Los Angeles County Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Protection

On April 5, a task force created to improve Santa Barbara’s tiny child welfare system will deliver county supervisors a slate of recommendations aimed at ensuring that no children “fall between the cracks.”

On November 3, Los Angeles County’s Board of Supervisors will vote on whether to hire Judge Michael Nash as the director of the Office of Child Protection. The office was one of the top recommendations to come out of the county’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Protection, which was sunsetted last year.

Social worker Ruby Guillen’s shift at the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS), the largest child welfare agency in the U.S., starts at 4 p.m. and ends at 2:30 a.m.—except when serious incidents occur and keep her on the job even longer.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is now considering four finalists for the position of Executive Director of the Office of Child Protection (OCP), according to District 3 Supervisor Sheila Kuehl.

Elected officials, philanthropic organizations, and the new child protection office in Los Angeles County are all moving forward on a plan to put one person in charge of securing grants and donations targeted at preventing child maltreatment and improving outcomes for vulnerable children and families.

A coalition of Los Angeles County child welfare leaders, frustrated by the slow pace of child welfare reform in the county, has called for the replacement of Department of Children and Family Services Director Philip Browning.

The quarterly “Los Angeles Child Protection Checkup” tracks the implementation of the 42 recommendations issued by the Los Angeles County Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Protection in April 2014. The county’s Board of Supervisors created the Blue Ribbon Commission in June 2013, following a spate of bad press centering on child death and systemic issues that have plagued the county’s child welfare system for decades.

The quarterly “Los Angeles Child Protection Checkup” tracks the implementation of the 42 recommendations issued by the Los Angeles County Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Protection in April 2014. The county’s Board of Supervisors created the Blue Ribbon Commission in June 2013, following a spate of bad press centering on child death and systemic issues that have plagued the county’s child welfare system for decades.

On the campaign trail, Board of Supervisors candidate Bobby Shriver recognizes a familiar face when he talks with social workers in Los Angeles County. Growing up as the son of Special Olympics founder and social worker Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Shriver says that the struggles of caseworkers in the child welfare system remind him of his mother.