To save the CASA volunteer program in MN your comments need to be heard by program management. Please review the report and the rebuttal and share your views in the link above. CASAMINNESOTA’s rebuttal to the MMB report appears below.
SAYING GOODBYE TO 1000’S OF VOLUNTEER CHILD ADVOCATES & Community Involvement & Trust In One More Community Institution. Since 1981, thousands of community volunteers have spent thousands of hours working to better the lives of Minnesota’s at-risk children. End this program, they will disappear and no more will follow.
This will result in weakened community awareness, less community involvement and an incalculable loss of…
The push to diminish/eliminate the CASA Volunteer workforce of Hennepin County’s Guardian ad Litem Program is impacting office morale for both paid and volunteer GALS. We’ve gone from about 250 volunteers to 32 remaining under new leadership in the last five years. CASA’s supporting program, CASAMN has over 200 volunteers waiting to be GALs –…
SAYING GOODBYE TO 1000’S OF VOLUNTEER CHILD ADVOCATES & Community Involvement & Trust In One More Community Institution. Since 1981, thousands of community volunteers have spent thousands of hours working to better the lives of Minnesota’s at-risk children. End this program, they will disappear and no more will follow.
This will result in weakened community awareness, less community involvement and an incalculable loss of…
KARA is working to make lawmakers and policy makers see the value of community volunteer CASA guardian ad litems in Child Protective Services.
To do this, we are seeking stories from 18 & up folks that have come through child protection with the help of a volunteer CASA guardian ad litem.
You may remain anonymous.
Please contact me directly – mike@invisiblechildren.org with STORY in the subject line.
children are dying on your watch” and calling them “callous”, saying “they do more to protect their bureaucracy than the children in their care”. Safe Passage for MN’s Children recent investigative reporting on Minnesota children murdered by their caregivers while in Child Protective Services might prompt a similar judicial response…
The following are recent survey responses by CASAs answering the question “What community CASA volunteers bring to abused children and the Child Protection System they serve. Several spelling and grammatical changes have been made for clarity. We advocate for these children without paycheck and without allegiance to anyone or anything other than the child. We…
The complete report can be read HERE. This post emphasises the GAL program’s effort to eliminate the CASA community volunteer Guardian ad Litems. The author made notes and corrected several minor spelling errors (notes are in parenthesis and in bold).
Hennepin County participants: Jodi Wentland; Dan Rogan; Lori Whittier; Evangeline Filosi; Patricia Zagaros; Sherry Smith; Lisa Bayley; Kwesi Booker; Michelle Lefebvre; Lori Munsterman; Fintan Moore; Lauren Kewley; Madeline Johnson; Shanese Reed; Rachelle Loewenson Stratton; Meredith Martinez: Lolita Ulloa
The American Medical community has joined forces to declare a national emergency in children’s mental health, largely due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “Today’s declaration is an urgent call to policymakers at all levels of government — we must treat this mental health crisis like the emergency it is,” said AAP President Lee Savio Beers, MD, …
Returning abused children into the care of criminally violent caregivers is a death sentence for many children. Speak for a child and share this information…
Costs of not knowing the reality of child abuse, trauma and child protection in Minnesota are high Children are dying at the hands of caregivers while in Child Protective Services
Metrics are the heart of the matter. Measuring the wrong things wastes money, makes failure likely and problems fester…
Tracking, recording and making available meaningful information shines a light on what’s working and failing – The opposite is continued darkness…
From Safe Passage for Children of Minnesota today; This Peabody Award Winning video documents the critical issues that lead to the gruesome murder of 6 year old Eli Hart and dangers facing all of Minnesota’s abused and neglected children.
Hundreds of children have died while known to Child Protective Services. Some have been tortured over time. Many more children have suffered years of trauma as the institution standards and practices of CPS have deteriorated.
There are no metrics or reporting made available about children’s suffering at the hands of their caregivers or the self-harm or suicide attempts of traumatized kids in the system.
Hundreds of MN children are being abandoned by their caregivers in MN hospitals. Many are children raised in toxic homes then shuttled off into State/County foster and group homes
There is a real lack of data and transparency in CPS which makes it hard to know outcomes short of child death.
