings. In welfare programs. In trying to collect child-support payments. In shrinking the number of children in poverty. In reducing health problems among children. In cutting crime, drug and alcohol addiction, school-dropout rates and unemployment.
All those are among the problems linked to homes in which children are raised without fathers. Nationwide, there are about 23 million such children - up from 7 million in 1960. In Virginia, as elsewhere, four out of every 10 kids are growing up without a father in the home.
Why worry about it? Well, 70 percent of today's hard-core criminals grew up without their fathers. Girls in homes without a father are 150 percent more likely to have babies out of wedlock, extending the difficulties of fatherlessness into new generations.
Allen's interest in emphasizing the moral and legal obligations of fathers to be part of their children's upbringing is on target. Allen leaves office in January; his Fatherhood Initiative should be continued by his successor.
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