Opportunity Knocks #47- Unpacking American Indifference to Child Wellbeing (Part 4) - Foster Care in Texas
Every Monday, I share reflections, ideas, questions, and content suggestions focused on championing, building, and accelerating opportunity for children.
In Part 1 of this series, we explored the broad theme of indifference toward child wellbeing. In Part 2, we defined indifference, evaluated its underlying causes, and illustrated the prevalence of these causes through examples from history, philosophy, literature, and science. In Part 3, we turned to Indian Boarding Schools the first of three case studies of demonstrable indifference to child wellbeing, examining whether these instances are bugs or features of American culture, and beginning to explore what lessons we can learn to manage indifference to child wellbeing. In Part 4, we consider the case of the Texas foster care system.
In 2015, Texas Governor Greg Abbott, just a little over a year into his first term, called for reform of the Texas Department of Children and Families (DFPS) via a letter to its Commissioner:
“Abuse or neglect of our most vulnerable Texans - our children - is intolerable, and it is especially unacceptable when it happens to a child under the care umbrella of the State of Texas. I am deeply concerned to learn that three children under the care and supervision of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services died in the first three months of 2015. This follows the tragic deaths of nine children in 2014. Such tragedies are solemn reminders of our enduring challenge to protect children from abuse and neglect.”
Governor Abbott was referring to the 144 child deaths between 2010 and 2014 alone. In his 2017 State of the State speech, he repeated the same refrain:
“The primary goal of government is to keep its citizens safe and secure. That goal is even more important when it comes to our children. You will cast thousands of votes this session. Few will involve life or death decisions. Your vote on CPS is one of them. Last year, more than 100 children died in our Child Protective System. You can vote to end that. We can reform the system so that no more children die in it. We were right to inject emergency funding. But that’s not a lasting solution. We need more workers, with better training, smarter strategies and real accountability to safeguard our children. While improving child safety in CPS, we must also remain vigilant in protecting parental rights. We must remember that the best place for a child, if at all possible, is with their parents. We also need to develop a Network of Nurture. The First Lady and others have reached out to faith leaders across Texas to encourage their members to become foster and adoptive parents. We need a legion of families in every county who can open their homes and open their hearts to fostering our vulnerable children. When done right, foster care yields tremendous results…To do this right, I’ve budgeted more than the House or Senate. Do not underfund this rickety system only to have it come back and haunt you. Do it right. If ever we’ve had an emergency item, this is it. And I’m declaring CPS reform my first emergency item. If you do nothing else this session, cast a vote to save the life of a child.”
The Legislature did act, and Governor Abbott signed four bills into law, declaring that he, “expect[ed] the Texas Child Protective Services and the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services to strive for, achieve and to accomplish No. 1 ranking status in the United States of America as it concerns taking care of our children." The bills did the following:
Provided $350 a month to families caring for abused and neglected children who are related to them.
Made Department of Family and Protective Services a standalone agency outside of the Texas Health and Human Services Commission
Altered how courts work with the state's child welfare agency
Empowered the state create a "community-based care" model, contracting with nonprofits to oversee children in foster care and adoptive homes and a relative's home.
DFPS also spent billions on this issue over the last decade. The Legislative Budget Board reported to the Special Committee on Child Protective Services that "[e]very Child Protective Service program has seen growth from [FY] 2014 to 2023, with the cumulative expenditures increasing by 60.2 percent over this time period.”
Unfortunately, Texas’ most vulnerable children still remain in a precarious situation. Between July 31, 2019 November 1, 2023, well over 100 have died while in the state’s welfare system, including, eight children whom DFPS determined were abused or neglected by their caregivers in connection with their deaths or their care prior to their deaths.”
