For decades, child welfare reformers have sought ways to create a less adversarial system. But parents with dependency cases still need one thing above all else: a good lawyer.
A Philadelphia mother’s fight to reunite with her children offers a grim window into the problems of the American cities’ child welfare systems – and how they can be improved.
Community members are lobbying ahead of a City Council hearing this week for long-sought reforms to Philadelphia’s Department of Human Services, citing years of systemic problems.
The hearing, the second convened by City Council members Nina Ahmad and Cindy Bass, was sparked by a Philadelphia Journalism Collaborative investigation, published in the Philadelphia Inquirer, which exposed chronic understaffing, turnover in the workforce and the needless separation of families. Advocates had offered a list of concerns early this past summer.
For years, people with intimate knowledge of foster care practices at the Department of Human Services cited similar problems: random and subjective decision-making, the confusion of poverty and neglect, an unstable workforce riven by turnover — and more.
The Philadelphia police special victims unit is investigating the death of a child who apparently drowned in a bathtub when his foster mother left him unattended to go to the microwave.
Records obtained by The Inquirer and Resolve Philly show that a Harrowgate foster parent left 19-month-old Sy’vir Hill and a second child unsupervised and returned to find Sy’vir submerged in the water.
How Philly can look to New Jersey to fix its child welfare system By: Steve Volk | The Philadelphia Inquirer April 14, 2025 | Tagged: Foster Care and Child Welfare, Our Kids. The problems bedeviling Philadelphia’s child welfare system — too many kids in foster care, worker vacancies, and lawsuits stemming from child injuries and…
Inside Philly’s hidden foster care system, where parents ‘voluntarily’ give up their children By: Steve Volk, Resolve Philly | The Philadelphia Inquirer April 10, 2025 | Tagged: Foster Care and Child Welfare, Our Kids. In fall 2021, Tytianna Hawthorne received a phone message from an investigator with the Philadelphia Department of Human Services: Someone may…
A story like this could begin in dozens of places. It could begin with Elliot, an infant shaken so badly that he suffered a traumatic brain injury; or Adeen, another boy, submerged in scalding water; or Samaya, held down and burned with an iron. A story like this could also begin with a mom, like…
Philly DHS took a 1-year-old from her mother but the girl was then kicked to death By: Steve Volk| The Philadelphia Inquirer February 16, 2024 | Tagged: Foster Care and Child Welfare. Su’Layah Williams, 1, was allegedly kicked to death in a West Philadelphia home where the city’s Department of Human Services had placed her.…
Philly still keeps the benefits of foster care youths despite a 2022 law By: Steve Volk and Julie Christie, Resolve Philly The Philadelphia Inquirer January 10, 2024 | Tagged: Foster Care and Child Welfare, Our Kids, Youth. Despite the city’s new law, DHS acknowledges it’s still keeping the money meant for foster kids — about…