Mothers Rights Group Urges: Keep Texas Compound Kids and Moms Together

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Free-Press-Release.com) April 27, 2008 -- For Immediate Release: April 27, 2008

Mothers Rights Group Urges:
Keep Texas Compound Kids and Moms Together

Origins-USA, a national non-profit that advocates for mothers’ rights and keeping natural families together, joins with many in grave anguish over the welfare of the 416 children taken from their families at the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints ranch by the state of Texas.

Texas state workers sent home 139 mothers who had accompanied the children initially in order to interview them about abuse without a parent present. Texas officials reportedly are sending the children to group homes, shelters and residences, some hundreds of miles away.

Origins-USA, which represents mothers who have lost children to adoption, implores Texas Child Protection Services (CPS) to keep mothers and their children together, as well as siblings, especially very young children who are in danger only of "possible" future abuse. Many of the mothers are themselves victims of abuse and the trauma of separation for mother and child is often irrevocable.

Origins-USA urges CPS to make every effort to locate family members of the children, outside the compound. Kinship care can be an effective alternative to foster care, providing numerous benefits for the child and family. Kinship care families are eligible for a foster care payment in all states if they meet state-specified foster care standard. More than two million children in the United States now live in kinship care arrangements (Urban Institute). Research shows that children living with relatives are no more likely—and are perhaps less likely—than children living with non-kin foster parents to experience abuse or neglect after being removed from their homes, according to the Center for Law and Social Policy.

If kinship care is not available, Shared Family Care (SFC), is the next best option. Texas was one of the first ten states to enact Shared Family Care (SFC). In SFC an entire family – or mother and child(ren) - is temporarily placed in the home of a host family who, along with a team of professionals, help the families to obtain the skills and resources they need to move toward self-sufficiency and adequately care for their children. SFC is used to prevent out-of-home placement, to provide a safe environment for the reunification of a family that has been separated, or to help parents consider other permanency options, including relinquishment of parental rights. (http://www.childwelfare.gov/outofhome/types/shared.cfm and http://cbexpress.acf.hhs.gov/articles.cfm?article_id=816&issue_id=2004-05)

Origins-USA Vice President Sandy Young, of Hondo Texas said that she is "horrified at what they are doing here, and so ashamed that mothers and families are being so grimly mistreated." Young fears it will be "almost impossible for these families to reunify...they are still criminalizing women for getting public assistance, and punishing them by removing their children."

Origins-USA president, Dr. Bernadette Wright, “empathically hopes that that Texas CPS will do everything possible to prevent the trauma of separation to these children and their mothers, and that everything possible will be done to avoid the risk of stranger foster care placements, especially in distant locations that will negatively impact visitation.”

Contact: Mirah Riben

PR@Origins-USA.org
732-329-3769

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