This data comes from the seventh, and most recent, report from the court appointed federal monitor installed after U.S. District Court Judge Janis Jack ruled in 2015 that Texas had violated the children’s Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process right to be free from an unreasonable risk of harm caused by the State (the initial case was brought New York-based advocacy group Children’s Rights Inc. in 2011 on behalf of all Texas children in long-term foster care). Child fatalities represent a small, albeit awful and unacceptable, part of the Texas foster crisis. For instance,
A July 2023 investigative report found 213 minors in DFPS’ care became sex slavery victims after going missing (that number may be far higher, with nearly 300 children missing across the state).
A 2022 report by the Texas Senate’s Special Committee on Child Protective Services, zeroed in on less than adequate investigative work by DFPS from 2010 to 2020.
In 2023, about 9,000 children were in permanent state custody, and an average of 80 children per month were staying in unlicensed and unsafe housing.
DFPS spent $262 million between 2021 and the end of August 2023 to house children in unregulated facilities including hotels, according to a state document obtained by Texas Public Radio.
Basically, over the last decade, DCPS still continues to fail miserably. There are lots more data points e.g., over-burdensome caseloads, licensing violations, reports of abuse being ignored by the state, lack of awake night staff.
Yet, the Abbott administration, that has spent $180M fighting the lawsuit over the last decade, just a few weeks ago, petitioned for relief from the federal monitor for claiming to have met 12 of the over 50 court-imposed orders. Patrick Crimmins, a spokesperson for DFPS said in a statement emailed to The Texas Tribune,
“Texas has made significant progress in the all-hands-on-deck effort to improve foster care. More than $100 million has been spent. Caseworkers are better trained, their caseloads are lower, and investigators respond more quickly to protect foster children and youth.”
DFPS’ petition comes as Judge Jack is considering whether the agency should be held in contempt of court for the third time since 2019 for failures including unsound sexual abuse investigations.
What happened here? Why has this taken over a decade to fix?
Undoubtedly, foster care policy formulation and implementation is incredibly challenging.
Foster care and child protective services usually involve multiple agencies—across state, local, and sometimes the federal government—each with its own regulations and policies. Communication, coordination, and data sharing among these entities is often broken or non-existent. Decisions in foster care involve navigating legal rights of biological parents, children, and foster parents, which can lead to ethical dilemmas and legal challenges. Preventive services to support families before children need to be placed in foster care is incredibly important, but implementing these services can be difficult. The workforce in child welfare services often experiences high turnover rates, because of low pay and high-stress, which leads to inexperienced professionals and lack of continuity in care.
In some instances, non-safety regulations are overly burdensome and punitive. There are shortages of foster homes. This list goes on. There also seems to be a unique level of incompetent leadership and organization dysfunction at DCPS.
But, I think indifference to kids’ wellbeing is at the root of this crisis: 1) the radical self-interest of politicians who do not see it in their interest or have any real incentive to fix problems facing poor children; 2) any number of cognitive biases—e.g., status quo bias, availability heuristics, illusions of validity, actor-observer-bias—that contribute to a lack of empathy among the general population towards children living in foster care, with obvious implications for voting behavior (the issue was very briefly mentioned by Beto O’Rourke, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate for governor in 2020, in a debate with Governor Greg Abbott, but no questions were asked about it. Likely because it isn’t an issue people voters care that much about; 3) injustice - all kids, under the U.S. Constitution have a right to life, liberty, and property and Texas has a duty to protect these rights, but because of inequality, discrimination, and power imbalances, poor children seem less entitled to those rights; 4) fragmentation - individuals are just more focused on their groups’ interests, leading to a scarcity of care and responsibility toward issues that affect others outside of their group. These tight-nit physical and digital communities share similar backgrounds, life experiences, and political opinions and poor children aren’t represented in these tribes.
The Texas foster care crisis, like the Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative, serves as a stark warning. It illustrates how societal norms can tacitly contribute to the mistreatment of children, especially during times when factors like willful ignorance, existential apathy, extreme self-centeredness, cognitive biases, social disconnection, and pervasive injustice are prevalent.
Until next week, be kind and be calm,
Andrew