$$ Foster Care in Alaska $$

Foster Care in Alaska
By Matt Jackson   May 09, 2009
Saturday

Today, I learned what really makes the "youth treatment system" go 'round in Alaska. It's not love, it is not about the kids, and no one cares about us. It is the money. I won't go into the many grievances Residential Youth Care and foster care have committed against me. Rather, today I will only talk about the numbers.
For the month of May, my foster parents will receive $3,900 in state money to care for one child. Me. I was never told this, I never knew, I only found out because they left their budget out on the computer desk. I never would have guessed. Admittedly, I eat and sleep in their house, but is that amount of money justified? When asking friends and teachers at school how much they thought foster parents received to care for one child for one month, the highest guess was 2,000, most were closer to 1,000. But even given generous estimates including food, utilities, gas and allowance ($15 a week), there is no way I cost them more than $1500 monthly. Where does the other $2400 go? I sure don't know.
Yesterday I bought a mother's day card for my real mother, $3. Last week I paid $150 in court fees for my emancipation case. Later today I will pay the enrollment fee to a prestigious college on the East Coast to the tune of $500. All $653 is coming out of my pocket. In about an hour I will be broke. Where did that extra $2400 for foster children go? I wish I knew.
When I asked Jack Duckworth, director of Residential Youth Care and the foster program, if he knew, he had an interesting point of view. "I'm not even putting this on the table. The state pays me to do them a service. I make shitloads of money." Mr. Duckworth, does indeed make lots of money, more than 1 million from Medicare and Medicaid alone. That doesn't include the money he makes of his four foster children. I've learned that he receives as much money for them as my foster parent's receive for me, about $130 per day. With four foster children that calculates out to $15,600 a month or $187,200 annually. I wish my mother, parent to four children, received half as much. Doesn't everyone wish they could get $3900 a month for having a kid?
Over the last 5 months I've been in treatment, (for one minor consuming alcohol) Mr. Duckworth, went a long way to convince me that it really was about the kids. However, yesterday he revealed what it is really all about. Mr. Duckworth, still remembers that he does a service to the State of Alaska. Unfortunately, he has forgotten that the State of Alaska is supposed to provide services to the People of Alaska. He is not supposed to be doing a service to the state, or to his budget. He is supposed to be doing a service to the children of Alaska.
But in a system which provides an extravagant amount of money for the control of children, there is only one eventual outcome. People, who care only about money, not kids, are being drawn into the system. I witness and experience it every day.
Matt Jackson
Ketchikan, AK

Received May 07, 2008 - Published May 09, 2009

Sitnews,Stories In The News, Ketchikan, Alaska


*The posts made in this blog are of our opinion only* Without Prejudice UCC 1-207

Safe Families for Children makes a difference

The Picayune Item

April 30, 2011

Safe Families for Children makes a difference

Dr. Stanley Watson, Syndicated columnist
The Picayune Item
PICAYUNE — I recently heard about a new program that is bound to be a godsend for families in trouble. Social worker Lynne Sabin gave this example of a family caught in a short term crisis:

Picture a dad with a wife, two kids under 5, and a minimum wage job that is barely meeting their needs, but dad is hanging in there and working hard. Now picture the mom with acute appendicitis and needing surgery... While mom is in the hospital, who is caring for the kids? There is no extended family and no other support system, so the only alternative is for dad to miss work to care for the children ... until now! Mississippi's new Safe Families for Children movement offers parents a safe, temporary place for their child without losing custody.

Lynne went on to tell how Safe Families For Children is currently enlisting volunteers through the churches to help families in crisis. It is not foster care; there is no government involvement and no family court making decisions about custody. This movement is set up to keep families together and out of the nation's child protection systems.

In other words, Safe Families for Children in South Mississippi matches those who volunteer to take the children into their homes with families who are in a crisis situation and need their help.

Lynne Sabin's job is to recruit and train the Host Families; she also enlists and trains Family Friends, Resource Families and Mentors. All of this is volunteer and without pay:

·Host Families invite children from a family in crisis to come live with them while their parents work through their difficulties. Host families provide for the children's needs and incorporate them into every aspect of their lives such as carpooling, play dates, church activities and sports events. Of course host families must be willing to accept criminal background checks, references and home visits.

