I encourage you to read further at a cautious pace, and absorb
as much as you can. It may change your
mind about the level of child abuse in this country, and about who some of the
people are behind a certain kind of child abuse.
First, let me paint a picture and see if you can envision
why this is written in the way it is.
Suppose you knew of a large group of men (and some women)
who were involved in a scheme or a plan to abuse or neglect a very large number
of young children? Suppose you found
that they had access to some of your money, and were using your dollars to take
away from these children some specific things that would cause them to become
sick or to lose some safety items that enable them to ward off or protect
themselves against harm or death? Let’s
say you had uncovered a conspiracy within this group to take away something
from their parents that was enabling those parents to protect them and to
enable them to develop into healthy and productive adults? And, one step further, what if you discovered
that this cadre of men and women was using your dollars and your backing to
perpetrate this whole scheme while protecting themselves from responsibility,
blame or consequences for their actions?
What would you do?
Second, let me give you a brief primer on child abuse definition. Ready?
“Child abuse is a crime that encompasses a variety of
behaviors involving physical, emotional, or sexual mistreatment or neglect upon
a child.”
State child abuse laws define child
abuse as any act (or failure to act)
that:
- Results
in imminent risk or serious harm
to a child's health and welfare due to physical, emotional, or
sexual abuse;
- affects a child (typically
under the age of 18);
- by a parent or caregiver who is responsible for the child's welfare.
In most states, the harm must have been inflicted by
non-accidental means. This includes
intentional acts, actions that were careless, and acts of negligence. Also, the
‘harm’ inflicted upon a child need not be actual, but may include ‘threats’ or ‘risks
of imminent harm’.” http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-charges/child-abuse-overview.html
Yes, I have taken liberties by bolding and underlining
certain words, but those words are key to a definition of child abuse that most
of us ignore. We are much more apt to
look for recognizable physical acts of abuse, rather than for inaction,
negligence, or risks of imminent harm as being abusive. But, according to these common definitions
used by the states (and the feds as well), they are as illegal as physical or
mental abuse.
So, hear me out. What
if you applied this definition of abuse to what you had discovered in the scenario above? Would you begin to believe that the group was
at the very least committing acts that could be labeled negligent, causing
threats of harm to anxious parents, including the risk of imminent hurt to
their children? Leaving that question aside for the moment, let us take another step.
What I propose to do now is to lay out for you three examples
of what I consider to be child abuse, not in terms of physical or mental or
sexual abuse acts, but under the terms we have just discussed: inaction,
neglect, threats and risks of imminent harm.
See if you can agree that the perpetrators could well fall under a general
definition of caregiver: "an unpaid or paid member of a person's
social
network who helps them with activities of daily living.”
Moreover, if the definition of caregiver is expanded to
reflect the care given by others in the social network (that could include all
of us), then anyone paid to be responsible for domestic tranquility, the
general welfare, and to secure the blessings of life, liberty and the pursuit
of happiness, might well be considered a caretaker in a very broad sense, but
also in a very real sense. More on that
thought later. First, the three examples
of child abuse:
EXAMPLE (1) If you were interacting with a group of pre-school
children in an educational, care-giving, developmental setting that included an
opportunity for those children to develop skills and understanding that would
give them a good chance to compare well withother children their age as they entered elementary school,
what would you think of a cadre of adults who swooped down on that center and
began moving out the furniture, shooing children out the door to fend for
themselves? What would be your response
to their firing adult mentors and making them leave the building or of them
telling any parents who showed up that their children would no longer have such
ineffective and inefficient “fun and games?”
And then, have the raiders shut all the doors and windows and exit the
building, leaving behind broken hearts, broken toys, no furniture no teachers
and caregivers, just an empty building.
Sound familiar?
That’s right – it’s Head Start, on the Trump chopping block for cuts of
enormous size, along with other Education programs (credit FirstFocus.org
for much of what follows)
EARLY CHILDHOOD-- Child Care and Development Block Grant
(CCDBG) funding decreased. This is the
primary government program that helps low-income families obtain child
care.
