NCCPR news and commentary round-up, week ending June 3, 2025

● Gothamist has a story about a new report from The Bronx Defenders that documents in case after case the bias that prompts the city’s family police agency to needlessly tear apart nonwhite families. From the story: 

“All parents are in situations where they need support," said Anne Venhuizen, a supervising attorney for the Bronx Defenders. "All parents are in situations where they wish, looking back on it, they could have done something different. All parents are in situations where they did nothing wrong. All parents are in situations where someone criticizes their parenting, where they're like, this is the parenting I want to do, that I think is best for me and my family." 

“Parenting is constant small and large decisions about what to do, what's best for your children, and it is inherently subjective," she added. "White parents get a grace that in this city, Black parents don't.”

● In March on this blog I wrote about a case challenging what amounts to Handmaid’s Tale jurisprudence: demanding that men control the behavior of the women in their lives and terminating their children’s rights ever to live with either parent if they don’t. Now, in The Imprint Prof. Cynthia Godsoe, a former children’s attorney discusses the case.

● Speaking of children’s lawyers: The New York City lawyers who wrote this column in The Imprint calling for an end to anonymous child abuse reports don’t represent parents; they lead an agency that represents children. They see the harm such reports do to children every day. Maybe lawmakers should listen to them.

● Could there really be anything good in an analysis of the intersection of poverty and neglect signed by 23 professors of social work and allied disciplines? In this case, also in The Imprint, yes. They argue when poverty is confused with neglect the solution is likely to be money. But they go on to argue that when poverty is not “alone” – that there also are other problems, often the solution still is money. 

● Minnesota Public Radio talks to Kelis Houston on her journey to becoming a champion of child welfare reform in that state. She was a prime mover behind the Minnesota African-American Family Preservation and Child Welfare Disproportionality Act. And now she has a Bush Foundation Fellowship to continue her work – including speeding up the implementation of the law.

Turning to entertainment news (but be warned, this part includes spoilers): 

● One of the most realistic portrayals of family policing in a Hollywood movie was in the original animated version of Lilo and Stitch, as can be seen in this 32-second clip 

But the remake is, uh, the Disney version, as suggested by artist Erin Kidd:

A pretty irresponsible message at the best of times, but right NOW? Sheesh. #liloandstitch #stitch #hawaii #disneymovie #ohana

[image or embed]

— Erin Kidd (@thebabygoat.bsky.social) May 27, 2025 at 12:21 PM

You can read about the undermining of the whole point of the original and the whitewashing of family policing in Slate, Flicksided, and The Daily Beast. 

In this week’s edition of The Horror Stories Go in All Directions 

● From WFAA-TV 

State knew of history of abuse at facility where 11-year-old foster child died 

Records show that despite documenting years of violence and abuse, the state allowed the operators to open two other facilities. … 

● Two from the Santa Fe New Mexican. One about a place now closed … 

A worker was allowed to sexually abuse a teenage boy in 2018 at a long-shuttered Albuquerque-based residential treatment center for youth, according to a new lawsuit. 

Desert Hills of New Mexico, initially operated by Youth and Family Centered Services of New Mexico Inc., faced numerous allegations of abuse and neglect — including sexual assaults — before it was closed by the state in early 2019. … 

…another about one that’s still very much open: 

The state Department of Public Safety, which handles records request for the New Mexico State Police, has failed to provide documents for nearly five months related to an apparent assault that took place at a state Children, Youth and Families Department office in Albuquerque. … 

The office is near Interstate 40 and San Mateo Boulevard in Albuquerque. CYFD has long struggled with having to house children in its offices, in many cases due to challenges finding proper placements for them. The practice has led to instances of abuse, neglect or other harm to children staying there. … 

● And have you heard about the Washington State residential treatment program that used to be on an island accessible only by boat?  KIRO-TV reports that residents called it “Juvenile Alcatraz”: 

Two men who say they were repeatedly abused while living at a group home on Cypress Island decades ago are now suing the facility’s operator, alleging it failed to protect vulnerable children from rampant sexual and physical abuse. 

The facility moved to the mainland; but it’s still a residential treatment center.