·Family Friends provide Host Families with assistance with carpooling, respite care, friendship and support. They must also submit to background checks.

·Resource Families offer goods and services to children in Safe Family care. This could include money for the movement, bringing food to the Host Family, or doctors and dentists who contribute their services.

·Mentors come alongside the birth parents to provide friendship, encouragement and support.

This ministry returns the church to the forefront of caring for families in trouble and Safe Families succeeds only when it is embraced and adopted by local churches. In fact it has become a successful alternative to the state child welfare system.

When Lynne began to describe this program it must have sounded familiar to the old timers who remember when Christian folks, without calling on the government or expecting payment, went out of their way to help families in trouble. My parents often took in boys who needed a place to stay; (never girls because the guests had to share limited space with me and my two brothers.)

Among the several boys who passed through our home, I remember two in particular. One was a huge 14-year-old that Dad picked up off the street one chilly Saturday evening. Bruce had on an old, torn sheep skin coat but was barefooted. Dad bought him a cheap pair of work shoes and the store owner donated a pair of work pants. Bruce even went to church with us on Sunday morning wearing one of Dad's dress shirts and his new pants and shoes.

He got a lot of attention during the congregational singing. Never having been in church before, he did not know the songs but knew how to whistle-not an ordinary whistle but the loud kind where you place your upper teeth over your lower lip and let fly. Everybody turned to stare and frown when he overwhelmed the combined efforts of the congregation including the pianist. Dad grabbed him by the shoulder and whispered into his ear until he got him bulldogged and under control. When Bro. McClung got up to preach he never mentioned it-just pretended it never happened.

Another boy was a dark haired, dark complexioned kid named Billy. He was friendly and obedient. My only problem with him was that he had some sort of a sinus or adenoid defect that caused him to constantly clear his throat, snort, and generally express his discomfort. At night he snored. Billy was placed in the home of a childless couple-a minister and his wife-and became a radio announcer when he grew up. He must have found a cure for his condition.

I'm sure my folks made a great contribution to the lives of the boys who passed through our home and I am also sure they could have done better and done more if Safe Families had been there to support and guide them. Now, if your family should volunteer to care for children from families in crisis you can expect some new and interesting experiences and God will smile with you.

Editor's note: If you are interested in this ministry you may contact Lynne Sabin at lsabin@bethany.org or visit the Safe Families for Children website at www.safe-families.org.

CPS family court corruption: Sign the petition

 CPS family court corruption
 http://www.petition2congress.com/3499/cps-family-court-corruption/?m=4135005

Recruit your family and friends to take action: Sign the petition

Tell a Friend

Families are being abused by State CPS and Family Courts through out the United States of America, this is a major issue that needs to be addressed, Families that have had their civil rights violated through family court proceedings and the fact that all due process and constitutional rights are violated and manipulated by family court judges, District Attorneys, and Commissioners of /social services departments as well as CPS workers, and court appointed attorneys that are not working for the clients but have helped incriminate parents. Also of extreme interest, is obtaining names/phone/location of CPS workers who are falsifying or have falsified documents in court and who have lied in a court setting. The people of New York State and the People of the United States of America demand a full investigation of all departments, and the termination of department until further the people also wish to sue for government entrapment as well as a suit brought against the case workers, family court judges, and district lawyers. The People through discovery have found:
1. The imbalance of funding is creating corruption
2. Corruption has filtered through all manner of government and related agencies
3. Judicial decisions violate the public trust
4. Laws are created and passed that give parens patriae unlimited power not provided by the Constitution
5. The pendulum has swung to create a monopoly strategy of funding extracted from dwindling Social Services that have been set up to help families in need is devastating families across America
6. Children's lives are at stake while in the care of government funded agencies, such as rape, sexual abuse, physical abuse and neglect, mental abuse, and statistics show our children are being killed while in government placements out side of the parental home/or close relatives
7. That the states are not following guidelines placing children with relatives but are screening them out using different criteria with foster families, or falsifying documents to entrap parents and not keeping the children in the home with parents but removing the children without due process or any true purpose other then to incriminate parents/family members and to insure family is unfit
8. That pockets of tyranny are going unchecked without recourse
9. Congress local government/ civil and family courts is not responsive to The People
10. That The People have been turned away from civil courts, and from family courts higher court of appeals, only to remain battered and bruised by the tyranny of these local government funded courts as the judges, case workers/commissioners and district attorneys mock the outraged parents and children of which they so willingly strip of their civil rights and liberties
The People are declaring a public health crisis and human rights violation as well as their Civil rights are being stripped and taken from them and their families, as a result of these above atrocities and also In addition, The People find the Parens Patriae to be more than a doctrine but a specialized position created by the government for the government that violates Article 1 Sec 9, 10: No title of nobility or honors shall be granted by the United States. The title extends to the courts, Childrens Administration and public education violating Amendment 14 depriving persons of life, liberty and property without due process. The position applies as a collective.
The People are ordering an investigation of the departments as well as Family courts through out the United States of America and most important in New York State the people of the United States ask that all family court files,case files, court tapes, and videos be put into the investigation, as well as there be a federal lockdown on all CPS and family courts so that no tampering of documents can be done by such agencies, the fact is family court documents will show the fact that they are mishandled and manipulated by these agencies to insure incriminating charges are inevitable and due process is not being carried out, civil rights are violated, all human rights are violated and the United States Constitution is not on the agenda of these agencies. And the people of the United States of America are being abused by these powers.