72% of of the 88 child maltreatment deaths studied (complete study below) were known to CPS. We do know that there were many reports of life changing violence, neglect and abuse but few follow ups.
During the lockdown, abused children were literally trapped at home with their abusers. This multiplied the stress on Child Protection Services as an institution and on the social workers doing their best in an impossible situation.
Free College for ALL MN Foster Youth
First in the Nation
A Really Big Deal
Neighborhood House in St Paul is hosting
KARA’s INVISIBLE CHILDREN Necessary Conversations Exhibit
April 24-28 for April – Prevent Child Abuse Month.
Stop by the Wellstone Center Atrium and Check us out
What’s it like to be a CASA guardian ad Litem (child protection worker) unable to find safe housing and mental health services for the 14-year-old struggling foster boy in your caseload? His self-harming and violent behaviors could change if he had help to manage childhood traumas. He could go on to lead a productive life.…
MN A.G. Keith Ellison’s response to the public outcry for punishment is normal (And that’s a shame). Our need for punishment over restorative justice is the American way. We don’t care if charging children and youth as adults brings more crime and recidivism.
Aaliya Goodwin. This is one of the 88 stories of children dying at the hands of their caregivers reported in the recent Safe Passage For Children investigation of child death in Minnesota. The report suggests why this tragedy is happening in our state and how we can make life safer for at risk children (in…
Eli Hentges. This is one of the 88 stories of children dying at the hands of their caregivers reported in the recent Safe Passage For Children investigation of child death in Minnesota. The report suggests why this tragedy is happening in our state and how we can make life safer for at risk children (in the read more at the end of the article). Please share this with your contacts and State Representative.
This is one of the 88 stories of children dying at the hands of their caregivers reported in the recent Safe Passage For Children investigation of child death in Minnesota. The report suggests why this tragedy is happening in our state and how we can make life safer for at risk children (in the read more at the end of the article). Please share this with your contacts and State Representative.
Tayvion Davis, Hennepin County
The Safe Passage Report on Child Maltreatment Deaths is a remarkable report – not in a good way. It demonstrates how common it is for Minnesota children to die from abuse in the home even after they have become known to CPS. This report is still only the the tip of the horrors facing abused children as;
DHS did not cooperate with the investigator,
Four counties did not respond,
Child deaths reported were only those that had court filings or had been reported in the media
If you read this blog, you know how hard it is for Minnesota’s abused and neglected children to find the help they need to thrive. If you have not read the investigative report of child fatalities known to CPS by Safe Passages for Children of MN, please read it here. Pages 22+ tells the sad…
This is one of the 88 stories of children dying at the hands of their caregivers reported in the recent Safe Passage For Children investigation of child death in Minnesota. The report suggests why this tragedy is happening in our state and how we can make life safer for at risk children (in the read more at the end of the article). Lylah Koob, Goodhue County
People suffering from untreated mental illness are 16 times more likely to be killed in interactions with law enforcement. Recently in Utah, a 13-year-old boy with autism was shot several times by police after his mother dialed 911 to request help as her son was experiencing a mental breakdown.
Conditions in Child Protective Services (CPS), foster care or in the lives these children live are unknown to most of us.
When the community doesn’t perceive a serious problem it will ignore it and the problem festers. This is why many city dwellers are afraid to ride the bus, prisons are full, and schools are struggling.
a cruel but accurate point. Our community has a passion for safeguarding adult rights of guns and abortion.
Safe Passage for Children investigation of child death in Minnesota
CONTACT: Rich Gehrman, Executive Director, Safe Passage for Children of Minnesota (651) 303-3209; gehrm001@umn.edu Report documents multiple systemic failures in cases Of Minnesota children killed due to maltreatment 8 YEAR OLD AUTUMN HALLOW’S MURDER (KSTP video) Minnesota Child Fatalities from Maltreatment 2014 – 2022 Executive Summary From the report; This study of children who died in…
Report documents system failures in cases of Minnesota Children Killed due to Maltreatment short (KSTP video)
Recent Star Tribune articles about juvenile justice and explosive growth of crime in our community miss the heart of the matter. We keep putting fires out that could have been prevented. The car jackings, transit crimes and other juvenile violence making life miserable for so many of us didn’t begin when these children became juveniles. It started with traumas suffered in the home mostly caused by parents that suffered the same violence and abuse as children.