Head Start funding reduced. Like the CCDBG, the
proposed FY 2018 budget seeks to fund Head Start at FY 2016 levels and excludes
the increase contained in the FY 2017 final Omnibus appropriations bill. The
highly successful Head Start program provides comprehensive health, education,
nutrition, and parent involvement services to low-income families to improve
the early health and education of young children.
Preschool
Development Grant eliminated. These
grants encouraging states to improve their preschool infrastructure by enabling
them to develop high quality preschool programs have been zeroed out in Trump’s
budget. But there’s still more…
EDUCATION Title
I reduced. The budget is asking for $578 million below FY17 for Title I,
which addresses disparities in education resources for low-income students by
targeting funds to public schools in areas of concentrated poverty.
Education for Homeless Children and Youth
(EHCY) cut. The budget includes
a 7 percent reduction to EHCY, which serves more than 1.2 million students
experiencing homelessness in the public-school system by providing protections
and services to ensure they can enroll in and attend school, complete their
high school education, and continue to higher education.
21st Century Learning Centers eliminated. The budget does
not fund the $1.2 billion for before- and after-school programs that support
academic achievement for low-income students, including providing nutrition to
students during the summer.
EXAMPLE (2) Picture
having a child or grandchild with a serious disease, a malformed heart, or a
cancerous liver. Let’s say the only
treatment available is at one of the premier children’s hospitals in the
nation. The first thing that comes to
mind is, of course, the ability of the child to undergo major treatment and even
surgery to repair the damage. The second
thing, undoubtedly, is the expense, not only of treatment, surgery, doctors,
surgeons, tests, equipment, etc., but also the added cost of having to arrange
and pay for temporary residential arrangements away from home at some distance because
back-and-forth trips would not be feasible.
Oh yes, and what about the other kids at home? Another story perhaps.
Parents find themselves facing costs they never expected in
their lives. They begin to search for
financial aid from government and the social worker at the hospital says, “I’m
terribly sorry, but the main source of funds in these cases used to be
Medicaid, but it isn’t available now for your child’s case. We’ll have to look elsewhere. How about family or friends? Money-raisers? Savings? All-of-a-sudden, the situation becomes darker
with the prospect of long-term care being a necessity. Where do the parent’s turn? Bankruptcy becomes one of the options, and despair
and fear begin to creep into the picture.
Got the Picture? It’s
all related to Medicaid and CHIPS re-structuring and funding.
HEALTH-- The
Trump budget cuts Medicaid funding by $610 billion, ending the Medicaid
entitlement and changing the program into a system financed through block grant
or per capita payments to states beginning in 2020. With more than 37 million children in America
relying on Medicaid for their health insurance, cuts of this magnitude would
have a dramatic impact on health care access, coverage, and benefits for our nation’s
children. The proposed Medicaid cuts are in addition to $880 billion in
Medicaid cuts that are currently pending before Congress. Combined, those Medicaid cuts would result in
slashing the program by an astonishing $1.5 trillion over the next decade.
While some child-focused programs remained flat or received
modest increases, others are zeroed out in the president’s budget. They include
Emergency Medical Services for Children, Autism and Other
Developmental Disorders, and Universal Newborn Hearing Screening. And then, there is CHIPS…
Should Congress fail to extend CHIP funding, states will
rapidly exhaust their federal allotments. MACPAC estimates that by March 2018,
31 states and the District of Columbia will run out of CHIP funding; by June
2018, all states but Wyoming will be without funding.
The Trump
administration has proposed significant reductions to current CHIP funding
levels:
a lowering of CHIP’s upper income eligibility limit to 250
percent of poverty, which would affect programs in 28 states.
For the 4.7 million
CHIP children covered through Medicaid, federal payments to states would drop
to the normal Medicaid matching rate, creating a considerable funding shortfall
that states would need to offset.
