abuse prevention

The Imprint is highlighting each of the policy recommendations made this summer by the participants of the Foster Youth Internship Program (FYI), a group of 10 former foster youths who have completed congressional internships.

A Democrat-led bill to reauthorize and double funding for the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visitation (MIECHV) program has been introduced. The Home Visiting Works Act would bring the authorization for MIECHV up to $600 million for 2018 and 2019; $700 million in 2020 and 2021; and then $800 million by 2022.

The Nurse Family Partnership (NFP) program, which provides services to new mothers from pregnancy through the child’s second birthday, positively impacts children up through the age of 12 but affects male and female children differently, according to new analysis of a decades-old study on the model.

In March of this year, the national Commission to Eliminate Child Abuse and Neglect Fatalities released its 150-page final report. The President and party leaders from both the House and Senate appointed this 12-member group in 2012 and tasked them with bringing forth recommendations for eliminating abuse- and neglect-related child deaths in America.

As I mentioned in a prior piece in this series, the federal child welfare advocacy community increasingly seems myopically focused on increasing federal funding for “prevention.” Unfortunately, few, if any, are able to paint a picture of what increased investment in prevention would look like.

Bill Baccaglini spent 20 years working in New York’s state government before taking the helm in 2003 at the New York Foundling, a 147-year-old nonprofit and one of the city’s longest-running providers of youth and family services.

In a marathon session before Senators made their way out of town to campaign, a bill to restructure adoption incentives and long-term foster care sailed through the chamber, and will likely be signed by President Obama this week.