Even child protection workers say their agency is racist | New York Civil Liberties Union

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Systemic racism is a key driver of the so-called child welfare system, better understood as the family regulation system. It is a system in which thousands of mostly black and brown families are put under the microscope and threatened with separation, often based on reports that turn out to be baseless.

Parents, advocates and scholars have known this for decades. But a report obtained by the Bronx Defenders and recently published by The New York Times shows that even employees who work in New York’s administration for children’s services agree.

The draft report was commissioned by ACS itself. It came against the backdrop of the 2020 George Floyd protests and it systematically engaged Black and Brown ACS parents, advocates and frontline staff to identify opportunities for anti-racism improvements within the agency. . The report found that parents, advocates and staff from all three groups see ACS as a system that actively destabilizes black and brown families and makes them feel unsafe.

Study participants described family regulation in New York as a predatory system that specifically targets black and brown parents and subjects them to a different level of control than white parents. White parents are presumed innocent, they say, while black and brown parents are presumed incompetent and pose a risk to their children. Further, the report finds that ACS clearly links safety to class and penalizes poor parents for their struggle to provide food, shelter and resources for their children without offering pathways to economic stability.

These revelations, while disturbing, come as no surprise to those who have experienced the family regulatory system or studied its origins and effects. Since the systems’ inception, racism has been a feature, not a bug.

The forced separation of black families has deep roots in American slavery, which commodified and exploited the reproductive capacity of enslaved black women as fuel for economic growth. This system was based on denying enslaved mothers custody of their children, who were considered the property of the slave owner. To justify this insensitivity, those in power have developed narratives devaluing black motherhood.

Similar stereotypes inspired the more modern child welfare system, which began to take shape in the 1850s. As east coast towns became crowded with Irish Catholic and Italian immigrants who at the time n weren’t considered white, a Protestant minister named Charles Loring Brace devised the concept of orphan trains to remove immigrant children from their genetically inferior parents.

Given this data and history, it’s no surprise that ACS staff describe their own work as racist and harmful to the very families they claim to protect.

When the government assumed responsibility for child welfare in the early 20th century, it continued to exercise it against Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities. State intervention in Indigenous communities was so extensive that by the 1970s up to two-thirds of Indigenous children no longer lived with their families or in their own communities.

Black families were increasingly targeted by state intervention beginning in the 1960s, largely in response to their increased eligibility for state benefits. Society began to blame poor, black, single women with children for burdening the state, labeling them as unworthy poor. As a result, black and brown parents were deprived of resources, accused of raising children in poverty, and punished with the permanent termination of their parental rights.

This is the framework within which ACS continues to operate today. Black families are seven times more likely than white families to be reported to the family regulatory system and 13 times more likely to have their children removed. Ninety percent of the families ACS investigates are black or brown.

The majority of reports to ACS are also related to poverty, with nearly two-thirds based solely on allegations of neglect. Although the ACS does not track the socioeconomic data of parents, nationally, families living below the poverty line are 22 times more likely to be involved in the family regulation system.

Given this data and history, it’s no surprise that ACS staff describe their own work as racist and harmful to the very families they claim to protect. The recent scrutiny of GBA practices is welcome, but it shouldn’t just spark outrage; it must lead to concrete actions. Lawmakers must reduce the number of black and brown families unnecessarily studied, torn apart and traumatized by the government.

One action lawmakers can take immediately is to pass a bill requiring ACS officials to inform parents of their rights during an initial interaction. Parents have the right to refuse to speak to ACS or let them into their homes without a court order, but social workers routinely pressure parents to let them search their homes, interrogate and examine their children and access sensitive personal information without ever going to court.

ACS as an agency opposes this legislation. But the internal report shows that ACS staff and management, as well as parents and lawyers, support the idea behind the bill. This is an urgent step to help level the playing field and allow parents to make informed decisions that best protect their families before ACS workers walk through their doors.

New York City and the state should also ensure that parents have access to counsel during a child protection investigation. Currently, parents are only entitled to an appointed attorney once a case has been filed against them in family court, after the ACS has conducted its investigation, which often includes interviewing the parents. , children, teachers, doctors and neighbours; examine their child’s body; review sensitive medical information; search their family’s home; and even withdraw their children.

Timely representation during the investigation is a proven way to keep families together, but the vast majority of parents investigated by the system cannot afford to hire their own lawyer if they is not provided by the state. New York should fund representation for all parents during the investigative phase to better support families and hold family regulatory agencies accountable.

Finally, state and local governments should consider how poverty is punished by the family regulation system. The ACS report details how the system penalizes families for their economic conditions, blaming parents who struggle to secure stable housing, food or medical care and labeling the challenges they face as neglect.

Instead of this punitive approach, the state should strengthen social safety nets regardless of family regulatory agencies, oversight, or mandates to help families meet their basic needs like affordable housing, childcare, and more. children and medical care.

City and state leaders must act quickly to ease the trauma this system has inflicted on generations of families and supporters, rather than punish black and brown families.

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