No one should lose their children simply because they’re poor, need mental health care or are culturally unaware of what disciplinary measures are acceptable in Canada.
But for far too long a disproportionate number of children in Ontario have been away from their families simply because their parents or guardians are struggling and need some support or simple guidance.
The result, according to many studies over the years: kids who would have been better off in their own homes end up in the child-welfare system where they have poorer outcomes in education, employment, mental health and homelessness.
Now a new pilot program run by the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto called “Journey to Zero” will focus on early intervention in an effort to keep children in their own homes and out of care.
It’s about time. As Mahesh Prajapat, the agency’s chief operating officer, points out, foster care should have always been seen as a short-term solution in a time of crisis.
“We shouldn’t design a system where we are raising children,” he said.
The solution? Putting much more emphasis on supporting families in need so they, not children’s aid societies, can do the job themselves.
In short, asks Prajapat: “Why are we investigating families that need help?”
Certainly, the government should still remove children from genuinely abusive situations.
But data and studies suggest that all too often kids are removed from their homes for other, indefensible reasons.
For example, one study found children whose families ran out of money for housing, food or utilities were twice as likely to be placed with foster parents or in group homes as their peers.
It didn’t matter if parents were struggling mightily to provide for their kids, even working two or three jobs. What mattered was that children’s aid staff found there wasn’t enough food in the home.
In those cases, it would clearly make more sense to provide financial support to the families on compassionate grounds alone, rather than paying foster parents to care for their kids.
In other cases, children have been removed from the family home because some society staff are tone-deaf to African-Canadian and Indigenous cultural practices.
In 2016, for example, the Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies released a report that found four in 10 children in the care of the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto were Black. This in a city where only 8 per cent of children are Black.
At the same time, studies indicate Indigenous kids are two-and-a-half times as likely to be taken into care as white kids.
The Journey to Zero program aims to keep children in their own homes by doing the basics that should have been done long ago. It starts off by pairing families in need with a dedicated co-ordinator who can connect them to community resources to address mental health, domestic violence and addiction challenges.
The simple brilliance of the plan is not lost on Anna Amy Ho, who was 13 when her mother and grandmother were killed by her mother’s abusive boyfriend.
She was placed in the care of her 18-year-old brother, but left when she was only 16 because he was struggling with his own trauma and mental illness.
“If my brother had gotten the support and help that he needed to take care of me, maybe we… would have had the chance to grow up together,” says Ho, who is now an ambassador for the Children’s Aid Foundation.
Sadly, Ho did not get the help she needed. But if Journey to Zero succeeds, other kids will.
And that can only be a good thing — for everyone.
https://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2019/11/24/a-better-way-to-keep-kids-safe.html
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