There are too many stories of children stolen by Child Protective Services (CPS) agencies for no good reason. Funding for these agencies is under the "Child Protective Services" operated by the Department of Health and Human Services. Why would a government agency whose charge is to protect children from abuse and neglect devastate children by taking them from their homes and families without good reason?

Studies show that most the CPS seizures of children are with out basis, which is the worst part of it. According to Cornell University, about 68% of all Child Protective Services cases nationwide "do not involve child maltreatment." The basis for largest percentages of CPS child "thefts" from parents is the result of "deprivation of necessities due to poverty."

If the parents were given support services "that may be helpful in keeping the family intact", just like the almost endless stream of incentives and services that are provided to the adoptive parents, it would stand to reason that the causes for removing children in the first place would be eliminated. Would that not be more to the thinking of pro-family and family values?

There are two main reasons this does not happen. One is the battery of narcissistic, progressive laws of controlling social engineering that both govern the people in our social services agencies and give them free reign to ignore our civil rights. The main reason is our money. "Child Protection Services" is one of the biggest social services businesses in our nation. CPS agencies spend billions of dollars a year, of our tax dollars, literally stealing children from their families.

Our money is paid to countless state employees, social workers and an amazing array of administrators that includes; court personnel, court investigators and evaluators, guardian ad litems, judges, and the states various forms of Child Protective Service agencies to steal our children from us. In addition, there are armies of contracted private professionals working under various government contracts.

It is truly astounding how many people there are in every state that have a government job or make their company profits off the children that are in custody of agencies and/or contractors funded under Child Protective Services. The financial infrastructure that provides the incentive for Child Protective Services funded agencies to steal people's children and be certain they never get them back is almost as sickening as the actions of CPS are.

Parents across the country have had their children taken from them through CPS for disagreeing with school officials about putting their children on "medication" for ADHA or other so-called "mental" and "emotional" issues they see no symptoms of or for simply wanting a second medical opinion before moving forward with recommended treatments. Why would a system designed to help children, destroy their families over the fact their parents are doing what any civilized and clear thinking person would do for their children or even themselves?

What do the recipients of adopted children stand to gain from this? The children's "new parents" receive:

• Medicaid for the child
• A clothing allowance
• Reimbursement for adoption costs such as:
  • Adoption fees
  • Court costs
  • Attorney fees
  • Cost of adoption home study

Under Title XX of the Social Security Act, adoptive parents are also entitled to post adoption services "that may be helpful in keeping the family intact." These services include:

• Daycare
• Specialized daycare
• Respite care
• In-house support services such as:
  • Housekeeping
  • Personal care
  • Counseling

Let us equate this to the welfare program that a single mother might have been on before having her children stolen. Welfare regulations say she may not own anything of real value, she must prove that she has no money in the bank, no boats, no real estate, no stocks or bonds, and they cannot even own a car worth over $1000. All this so she can collect around $550.00 per month for herself and two dependent children.

The foster parents, who would get her children, will receive about $850.00 plus all the support services they can handle. We mock the single mother on welfare as though she is nothing but a lowlife that is sucking off the taxpayers, all while we paint this rosy picture of the foster and adoptive parents as being saints. The truth is the adoptive and foster parents are placing six to eight times the burden on the taxpayers as the welfare mother was.

Just to add insult to injury, adoptive and foster parents are not required to take psychological evaluations or drug & alcohol evaluations. Unlike parents who are in the middle of a divorce and working through custody arrangements or trying to keep their own children out of "protective custody."

You have to wonder, why we do not just give the same level of support to the children's parents in the first place and save the family instead. The savings from the reduced cost of bureaucracy alone would justify doing this.

If we did preserve the family, how many less children would enter foster care in the first place? Some estimates show the budget reductions for Child Protective Services' budget would be from $12-plus Billion dollars a year to around $2.8 Billion.

What can we do in the grand scheme of things? Congress does not care; they are more worried about upsetting their state's governor for trying to cut the state's take of this funding and the loss of population control that would result.

The people in the Department of Health and Human Services who stand to lose their jobs will massacre the President, so he will not help. The press will hammer both Congress and the President for "hurting children's programs" that either do not exist or, in actuality, are based on purely narcissistic laws that are the absolute reverse of help.

The answer is to do what ever it takes to see CPS fail at stealing our children. Without children "for sale," like any other business that has no product supply, the problem will solve itself. Parents working together are the only real hope.

Support of Kinship care programs is also critical for those times when placement away from the parents does truly need to happen. Keeping the children within the family some way, any way that will work for them help maintain a sense of family and belonging for them. Presently, Kinship care has no funding under foster care or adoption support. How much more anti-family can we get?

Why are the members of Congress, the same who shouted from the mountains that they honor and will protect family values, not taking a stand against one of the most anti-family values programs on earth? We would like to know what they think about the reason we elected them - family values.

What is happening through the actions of our lawmakers is certainly far from what we had in mind. Tell the people you voted for that if the adoption industry runs short of "product," to give them their children and leave ours and our families alone.

Yours truly,

Director
The Center for Children's Justice - Carolinas Chapter
P.O. Box 891
Concord, NC 28025