Los Angeles CASA does the most CASA thing in the world

There are more than 900 chapters of Court-Appointed Special Advocates. Of that number, one was led by a Black woman with lived experience. Now that number is zero. 

On May 19, UCLA Blueprint published this story about Dr. Charity Chandler-Cole,
director of Los Angeles CASA. On June 18, she was fired.

Here’s how that most sacred cow in child welfare, Court-Appointed Special Advocates (CASA), works: 

Overwhelmingly white middle-class volunteers are given 30 hours of training, maybe 40, much of which can be taken online.* Then they’re sent into the homes of families that are overwhelmingly poor and disproportionately nonwhite. The usually white, middle-class amateurs interview everyone, assess the families, spend what one study found to be an average of 12 minutes every working day investigating the case (less if the child was Black).

Then they can effectively decide if the child will go into foster care. They can effectively decide if the child stays in foster care.  They can effectively decide if the child will ever see his or her parents ever again. (Yes, judges do it officially, but CASA brags about how often judges do as they tell them to do.) 

What could possibly go wrong? 

Well, for starters, abundant research shows that it backfires. Studies find that CASA prolongs foster care, reduces the chances of reunification, increases the chances that children will “age out” with no home at all – and does nothing to improve child safety. (And by the way, though the amateurs also are volunteers, it turns out running all this costs taxpayers a fortune.) 

Second, no matter how well-meaning the volunteers, the program is so steeped in unfixable racial and class bias that runs so deep, two legal scholars called the entire program “an act of white supremacy.” 

But for a while there, it looked like one CASA program was serious about trying to do better, and it was a big one.  In 2021, the Los Angeles County CASA program hired as its director Dr. Charity Chandler-Cole. That was a shock. Charity Chandler-Cole is a Black woman with lived experience; someone who had risen above everything the system tried to do to her. And Los Angeles tears apart families at one of the highest rates among America’s largest cities. 

As The Imprint points out in this excellent story, among those who hailed her appointment was Karen Bass, then a Member of Congress with a strong interest in foster care issues, now mayor of Los Angeles. Said Bass: 

“Charity is the right leader at the perfect time for CASA/LA. She is a visionary who will be a tireless champion for the program and the children and families they serve.” 

But on June 18, the Board of Los Angeles County CASA fired Dr. Chandler-Cole.  That was not a shock.  That was the most CASA thing in the world. 

As The Imprint points out, it’s not like the Board didn’t know what it was getting: 

Her views were clearly stated upon her hiring. 

“If our CASAs don’t understand why these systems were created in the first place and that they weren’t created to really address the needs of our communities, then they can’t really go in understanding how to navigate this system that is not created to help young people from Black and brown communities,” Chandler-Cole said in a 2021 interview with this outlet. 

But, as the story also points out, that was 2021, the height of America’s short-lived racial justice reckoning.  Now, of course, there’s a lot less pressure for racial justice, and CASA can return to its comfort zone. 

In retrospect, a profile of Dr. Chandler-Cole and her work, published just last month, included a hint of what was to come: 

Not everyone was happy when Chandler-Cole got the job and began a series of monthly virtual fireside chats at which she talked about race and racism, immigration, and the particular needs of — and structural discrimination against — LGBTQ-plus kids and parents. Some volunteers and board members told her that her approach was scaring people. Some quit. One said she was triggered every time the new CEO used the words “social justice” or “racial justice.” [Emphasis added.] 

That article was published on May 19. One month later, Charity Chandler-Cole was out.  I guess too many CASAs were getting “triggered.” 

In one sense, the Los Angeles County CASA Board of Directors was absolutely right. Some board members told The Imprint: 

“The CASA Board determined that there was a fundamental misalignment between Dr. Chandler-Cole’s approach and CASA’s mission ..." 

That tells you all you need to know about CASA's real mission. 

*-Plus in-service – some CASAs get soooooo upset when you don’t mention the in-service.