It happens more than one might think. A report alleging child maltreatment is made to Child Protective Services (CPS), CPS shows up to investigate and after conducting a safety assessment the CPS investigator decides the child(ren) can’t safely remain in the home. The CPS investigator offers an ultimatum: suggest a kinship caregiver they can take the child(ren) to immediately or we’ll have no choice but to take your case to court and place your child(ren) in foster care. What’s a family to do when offered such an impossible choice- find a relative or friend to take the child(ren) for an indefinite period of time, likely with no additional financial support, or roll the dice with the courts and foster care- hoping for the best?
Legally, these are considered voluntary placements known informally as hidden foster care, as the parent(s) are agreeing to the placement (even if it is coercive in nature, it doesn’t show up on paper). There is no court order (sought or granted), there is no oversight (other than CPS) and the parent(s) consented to the placement. Such kinship caregivers are provided no financial support- unlike licensed foster parents. Not only that, if the kinship placement is found to be unsuitable, then a petition does get filed in court, anyway (just some time after the initial threat) and the child(ren) may get placed in foster care, anyway. There is no time frame for this, either and since court isn’t involved, there’s no right to legal counsel or other assistance. If these can’t afford expert assistance, they’re more than likely on their own, praying that CPS will be true to their word if only they just comply with the demands of CPS.
Even if a kinship caregiver is suggested, CPS still has to approve the placement. That means a home study and child maltreatment background check for all household members. In hidden foster care, though, this does not usually lead to licensure as a foster family, which is why no funding is provided for these families and that assumes that the placement is approved; many families do not have such kinship resources available close by (let alone a distance away) that meet CPS’ standards so quickly; if they’re not available close by, this quickly becomes an issue as far as visitation goes. As for CPS all they have to do is make a call to request visits be done on their behalf in the jurisdiction of the hidden foster care placement.
It’s unclear just how many children are in hidden foster care placements, how long these placements last and how to reign in this practice- which is legally questionable at best. Some states have limits on how long a placement can last without a court order, but those only cover involuntary placements. Since hidden foster care placements are legally classified as voluntary placements, they’re not often covered under these policies and statutes. This is in spite of the fact that the arrangements underpinning hidden foster care are often coercive.
If CPS comes to your door and gives you the option of involuntary placement of your child(ren) and court involvement or voluntary kinship placement (hidden foster care), we at Heartwork Defense tend to advise accepting hidden foster care for the moment if you have the resources available, as this tends to be a time-sensitive issue. It is much easier to get an attorney or child welfare consultant to help you bring your child home from hidden foster care over the next few days to a week than it is to reunify with your child after involuntary placement and the commencement of legal proceedings. As a brief solution (days or a few weeks) to resolve a serious safety concern in a home where the landlord has been resistant, there is an argument for such a placement- however, hidden foster care rarely, if ever, operates in this way; instead, it often continues for months or years (even if a court order is never sought and the child(ren) remain in kinship care instead of ending up in foster care).
Hidden foster care is an unchecked practice without solid data on prevalence, nor oversight other than CPS itself. This is a problem, as it capitalizes on some of the worst aspects of the child welfare system as it exists today: the fearsome, adversarial nature of investigations, the liability first culture that pushes CPS to take action disproportionate to the safety concerns identified and the inefficiency of the system itself. When a family is faced with a choice of foster care placement and legal involvement or unchecked placement and no time to think or consult with others, there is no good choice. As the hidden foster care problem has been getting more attention in recent years, any substantial steps to reform are in their infancy. While in an ideal world, out of home placement would never even need to be a thought, we do not live in that ideal world. Fortunately, there is hope that hidden foster care will be addressed in the coming years- on our way to addressing what we at Heartwork Defense have come to call ‘the CPS problem.’