Rethinking Foster Care

I opened my inbox to find an email titled, “I can’t take this life anymore.”   My heart sank.   These were the words of a former client, a young adult who had aged out of foster care after living in more than ten placements.   Now she had four children, was on the verge of being evicted, and was struggling to find a job because she didn’t have child care.   She felt alone in the world and was in crisis.   Hundreds of miles away, I felt powerless to help.   So I didn’t respond right away.   The email sat unanswered in my inbox for hours.   But it remained on my mind. Those of us who work with struggling families experience this feeling often.   Our clients have overwhelming needs.   They lack housing and money.   They can’t buy food for their children.   They don’t have access to a doctor.   They lack community.   So they turn to us – their lawyers – for answers to this cruel world that has left them behind.   They look for someone to show them how to win despi

The Washington Post recently profiled the remarkable work of Judge Ernestine Gray to essentially eliminate New Orleans’ foster care system. Between 2011 and 2017, the number of kids in foster care in New Orleans fell by 89 percent. Of the kids who did enter foster care, seven in ten left it within a month. She’s achieved these results without any evidence that she’s putting more children at risk. In fact, the article notes the city’s rate of children being revictimized is lower than the statewide average. The article suggests that Judge Gray achieved these outcomes by simply applying the law and forcing child welfare agencies to meet their legal burden, not being swayed by general concerns about a family. It reads: “If protective services can’t make an ironclad case as to why children should be removed, Gray returns them to their families — even if DCFS investigators have described the setting as an ‘unhealthy environment.’”  The most striking aspect of the “reforms” institut