by Cynthia Gutierrez, Photo: istock, Prism, February 9, 2022
Child Protective Services often result in the policing, surveillance, and separations of Black, Indigenous, and families of color. We need alternative solutions.
The 2020 uprisings against police brutality and state-sanctioned violence pushed more people to recognize how police forces disproportionately abuse and kill Black, Indigenous, and people of color. But policing by other branches of the state also extends to people’s homes. BIPOC families have been systematically torn apart under the guise of protecting children by the family regulation system, commonly known as the child welfare system or Child Protective Services (CPS), creating a climate of fear and erecting barriers that keep families apart.
Families have to navigate confusing and often contradictory systems that make it challenging to keep their families together and receive much needed support. Because the surveillance of parenting is interwoven into so many systems, anything from seeking shelter from intimate partner violence, getting treatment for substance use disorder, or even showing your home in the background of Zoom school can be fraught with fear. My colleagues at San Francisco General Hospital repeatedly hear from families that they are scared to access prenatal health care for fear of CPS getting involved.
This system has roots in our country’s deeply racist history, from tearing families apart during slavery to forcing Indigenous children into boarding schools. That historical trauma reverberates through the system today. In San Francisco, families with Black children are 12 times as likely as white ones to face allegations, 16 times as likely to have them substantiated, and 22 times as likely to be placed in foster care. Indigenous and Latinx families are also disproportionately impacted. The COVID-19 pandemic has put these inequities in sharp relief. In New York City, where 90% of children’s services cases involve Black and Latinx children,school personnel made more than 2,400 reports for child abuse and maltreatment in the first quarter of this school year as families balanced education and protecting their children from COVID. Just as violence against BIPOC by police has sparked a reimagining of public safety, we must envision a new system where families are supported, not policed.
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