I have a friend who has two foster kids. The agency in charge (Nebraska Health & Human Services) sent her a questionaire recently asking her what she was doing to prepare for Y2K. She filled it out and sent it in. A few weeks later, someone from the same agency in another town called to ask the same questions. She told the person to check at the first agency office. (aaaargh!)

Apparently, when it comes to possibly losing your job (read "kid clients") it's okay for a gov't agency to be worried about what you're doing to prepare for Y2K.

For the millions of other kids and adults who aren't under the wing of some gov't agency, the standard line becomes "no problem, it's all fixed, don't do anything"

Lots of luck -- too bad you ain't a foster kid.

-- (coverthy@rump.com), December 19, 1999

Answers

We have "Childrens Protective Services" here in California.One of the few Agencys accountable to no one as to what the statis is of any given child in their clutches.Average time spent in their tender care is two Years at least.Children is their Business,their only Business.The longer a child is kept with in The System they have job security.I hope every fat ass social worker loses their jobs and burns in hell.

-- Dan Newsome (BOONSTAR1@webnet.tv), December 19, 1999.

Have first hand experience with Protective Services. Had siblings (my nephews) living in my home. My Mother dies (in another state), I cannot leave to make Funeral arrangements because I don't have legal permission to take children out of state. What am I going to do?! The permission givers are all in a meeting! I am in agony. My Mother is dead, there is only me to go to another state to make arrangements, and I cannot go, because it is illegal for me to take this children with me to another State, without permission! If I break the rules and go without "permission", I risk the children being removed from my home, and placed with strangers.. I die, a thousand deaths, because of "The Rules".

-- Will feed all Children (Childrenclose@arms.com), December 19, 1999.

Couple this post with the DEE CEE prep note above, and you have the answer to the question "What about between now and New Years?" A lesson in Governmental Hypocrisy.

They HOARD, we're supposed to be unprepared...They have well stocked BUNKERS, we get to be relocated, against our will, to WARMING CENTERS aka CONCENTRATION CAMPS!

Let them "Burn in HELL!!!"

-- Z (Z@Z.Z), December 19, 1999.

CPS snatched our kids illegally. They do that all the time around here. We got our kids back, and so did some other folks. The others thought to ask for a restraining order against CPS and got it. I can't imagine what we would do if we were facing y2k uncertainties and our kids were missing. We thought about taking foster children before the rollover just to make sure they were fed, but we will be overwhelmed with the people we know will show up here. I suppose we can take in any unwanted child as it comes up later.

I hope CPS workers lose all their files and the foster parents return the kids to their parents.

-- still afraid of CPS (cannotsay@this.time), December 19, 1999.

OK--not a Child Protective Social Worker---but a social worker---you who are so quick to criticize: come up with an answer for the thousands of children abused by their parents--come up with a program to teach common sence to social workers--come up with the will to make legislatures write reasonable laws--come up with lawyers and judges who refuse to abuse the kids with their readings of the law--come up with the money and the will to fund enough people to see to the welfare of children--lower case loads for god's sake! Come up with a way for people to NOT use Child Protection agencies as a threat against their neighbors when they are mad. Come up with a way to FORCE these protection agencies to listen to their cohorts rather than refuse to take a referral for abused children. Come up with some solid laws to punish parents who abuse, neglect and use their children. Come up with a law to remove children from drug addicted parents, parents who are simply unable to protect their children from exploitation. Find funding for adoptive and foster care programs and weed out the bad ones. Social workers are those hired by society to do the job individuals in society refuse to do--social workers respond daily to Solomon's dilema, walking the line between awful choices for the people they serve. They themselves are the recipient of abuse themselves from parents, from children, from the community--the same people who on any given day with come with hands out begging for help--if you respond to one you infuriate or injure the other. Why would anyone want to be a social worker? One day I grabbed a newborn child from a father who had just thrown her 5 feet. Another day I recieved notice that a severlly mentally ill person I had fought for was finally accepted for SSI and wouldn't have to sleep in abandoned buildings anymore. Get rid of me? Send me to hell? Who then will take care of and advocate for your handicapped child, your addicted brother, your battered sister, your mentally ill mother, your out of work father, your grandmother with Alzheimers, your exhausted grandfather? Please--come up with a better solution--I'm damned tired.

-- burning eyes (raisingttothebait@furry.com), December 19, 1999.

Folks: We have so much govt. intrustion into our lives because it is the natural result of so many folks not wanting to be "bottom-line" responsible for themselves and their kids.