*The posts made in this blog are of our opinion only* Without Prejudice UCC 1-207

CPS Falsifying Records To Receive Grant Money

DFCS employees helped lead to supervisors' arrests

 COLUMBUS, Ga. --
Department of Family and Children Services whistleblowers helped lead to Wednesday's arrests of two Muscogee County Child Protective Services supervisors.
Forty-eight year-old Deborah Cobb and 54-year-old Phyllis Mitchell are on paid administrative leave from the agency pending the outcome of the investigation.
DFCS employees alleged the two women were ringleaders in an effort to alter, delay and destroy reports to meet internal guidelines and receive grant money.

 Dozens of boxes allegedly containing numerous falsified child abuse reports were wheeled out of the Muscogee County DFCS office and are now in the hands of federal agents.

 Investigators will be pouring over the documents to see if they match the electronic records.

*The posts made in this blog are of our opinion only* Without Prejudice UCC 1-207

There are "NO" words to describe the ----"O.U.T.R.A.G.E." ---- AND IT'S STILL HAPPENING!

From a veiwer comment:

"... He was tied down and tased THIRTY-ONE times over a period of seven HOURS. What could he possibly have done to warrant THAT level of brutality...kill a dozen people? Blow up a building? From what I hear, we only torture TERRORISTS."

 Maybe it's time for a Grand Jury Investigation into this sadistic ritual of corporal punishment.

*The posts made in this blog are of our opinion only* Without Prejudice UCC 1-207

Communist Goals (1963) ~~ 2013

 The highlighted lines below are just the ones I know have been completed or are in the process of becoming so thanks to our president usurp and gang. Follow the antics of child protective services (office of children's services) and see how they "fit" the program below.


Congressional Record--Appendix, pp. A34-A35 January 10, 1963
Current Communist Goals
EXTENSION OF REMARKS OF HON. A. S. HERLONG, JR. OF FLORIDA
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Thursday, January 10, 1963
Mr. HERLONG. Mr. Speaker, Mrs. Patricia Nordman of De Land, Fla., is an ardent and articulate opponent of communism, and until recently published the De Land Courier, which she dedicated to the purpose of alerting the public to the dangers of communism in America.
At Mrs. Nordman's request, I include in the RECORD, under unanimous consent, the following "Current Communist Goals," which she identifies as an excerpt from "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen:

[From "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen]
CURRENT COMMUNIST GOALS
1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.
3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament [by] the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.
4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.
5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.
6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.
7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.
8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.
9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.
10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.
11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)
12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.
13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.
14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.
15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.
17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.
18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policymaking positions.
21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.
22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."
23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."
24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.
25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.
26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."
27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity which does not need a "religious crutch."
28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."
29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.
30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."
31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.
32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.
33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.
34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.
36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.
37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand [or treat].  
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals. [drug, drug, drug]
40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.   [Watch the antics of any social worker like justin heminger, jaylen day, bruce downs, judy ringstad and many others when they bar hop, lie, cheat, coerce, make false acusations and kidnap for profit children. All in the "best interest of the children" when what it really boils down to is "the best interest of their wallet".]
42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use ["]united force["] to solve economic, political or social problems.
43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.        [ too late]
44. Internationalize the Panama Canal. [President Carter GAVE IT AWAY]
45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction [over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction] over nations and individuals alike.




