PORTLAND, Maine — State figures show that the number of children removed from abusive homes in Maine has declined by more than 50 percent in the past decade.
The numbers have fallen as the Department of Health and Human Services pursued a policy of keeping children with parents unless they face physical abuse or serious neglect.
The Maine Sunday Telegram said the numbers mirror a national trend, supported by findings that children can suffer severe emotional trauma when separated from their families and placed in foster care.
But the newspaper also finds that the trend raises concerns about whether child welfare workers are acting quickly enough in cases where children are suffering or at risk of abuse.
“The numbers have fallen as the Department of Health and Human Services pursued a policy of keeping children with parents unless they face physical abuse or serious neglect”.
REALLY? You mean DHHS is now following the LAW? That has been on the books and ignored for the past 15 plus years? persued a policy???? Try following statue that is known as LAW. I am appalled that DHHS have not followed the law admitedly so evidentally by themselves with reading this article.
As to whether DHHS acts quick enough or not is not for me to say, I no longer work for them, it does seem that DHHS acts to quick in some and not enough in others but none of us really know unless we are in the decision making office why.
I will say this, and this is fact the federal riembursment rate for state dollars spent on foster children in Maine and elswhere has declined dramatically, for instance when a foster child was placed in care we paid an example of 32 dollars a day to the foster family, The Feds would pay us the state 96 a day for the 32 we spent on a child. Now the Feds would pay about 52 from the 96 they use to
The reason in the decline of children removed from parents is purely CASH
durning the Angus the State made tons of money on foster kids.
You used to work for DHHS? Did you see any correlation between more children being removed from homes who were considered “highly adoptable” versus those who might have a low chance of being adopted out of the foster system, say due to age, health or behavioral problems?
Children should remain with their extended family if there is not a “threat of serious harm” which would be a jeopardizing situation. Staying within one’s culture clearly protects the child from the trauma of culture shock, which can be devastating, which could be abusive. It is encouraging that a directive of nonintervention is implemented as policy for the protection of the children.
There are many different sociological perspectives to consider when acting to uphold the Child Protection Act.
So children of Irish immigrants should stay in the Irish immigrant community?
I agree that it is probably very traumatic for the kids to be separated from their parents. My spouse occasionally works out of town, and our kids have a lot of anxiety when he travels. They are only 2 and 4 years old. It’s only for a few days, and they talk to him on the phone every night. Of course, they get really excited to spend the weekend with their grandparents, and they don’t have a problem being away from him them. I can certainly see your point that it would be less of a shock to stay with other loving adults with whom they are already familiar.
This story comes out after the little baby beaten to death by the father and the Ayla Reynolds case . How ironic!
This story makes me sick! What was the purpose of this article? Was it to somehow prove physical abuse is down in the state of Maine? If so, I call bull s&*t! The rate of children hospitalized or killed by a parent/caregiver is up SOOOO this would lend us all to say, like we have been, DHHS is not doing their job.
AND if the rates are down, then why are they soooo overwhelmed and under staffed??
I agree 100%. We have several cases where kids were abused (broken arm at four weeks, and another child who is missing) Both of these children suffered bodily harm at the hands of a parent and were left in that situation. One is now dead and the other has been missing for months!
This headline is useless. Without more information about the number of children who are killed without State intervention, the number of children and families being served by ‘in-home support’ programs, the number of kids winding up at Charleston or South Portland Detention facilities, the number of kids being taken from their families only to be getting dropped off at homeless shelters like Shaw House, New Beginnings or Halcyon House (even though DHHS promises that it never dumps kids at homes shelters…..
“……supported by findings that children can suffer severe emotional trauma
when separated from their families and placed in foster care.”
WELL DUH!!!!
So much for Paulie’s much touted efforts in domestic violence and child abuse. He finally came out of the closet and put his money where his mouth is. How many kids and abused spouse’s, of both sex’s, are gonna have to pay for his philosophy ? Only time, and the emergency room admission’s, will tell.
I think statistic’s show that the results of this parent, child, separation experiment, performed by unqualified experts; was about like taking the child from the pot and throwing the child into the frying pan. In 90 percent of these experiments, I’ll bet in a lot of these cases; to the child, it would be kind of like emotionally going through the experience of losing a parent or parents to death. I’m sure there have been many cases where it was necessary for the child to be taken from the parent or parent’s. However, I think the state made a lot of mistakes on this one.
And lets not forget the case in Arundel where that poor 2 month old baby was killed when the father squeezed his head and then threw him across the room into a chair causing a brain bleed and the childs death. Very horrific. And what is also sad is that you can tell people “if u can’t afford to raise a child then don’t have any” until you are blue in the face and that there are no laws setting a certain limit on how many kids u can have because this is a free country. But then there are women our there who lose their kids to the state and go out and get pregnant again. There should be some type of law for women like that. Like if a woman loses her kids to the state once or twice then the third time is last offense and have a judge court order that woman to be fixed so she can’t have anymore. But then again like I said it is a free country and that type of situation would not be considered. Or would it? The people in Augusta pass laws all the time without us knowing…..I guess its just a matter of time.