As part of KARA’s TPT documentary project I interviewed Minneapolis City Councilman / Mayoral candidate Don Samuels recently. He described his experiences as a volunteer CASA guardian ad-Litem, North Side resident, and city councilman that were relevant to child well-being and child protection.
This conversation about the study of MN child fatalities is eye opening and terribly sad. Ignoring brutality being done to children allows it to continue and to fester. Let’s all commit to caring for other people’s children. It will be a better place to live for all of us if we do.
What is transparent and measured can be identified and improved. What is not transparent and measured remains unknown and can fester.
In business, Cost Benefit Analysis focuses on ROI (return on investment). ROI is based on “assets”, “net income” & “profitability”. That’s what business is about (money). Corporations have extremely detailed and accurate methods of measuring their “money”…
We the people are serious about continued investment in our punishment model.
Expelling kids from daycare and elementary school is common. Charging youth in adult courts is too. The nation’s Supreme Court recently reinstated lifelong (no chance for release) sentencing for crimes committed by juveniles.
Instead of investing in healing broken children we invest our tax dollars into courts that punish kids from traumatizing violent and toxic homes. Are we bad at math or pro growing crime, criminals and broken communities.
For most of us in Child Protective Services, KARE 11 / Lauren Leamanczyk’s investigative reporting on the absence of facilities for troubled foster and adopted State Ward children is a recurring nightmare.
37% of children overall and 44% of Black children are reported to child protection services in America by the time they turn 18. (American Journal of Public Health 1.17)
The Conversation, with Al McFarlane, DR Oliver Williams and Mike Tikkanen exploring issues facing at risk youth in our community today (1 hour with video).
Fairview Masonic Children’s hospital has been overwhelmed with 145 emergency pediatric psych cases since September. A makeshift shelter in an ambulance garage is all that’s available at Fairview Masonic to protect children suffering from the traumas of child abuse and homelessness.
Star Tribune Nowhere To Go For Most Troubled Youth, crime, preteen moms and juvenile injustice
Child Protection Statistics and Carjackings;To solve carjackings and 83% and 90% recidivism rates, we need to track the successes and failures of children in State care if we are to improve their lives and strategies in place today.
This Star Tribune article by Neal St. Anthony points to a threat to the community volunteer Guardian Ad Litem program in this time of institutional stress.
If you knew that 10,000 Minnesota’s CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) volunteers provided civic engagement, first person narratives, reporting, institutional transparency and many thousands of advocacy hours for babies, children & youth over the last 40 years in Minnesota’s Child Protective Services would you;
It has been stated by program management that CASA volunteer time spent with abused and neglected children is of no value. Ask that question of any child removed from the only home they have ever known now passing through the cold scarey institution of judges, courts, foster and group homes where you don’t know anyone and new adult faces come and go after short periods.
Plenty of data Stories and literature provide proof
School is about to start for students across the state. For many of our Foster leaders, the classroom was a place of refuge, where, unlike their time in foster care, they had agency and connections. Over 80% of high school Fosters want to continue with post-secondary education, but that dream was financially out-of-reach for…
Self-Destructive Habits & Institutions (Professionalism – Part 5)
Volunteers lack “professionalism” is a primary argument management is using to eliminate the community CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) volunteer guardian ad Litem program in Minnesota.
Arianna Hunziker 1.3 million dollar settlement. Blaming child protection workers solves nothing. It’s counter productive – people in these fields are asked to do more than they ever can do. It’s very hard work with too much sadness and failure.
MN Senior Judge Lyonel Norris has stated that, “…an all employee model can create an institutionalizing effect upon a child”. I would add “an even greater” institutionalizing effect upon a child”.
Eliminating the Volunteer Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) will hurt children, institutions, and our quality of life for years to come. Minnesota youth and young families are struggling. They need more, not less help.