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Child Welfare is at Stake

Social workers provide life-saving protective services to neglected and abused children. We can’t sit by and watch as the Governor puts their lives at risk. With cuts to Child Welfare Services, the Governor is putting vulnerable children in direct jeopardy, even as he fought to protect big oil and big tobacco. These values are upside down. We need to put a stop to these cuts. Tens of millions in continuous underfunding coupled with the Governor’s veto puts our system close to the breaking point.

Make a call to protect child welfare.

1. Cutting $124 million more will put children’s lives and safety at risk.

  • The Governor’s $80 million line-item cut is actually an overall cut of $124 million because of the lost federal funds.
  • This could mean that counties would lose 750 social workers dedicated to protecting children.
  • Losing 750 social workers would mean losing the ability to investigate 143,000 reports of abuse a year, or to re-unify 20,400 children safely with their families.
  • In the past, the Governor has correctly acknowledged that even much smaller cuts would jeopardize the health and safety of California’s most vulnerable children.

2. Child Welfare Services is already stretched past the breaking point.

  • A workload study from 2000 showed that child welfare social workers have a caseload of 30-55, three to five times higher than the federally recommended standard for the safe delivery of services.
  • Since that time, Child Welfare Services has lost nearly $500 million as a result of flat funding that has not kept up with workload increases and costs.
  • Every month, we hear more stories of how the overburdened, underfunded system fails more children in California, resulting in more abuse, neglect, injury and death.

Just one call can help California.

Categories: Los Angeles County