All 50 States Fail to Comply with Child Welfare Standards

By Laura Vogltanz

Published on January 19, 2006

In the past few years, state governments have failed to comply with U.S. child welfare standards. The Department of Health and Human Services has conducted reviews of each state since 2002 and not one adequately met the requirements.

Deficiencies in the systems included caseworkers not visiting children often enough, kids failing to receive promised health services and many suffering abuse or neglect. Permanent and stable homes are a rare occurrence for many children in the U.S. foster-care system.

There are several hypotheses for why child-welfare is lacking in each state. Some blame private agencies that arrange international adoptions for not providing adequate post-adoption services. Others say families that adopt need to be better prepared for any problems that may arise. Lastly, average citizens have high expectations of their child welfare system, but have yet to fund it adequately -- making it difficult to run a successful program.

Whatever the reason, states are encouraged to improve by doing a better job of recruiting potential adoptive families, monitoring homes and providing post-adoption services.

The DHHS has scheduled more reviews in 2006 and states will be penalized large fines if their child welfare system has not progressed.

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