Professional Documents
Culture Documents
REPORT NO. 7
A Report by the
1991-92 San Diego County Grand Jury
June 29, 1992
THE CRISIS IN FOSTER CARE
INTRODUCTION
2In earlier reports the Grand Jury has used the term "social worker" to describe employees of the
Department of Social Services. However, the term "social worker" denotes a person who has
achieved the Masters Degree status in the social work curriculum or who is licensed as a social
worker. Many departmental employees who work on cases are not "social workers" by this
definition. (See San Diego County Juvenile Justice Commission Case Review Report, p.1.). In
this report the Grand Jury uses the word case worker to denote that general class of departmental
employees who perform case work.
screening children for the "right" one to adopt.
These problems run deep and wide, and they share a common
denominator: inadequacies in funding. The Jury describes these
systemic problems, even with the knowledge that solutions are
difficult and that budgets are strained to the breaking point.
7Twenty-three percent of the children placed out of home by the Department of Social Services
are African-American while only seven percent of all children in San Diego County are of
African-American. Report of the Placement and Evaluation Committee, San Diego County
Commission on Children and Youth, April, 1992.
o Long term foster care homes expect to have the foster
child for an extended period of time. (Long term foster care is
an alternative for children who cannot be reunited with their
birth family, and for whom an adoption is not a possibility.
Once siblings are separated, the child has lost the last
vestiges of his or her natural family. The only hope for that
child to remain in contact with this family is through regular
visitation.
The lack of foster homes and the same arbitrary rules are
"terrible for kids and pernicious for infants".
The Grand Jury calls for the formation of a task force made
up of child psychologists, child advocates, caseworkers and
their supervisors who will establish minimum standards for the
child's preparation for change of placement in every instance.
CONCLUSIONS
RECOMMENDATIONS
SI-HSS2