For the 3.7 million
children covered through separate CHIP programs, all federal funding would
cease and states would have to move these children to Medicaid, replace
separate program funding out of state revenues, or end coverage entirely.
MACPAC estimates that ending CHIP funding could translate
into a complete coverage loss for 1.1 million children, while millions more
would face significantly higher coverage costs. Furthermore, ending a public
program involves months of planning, multiple administrative steps, and enough
time to try to help families find alternative coverage. http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2017/sep/extending-chip-high-stakes-families-states
EXAMPLE (3) Picture, if
you will, the enormous factor adequate food is to a child’s life and
development. Here’s a brief paragraph that tells the story:
|
Why Is Nutrition
Important for Children? Nutrition
is very important for everyone, but it is especially important for children
because it is directly linked to all aspects of their growth and development;
factors which will have direct ties to their level of health as adults. For
example, a child with the right balance of omega fatty acids in his/her daily
diet has a much better chance at creating a more solid foundation for brain activity and capabilities in later life.
|
And, please don’t forget those school meal programs
that are also being cut. Going hungry in
class is not amenable to achieving a quality education.
In many other ways, Trump’s $4.1 trillion budget proposal
for Fiscal Year 2018 seeks massive cuts to critical programs that help American
children and families. It takes aim at
all areas of life that impact kids: health, education, poverty, housing,
immigration, and foster care. Below is a brief account of how other
administration proposals for FY 2018 spending will affect the well-being of
children and families.
HOUSING, RENT and HOMELESSNESS
- The homelessness rate of American
children and youth continues to skyrocket, but President Trump’s proposed
budget aims to make massive cuts to homeless assistance and affordable housing
programs that help children and families:
National Housing Trust Fund This program provides resources to build and
rehabilitate housing, including rental housing, for low-income families. About
one-quarter of this spending, or $35 million, goes to children.
Legal Services
Corporation (LSC) eliminated. This important organization provides civil
legal services for low income families, including representation for families
facing eviction. The proposed budget
also seeks to cut $133 million from Homeless Assistance Grants, $15
million from the Office of Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes
Grants, and cut the Tenant Rental Assistance Program by 5 percent.
INCOME SUPPORT --
The White House budget proposes a devastating cut of $21 billion over 10 years
to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, the
primary cash assistance program for low-income families with children. Fully 75
percent of TANF funding goes to children. Income support is critical to healthy
child development and academic achievement. It helps parents provide the
resources needed for economic mobility – such as transportation to work,
childcare, and educational materials for their kids.
Social Services Block Grant (SSBG) eliminated. This
vital program currently funds an array of services for children, including
child care, child abuse prevention, adoption assistance, and transitional
services. Currently, states use about 35% of SSBG dollars for child welfare
services…
Cuts to Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax
Credit. Trump wants to cut $40 billion from the Earned Interest Tax Credit
(EITC) and Child Tax Credit (CTC) over 10 years. In 2015 alone, the EITC and CTC
helped lift more than 5 million children out of poverty. Low Income Heating
Assistance Program (LIHEAP) eliminated. Nearly one-quarter of all funding
for this critical program is directed toward children.
CHILD WELFARE --
there are several programs that have been reduced or cut that will heavily
impact how states use federal dollars to support their child welfare programs,
which puts the safety and well-being of children in care at risk.
Adoption
Opportunities Program cut by $9 million - helps children achieve permanency
by providing funds to eliminate barriers to adoption and helping find permanent
families for children
The elimination of
the Social Security Block Grant and reduction of TANF funds also
greatly impacts child welfare systems since states use these funding streams to
supplement child welfare programs. Cuts to Medicaid also significantly impact
child welfare populations since most are covered through Medicaid and rely on
it for physical health exams and mental health services and therapies.
One more point (and there are many more to make in this
story): some programs that hurt and harm children with cuts are programs we so
not readily associate with them. Take just
two of many:
Affordable housing
“President Trump’s fiscal 2018 budget request seeks to raid
some of the most flexible and effective grant dollars that communities receive
from the federal government to meet affordable-housing and economic-development
needs.
