By Paula Rhoden, The Daily Courier
Monday, September 22, 2008
PRESCOTT - Arizona Child Protective Services’ began the Family to Family Team Decision Making program to give children a safety net as they enter the child welfare system.
With it already working in other Arizona counties, CPS began the program in western Yavapai County Sept. 22.
CPS District [...]
BY NANCY HICKS / Lincoln Journal Star
Sunday, Sep 21, 2008
Nebraska made the national news this week after two boys — a 15-year-old and a 11-year-old —became the first to be legally abandoned under the state’s new safe haven law.
And on Saturday a 13-year-old girl was abandoned.
In the first two cases, the guardians, an [...]
BY JoANNE YOUNG / Lincoln Journal Star
Friday, Sep 19, 2008
The state’s reliance on private companies to transport foster children to appointments and visitations has resulted in significant problems and caused children harm, the Foster Care Review Board director told a panel of senators Friday.
Carol Stitt and other review board staff members testified before the Legislature’s [...]
September 19, 2008
BY MICHAELA SAUNDERS
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
Early investments can yield the most return.
That’s why the Building Bright Futures effort plans to start its work with low-income pregnant women by providing in-home parenting classes and money for their children to attend high-quality child care centers.
The hope is that all 10,000 babies born in Douglas and Sarpy [...]
By MELISSA LEE / Lincoln Journal Star
Tuesday, Sep 16, 2008
Children don’t vote.
They don’t contribute to political campaigns.
They don’t lobby.
So when government budgets need to be trimmed, Sarah Ann Lewis fears, children’s programs too often are the first to take a hit.
Lewis, policy coordinator for Voices for Children in Nebraska, wants that to change.
“Politicians need to [...]
By JoANNE YOUNG / Lincoln Journal Star
Tuesday, Sep 16, 2008
If you’re at the end of your rope with your child’s behavioral problems, you have alternatives to the safe haven solution.
That’s what state officials and private agency heads said over and over after two youths — a 15-year-old in Lincoln, an 11-year-old in Omaha — were [...]
By Laurel Chesky
Two Travis County judges are trying to achieve the impossible: Create a bureaucracy that will improve service to the public and save taxpayer dollars.
Travis Co. Civil Court Judges Darlene Byrne and Jeanne Meurer have proposed forming two new public defenders’ offices in Travis Co. One would represent parents involved in civil cases in [...]
Brian Burns
Aug 28, 2008 at 8:46 AM CDT
AUSTIN (AP) - A federal appeals court ruling will force the state’s child welfare agency to obtain court orders or parental consent prior to removing allegedly abused children from their homes.
The ruling last month by a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of [...]
By JoANNE YOUNG / Lincoln Journal Star
Monday, Aug 25, 2008
The Legislature’s audit of the state’s personal services contracts, to determine compliance with state law, has found a number of issues with transportation service contracts that have caused concerns.
The Performance Audit Committee, which oversees the auditing process, has scheduled a public hearing [...]
By JEAN ORTIZ Associated Press Writer
The Associated Press
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - Nebraska’s new “safe-haven” law allowing parents to abandon unwanted children at hospitals with no questions asked is unique in a significant way: It goes beyond babies and potentially permits the abandonment of anyone under 19.
While lawmakers may not have intended it, [...]