*The posts made in this blog are of our opinion only* Without Prejudice UCC 1-207

Judge orders Tennessee Department of Children’s Services to provide child death records

Judge orders DCS to provide child death records

More information about the deaths of children who were known to the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services must be made public, a judge ruled Wednesday.
Davidson County Chancery Court Judge Carol McCoy ordered DCS to release copies of the forms its employees fill out when a child dies.
Those forms will provide more information than DCS has so far provided to The Tennessean, the judge wrote, including more about the cause of death, the department’s prior involvement with children, results of prior contact and services provided to the children who later died.
“DCS has a statutory duty to provide the non-confidential information as an essential function and integral part of its routine duties,” McCoy wrote in a 27-page order.
The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed Dec. 19 by The Tennessean and a coalition of a dozen other news organizations alleging that DCS violated the law by refusing to provide the records of children who died after being brought to the agency’s attention.
The Tennessean made requests over a three-month period for information about 31 children who died in the first half of 2012 — and regarding 206 children involved in fatal and near-fatal incidents dating back to 2009.
“We’re delighted that the judge took a broad view of openness under the Public Records Act and took into account that our goal, as well as that of the state, is the protection of children in the state’s custody,” said Robb Harvey, the attorney representing the media.
In a statement Wednesday, Gov. Bill Haslam said the state will provide the records that the judge ordered released and said the state has all along sought to protect the privacy of families receiving services from DCS.
“This is not an obligation that we can casually dismiss or ignore when we get a public records request,” he wrote.
Haslam went on to say the state had been prepared to provide more information before the lawsuit was filed, “but wasn’t given the opportunity.”
The Tennessean repeatedly requested records from DCS. When none were provided — the department had instead created new spreadsheets with one-line summaries of incidents, stating DCS prior involvement was “not pertinent” to the deaths — the newspaper set a deadline for DCS to produce more.
On the day of the deadline, state officials offered to sit down with attorney Robb Harvey, who represents the media coalition, to discuss providing more information.
“The plaintiffs wanted all of the files and all of the information, so they chose instead to sue the state,” Haslam wrote.
“The state will not have to provide all of the files and information the plaintiffs demanded,” the statement concludes.

'Exhaustive' ruling

McCoy reviewed four DCS case files after a Jan. 8 court hearing.
She ordered DCS to provide redacted “referral forms” from those four cases within 10 days. Those forms summarize how a child died and the level of DCS involvement.
In the four files that McCoy looked through, she found DCS employees completed or “partially completed” these forms, and that some were later revised and added to the file multiple times.
In the files, the judge also looked at other records, letters, investigation summaries, autopsies, medical reports, photographs, and hand-written notes, but did not order that those be released.
“The files do not appear to be in chronological order nor are they organized in a meaningful way … that DCS did not have the information readily available becomes apparent upon a review of the four files provided,” the judge wrote.
McCoy said the department must provide an estimate of the time and cost required to produce the death referral forms for the other 200 fatalities and near-fatalities.
She wrote that when a child dies, the department’s “efforts or lack thereof become a key concern.”
The judge ordered identifying information to be redacted from records, including the names of hospitals and schools.
McCoy outlined how state and federal laws make child abuse records confidential in most circumstances, but that other laws require that child death and near-death records, in particular, must be made public.
Harvey called the ruling’s analysis of the law “thorough and exhaustive.”
A similar legal demand for fatality records — in a separate lawsuit — will go before a federal judge on Friday. In that case, a watchdog group asked for similar records

Written by

Tony Gonzalez

The Tennessean

*The posts made in this blog are of our opinion only* Without Prejudice UCC 1-207