Here's the deal: If you don't want to be responsible (read accountable) then the govt. comes and takes care of your responsibilities, but takes all the rights that go along with those responsibilities when it does.

RIGHTS = RESPONSIBILITIES

This is a natural relationship. If people will take care of their responsibilities, then they may enjoy their rights. Is this not how we train our children so that they may one day be decent, honorable, independant adults? Yes. We give them small responsibilities and small rights, with both of them increasing as they prove that they can prove good stewardship over things that they are given.

For a long long time, there was no CPS or other such thing. There were charitable groups usually organized through churches. That was just about the only social "safety net". There just was not a govt. way of taking care of children if parents died or did not take care of their parental duties.

Of course we had "poor houses" in those days, and if you did not pay your debts, you lost everything, and were sent to the poor house. In those days, punishment was swift and sure for folks who made stupid mistakes, or were unlucky. Insurance was called family relations and it was the job of family to take care of family.

Now, the govt. has taken the place of the father or the head of the household. It only follows that the person resonsible wants to have some control over his children or wards. So you see, each time people take the handout from the govt, they give up something, and they don't realize it till it's gone.

Students of Biology will see a similar relationship in ecosystems ie. the relationship between populations of species, ie. sheep and wolf populations. But that is a post for another thread.....

-- Formerly (formerly@nowhere.zzz), December 19, 1999.

"come up with an answer for the thousands of children abused by their parents"

A no-brainer. Attach legal liability to fraudulent accusation, and *enforce* it. Then, honor the "right to face your accuser" doctrine, and allow victims of false accusation to sue the accusers for *serious* damage penalties.

"come up with a program to teach common sence to social workers"

Perhaps it might be better to start with something more realistic, such as teaching them grammar, punctuation, and spelling.

First things first, after all.

-- Ron Schwarz (rs@clubvb.com.delete.this), December 19, 1999.

Mea culpa -- while wading through your voluminous rant, I copied and pasted the wrong rant-bite for the first item.

Substitute the existing quote with, "Come up with a way for people to NOT use Child Protection agencies as a threat against their neighbors when they are mad."

PS: being able to sue social workers might be a nice "second step".

-- Ron Schwarz (rs@clubvb.com.delete.this), December 19, 1999.

Spelling, punctuation and etc. You are right--prety awful isn't. (so I've been told repeatedly.)Never could. Thank god for spell checker. Does take care of some of the problem. Point well taken about lawyers---in my state they do get sued and that does give fair warning to some of the worst of us. Responcibility----absolutely, in every sence, at every corner and every house. If only.

-- Burning Eyes (raisingtothebait@fury.com), December 20, 1999.

Response to burning eyes.

Send Dr. Kervorkin to see the Handicapped kid, the mentally ill mom and the grandma with Alzheimers. Cold turkey the druggie brother with 3 weeks in a cage. Give the battered sister a .38 pistol and some firing range instruction. Give dad a job. There is plenty of real work that needs doing.

A few days ago on this board a Catholic was trying to "prep" a woman with 5 kids at home and 4 who had left home. Several people wrote in and said "Two and a tubal". In other words 2 kids on welfare and the woman should be sterilized.

I am slightly tougher. NO DEPENDANT SHALL BE ALLOWED TO INCREASE HIS OR HER DEPENDANCY.

The leeches at welfare never never preach personal responsibility, abortion or sterilization. IT WOULD PUT THEM OUT OF A JOB.

How many of us are here today because our grandparents got married when the girl got pregnant?

-- Dr. Death (dying@time.die), December 20, 1999.

Sheez, I'm afraid to jump into this thread!

We pay what we value. CPS/Social Workers don't make jack. If you want the cream of the crop, you gotta pay. I lost 2 social workers in one month cause an insurance company offered them $42k to process claims, verses our 26k. Both were uh kinda shitty at their jobs to start with... Imagine what that leaves me to provide service to the clients?

***Hey, I got the answer! NPR 3:30? EST reported Chicago is trying to import foreigners to teach their kids, cause (my opinion here: American teachers are fleeing the Marxist SOL.) How bout foreign social workers too, to control how you teach your kids at home?

BTW, OT: Virginia complains of a teacher shortage. Daily Press had an article which broke down the shortage for the city Williamsburg. They complained that they were 4 teachers short because thay had 1800 applicants and hired like 94. Excuse me, but their acceptance rate was lower than MEDICAL SCHOOL! Clearly there is no shortage in VA, and the media is perpetuating this scam to justify why Communists and Nazis are gonna teach YOUR KIDS! Hello!

-- Hokie (nn@va.com), December 20, 1999.