Trinity Mount Ministries

Showing posts with label data. Show all posts
Showing posts with label data. Show all posts

Sunday, March 24, 2019

Opinion: What the Data Says About Child Welfare in New York City

David Hansell was appointed commissioner of the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) in 2017.

By David Hansell

When I became Commissioner of New York City’s Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) two years ago, I vowed to ensure that we’re protecting children and supporting families and I committed to use data to measure whether we’re reaching the right outcomes.

New data from 2018 shows that we’re moving in the right direction – and that we must continue investing in work that is helping our city’s most vulnerable children and families.

In 2018, the number of children in foster care in New York City fell another 6 percent, while nationally the number of young people in foster care has steadily increased over the last few years. Today, there are fewer than 8,500 children in foster care in New York City – down from nearly 50,000 in the 1990s and more than 16,000 just a decade ago.

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ACS investigates about 60,000 reports of suspected child abuse or neglect every year. We don’t choose which cases to investigate; we’re required to investigate every report that’s forwarded to us by the State hotline, which fields calls from teachers, doctors, neighbors, and members of the public.

When we start an investigation into alleged abuse or neglect, our first priority is making sure that the child is safe. More children are now able to stay safely at home with their families, thanks in part to evidence-based prevention services we’ve expanded in New York City. On any given day, families with 25,000 children are receiving these services, which include a wide range of services such as intensive family therapy, drug treatment, domestic violence advocacy, assistance with housing, benefits and child care, and coaching for parents. These services are helping parents provide the safe, healthy, happy homes that children need in order to thrive.

However, if we find a child in imminent danger of serious harm, and there is no alternative that will keep that child safe, we must remove the child for his or her own safety. In 2018, removals happened in 2,060 investigations. We carefully balance the need to ensure the child’s safety with the parent’s rights to due process.

In the vast majority of cases, children remain at home while parents take part in prevention services. Most often, parents participate in these services voluntarily. Sometimes, we need to obtain a court order to ensure that they participate, or that an abusive parent or relative is excluded from the home in a domestic violence situation, because that’s how we are able to ensure that a child remains safe. We aim to use court orders only when necessary, and in 2018 the number of children in cases in which ACS filed for and received court-ordered supervision decreased by 20 percent from 2017. Every removal must be reviewed in family court before a child is remanded to foster care. In some cases, we remove a child on an emergency basis and then seek a court order the next business day.

For example, our caseworkers might conduct an emergency removal if a child has serious bruises and cuts that were caused by a parent at home, but the report was received at night or during the weekend when the family court is closed. We will not send that child back into a dangerous home for the night and wait to go to court the next morning. Instead, we will remove the child on an emergency basis, and file with the court first thing the next morning.

In short, we conduct emergency removals only when there’s an imminent risk of harm and it’s impossible to get a court order first. And in 2018, the number of emergency removals declined 14 percent from 2017.

We will always need to seek court-ordered supervision in some cases, and we will always need to conduct some emergency removals. That’s the unfortunate reality of the extremely difficult and important work that ACS’ frontline staff does 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. But we have strengthened our decision-making in these cases – making sure that we’re taking action when children’s safety is at stake, and that we’re supporting families appropriately – through a range of reforms we’ve put in place over the last two years, including enhanced training on safety and risk, expanded technology to give caseworkers fuller and faster access to information, and increased oversight and consultation from managers, law enforcement experts, and medical professionals.

Ultimately, the most important data we monitor is whether children are safer as the result of our protective and preventive work. In 2018, fewer than 1.5 percent of families that completed prevention services had a child who was later removed and placed in foster care. We also know that nearly 10 percent of families with an “indicated” case (an investigation that uncovered evidence of abuse or neglect) that were referred but didn’t take part in prevention programs ended up having a repeat indicated investigation of abuse or neglect within six months. That’s why we continue to seek court orders when participation in prevention services is needed.

We are continuing to examine our work critically, identify areas for improvement, and make reforms. The most recent data shows us that we’re on the track – and that we need to keep moving forward.

David A. Hansell is commissioner of the New York City Administration for Children’s Services.



Sunday, April 22, 2018

Child Abuse Neglect Data 2018

Child abuse, neglect data released
February 1, 2018  27th edition of the Child Maltreatment Report
TOPICS: Children & Youth, Communities, Families

Newly released federal data on child abuse and neglect shows an increase from Fiscal Year 2015 to 2016 in three key metrics: referrals to child protective services (CPS) agencies alleging maltreatment (3.6 percent), referrals CPS agencies accepted for investigation or alternative response (4.0 percent) and the number of children who were the subject of an investigation or alternative response (3.3 percent).

The Children’s Bureau at HHS' Administration for Children and Families (ACF) published the 27th edition of the Child Maltreatment Report, which analyzes data collected by state CPS agencies. The report is based on Fiscal Year 2016 data, which is the latest data available.

Of the 3.5 million children who were the subject of an investigation or alternative response in Fiscal Year 2016, a national estimate of 676,000 children were victims of abuse and neglect, representing a 1.0 percent decrease from Fiscal Year 2015. In total, 74.8 percent of victims suffered neglect either by itself or in combination with any maltreatment type.

The number of children experiencing neglect decreased from Fiscal Year 2015 to Fiscal Year 2016, while victims experiencing physical or sexual abuse have increased. 49 states reported 1,700 fatalities as a result of child maltreatment in Fiscal Year 2016, which is an increase from the 1,589 fatalities reported by 49 states in 2015.

“Helping state child welfare agencies prevent and address child abuse and neglect is one of our top priorities this year,” said Steven Wagner, acting assistant secretary for children and families at ACF. “Collaborating with state child protective services helps us collect case-level data to better understand what’s occurring in a home when a child is neglected or abused.”

When states submit their data, they also are afforded the opportunity to submit commentary that may provide context to the data published in the report. States’ commentaries suggest the implementation of alternative response, increased public awareness of child maltreatment and staff training in screening and assessment of child maltreatment referrals, led to the changes noted in the 2016 metrics.

“To be effective in reducing the incidence of child abuse and neglect, service providers need access to a range of support services that help to strengthen the protective capacities of families and increase flexibility of providers to tailor child welfare intervention to the needs of individual children,” said Jerry Milner, acting commissioner of the Administration on Children, Youth and Families (ACYF) and associate commissioner at the Children’s Bureau.

The child maltreatment report is from the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS). NCANDS is a voluntary national data collection and analysis program of state child abuse and neglect information based upon data received from the 50 states, the District of Columbia and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

Administration for Children and Families

Trinity Mount Ministries

Monday, September 19, 2011

The FBI - Crime in the U.S. 2010:

About Crime in the U.S. (CIUS) By offense, by region, by state, by local agency

Includes data about the
age, gender, and race of
arrestees for 29 separate
offenses including murder
Includes data about
sworn officers and
civilian employees
Caution Against Ranking Read why the FBI discourages ranking agencies on the sole basis of UCR data.

Additional Data Collections