It’s a tragic story that repeats itself daily in virtually every community across this country. Whether you live in a sprawling urban area or the rural countryside, the undercurrent of addiction not only is devastating the lives of adults and teens but is having a growing impact on innocent children.
Consider this:
- A video went viral recently showing a mother collapse at a dollar store in Massachusetts as her toddler daughter, screaming and crying, tries to wake her up. The mother overdosed on heroin.
- Here in Georgia, a Sandy Springs grandmother was charged this summer with murder, cruelty to children and possession of methamphetamine in the drug overdose death of her 9-month-old grandson.
- A Walton County infant was beaten into a vegetative state last summer. After a lengthy legal fight, Baby Dinah Paige Whited was taken off life support and her father was charged with murder. Her mother was charged with child cruelty and also faced drug charges in another jurisdiction.
The common thread throughout these cases and too many of others like them is substance abuse by parents and guardians. According to Casey Family Programs, a least 31 percent of the children admitted to foster care are due to drug and alcohol abuse. Some states report even higher rates. This is what is straining a foster care system already in crisis as we cannot find enough loving homes for these children.
In Georgia, there were 12,765 children in foster care as of the end of September, with 2,675 of those children from metro Atlanta, according to the Division of Family and Children Services.
Although churches and the faith community are stepping up to find stable homes for these children until their parents can get help, we must find a solution to stop the exploding numbers of children being removed to foster care because of parental substance abuse and addiction. No child should have to be taken from their biological parents, but all too often there is no choice when they are the victims of abuse and neglect thanks to addiction.
One positive solution now before the U.S. Senate would provide addiction treatment and prevention services to at-risk families to stabilize their home life before a child is removed. The Family First Prevention Services Act has already passed the U.S. House. It would provide an additional $400 million for critical services like mental health and substance abuse treatment for biological and adoptive parents and relatives so that their children would not have to be removed to foster care.
The legislation also:
- Prioritizes the placement of children in family-like settings when foster care is necessary.
- Makes it easier for individuals and families to adopt children from foster care across state lines.
- Provides expanded funding for independent living programs, education and training for foster youth until age 26.
Currently, states are restricted in using federal dollars to care for children in foster care and cannot easily use monies to stabilize families and prevent children from being placed in foster care. This expands the scope of dollars we normally would just use to place children in foster homes.
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That’s why we must shift our focus to addressing the root problems that are creating our foster care crisis. Not a single child should suffer abuse, neglect or harm due to living in a home with someone afflicted by addiction. This proposal begins to move the focus of our child welfare efforts from not just caring for foster children but towards a real cure to prevent child abuse and neglect.
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