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Chapter 3

Welfare Agencies Seek Foster Children's Assets

Welfare Agencies Seek Foster Children's Assets

This activity contains 3 questions.

	What two competing goals in child welfare seem to be fueling the debate between child welfare agencies and child advocates around the use of foster children's assets to support the welfare agency?   "...state governments had an inherent conflict of interest, serving as creditors trying to recoup the cost of their programs and also as trustees of children's money." d Fiscal viability of the child welfare agencies and Best interest of the child.

	What arguments are used to support the use of foster children's assets to fund child welfare agencies?   The federal regulations say that the funds are to be used for current needs and expenses, "Determined to extract as much federal aid for social programs as the law will permit, some state welfare agencies even hire private companies, working for contingency fees, to help them reap more federal money by identifying foster children who are eligible for Social Security benefits. The money is then routinely used to help offset the cost of foster care." A Supreme Court decision in 2003, overturning a decision by courts in Washington State, affirmed that states could legally use children's Social Security benefits to offset current ''maintenance costs. ''The practice is not the result of deliberative policy discussions regarding how to best serve children in foster care,'' said Daniel L. Hatcher, a law professor at the University of Baltimore...'It is simply an ad hoc reaction by under funded state agencies.'' Twenty-six states filed a supporting brief to the Supreme Court in the 2003 Washington case, noting that the practice had been approved by the Social Security Administration and arguing that barring it ''could leave the states in a position of economic peril.'' "If states cannot devote money to current care, the brief added, children will ultimately suffer because the states will not help eligible children sign up for benefits.

	What arguments are used to oppose the use of foster children's assets to fund child welfare agencies?   Advocates for children question the wholesale takeover of money, accusing agencies of repaying themselves for care they are obligated to provide and of failing to use the windfall to meet children's individual needs, whether extra tutoring or counseling or, as in John's case, something more unusual. For the state to pocket a child's money and allow his home to go into foreclosure just doesn't make sense,'' said his Legal Aid lawyer, Lewis Pitts. ''No one can say it's in the best interests of the child. The Supreme Courts 2003 decision "...did not address a deeper question: does that always serve the child's ''best interests,'' as federal rules require, or the longer-term interests of the public for that matter?" "'The Social Security benefits are treated as a funding stream,'' Mr. Hatcher said, rather than as an opportunity to provide any special services or to give children savings for the perilous months after they turn 18, when many fall into crime or homelessness."

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