Governors, mayors and other officials use funds from
Department of Housing and Urban Development initiatives, such as the HOME
Investment Partnerships and the Community Development Block Grant
programs, to build and preserve housing, support first-time home buyers, open
community centers and supplement services for the homeless, elderly and
disabled. These funds would be eliminated in this proposal, which could result in 580,000 fewer affordable
homes created and more than 350,000 jobs lost over the next five years.
Eliminating these programs will leave cities and towns with too-limited funds,
leading to local tax increases that stifle economies and limit mobility. (Henry
Cisneros (HUD secretary, 1993 to 1997) quoted in the Washington Post)
Environmental Protection – see my Blog post for 6/3/2014 titled ‘Misusing
the Power of the Purse” and let me conclude today’s blog post with some words
from that posting:
“Now let me add to
that the abuse of children that Congress has allowed to happen by neglect and
inaction, as well as by active cutting of programs that benefit children and
families. Because I have spoken before
of this (see blog postings for 4/13/2014, 2/17/2014, 3/14/2013, 3/3/2013), I
will make it brief and to the point.
Pre-natal care is essential for children yet unborn. Affordable healthcare is a must for children
if they are to grow as they should and to face life without the effects of
childhood diseases; they must have a first-class education that prepares them
for life's work and life's demands, beginning with a pre-K program that starts
them off with an advantage; they must be protected from environmental hazards;
they must be encouraged and enabled to graduate from college; they must be nurtured by families that are
themselves not put at risk by either private or public decisions that can harm
their lives. Children must be nourished
in many ways: by caring people, with the
right foods, the best education possible, and with a vast array of
possibilities for living a fruitful and meaningful life.
“The
Republican Radicals in Congress have decided that none of this is true or
possible. They have instead decided to
cut funding for almost every program that benefits, encourages, nurtures and
promotes children: research, universal
pre-K education, housing for the homeless and the poor, adequate funding for
all schools and the resources necessary to bring about a world-class education
for all; they cut Head Start, Aid to children and families, food stamps, and
housing subsidies, and still want to repeal the Affordable Care Act. They have neglected children with special
needs; have cut Pell grants and neglected to cut back on interest rates for
student loans. They neglect entirely the
special needs of homeless children, children with disabilities, children who
will not go to college, and of those who drop out of school. They have done nothing to reform the juvenile
justice system or the over-incarceration of drug-abusers. They have neglected the potential of minority
children and have instead laid the groundwork for them to be labeled as perpetual
felons with no vote, no rights and no jobs.
I call this abuse and neglect of children who are our most valuable
resource. The congressional naysayers
are child abusers and for that they must be called to account. Impeachment for them is too mild.”
I would simply add
that the burden of proof as to whether “direct harm” or the threat of such, has
been caused to specific children by congressional and presidential action or
inaction (neglect) is no further away than the records of social service,
Medicaid and other offices, doctors’ medical records, hospital records, housing
authorities, etc. It is simply a matter
of equalizing the investigation of abuse and neglect by these politicians with
the same unrelenting sleuthing when parents or relatives or strangers are
involved. The proof is there – passing
or signing legislation is a potentially abusive action, and we need to make
that fact stick through numerous class action lawsuits on behalf of the
millions and millions of children who have been abused and neglected by the
politicians we elect to represent and protect them as their surrogate
caregivers. (Is that why Legal Services got eliminated, so the poor have
nowhere to turn?)
And let’s not
forget, voters who continuously return abusive politicians to office are themselves
abettors of abuse, neglecting their duty to protect their own children and
grandchildren. I speak directly to those
many seniors who supported Donald Trump, and who, by so doing, have unleashed a
child abuser upon their own grandchildren and on my grandchildren. Shame on you! You, and others, can redeem yourselves by
never ever voting again for politicians who willfully or neglectfully support
cutting back on programs that benefit our children and grandchildren. It’s time
to stand up and challenge the child abusers in the White House and in the
Congress.
