Cissy's note: Jezebel is working with Rise on a series sharing stories such as this one!!! There are already 100's of comments on this one piece.
The tragic death of Zymere Perkins, a child who died at the hands of abusive parents even though the city's child welfare agency had repeatedly investigated his family, made headlines in New York City publications for months this past fall. In their coverage, many outlets focused on a familiar narrative of monstrous parents and failing caseworkers, in stories that advanced the notion that the child welfare system had become too hesitant to remove children from their homes. Ultimately, the city's child welfare commissioner resigned.
But recent reporting has captured the opposite reality, that child welfare investigations and removals are a constant, terrifying presence in the lives of poor parents. Citywide, one in five children comes to the attention of the child welfare system. The majority of investigations are concentrated in just eight neighborhoods. Most allegations are not abuse but neglect, often driven by the stressors of poverty, not the character of the parent. And the negative press may have heightened disparate treatment of poor families; in the first quarter of 2017, after the coverage of Zymere Perkins'death, requests for removals by the agency were up significantly over the same time last year.
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