How Policy Failures Turned Poverty into Neglect: Reflections on Prudence Carr’s Eye-Opening Presentation
This week, at the Prevent Child Abuse America’s Executive Directors Meeting with the Children’s Trust Alliance in Glendale, Arizona, we had the privilege of hearing a powerful presentation from Prudence Carr, Director of the American Bar Association’s Center on Children and the law. Carr’s talk, titled “How Poverty Became Neglect in Federal Foster Care Law and Policy: Race, Parental Fitness, and Financing,” offered a deeply compelling critique of the historical and systemic issues within our child welfare system. Her insights were as enlightening as they were unsettling, exposing the harsh reality that, for decades, policymakers have criminalized poverty, particularly impacting poor under resourced American families.
Carr shared extensive evidence revealing a troubling sleight of hand: rather than addressing the root causes of poverty, lawmakers crafted policies that effectively penalized families for being poor and asking for help. Families, like my own when I was young, in crisis were asking for help — needing support to make ends meet — but instead, they were met with policies that deemed them “unfit” based primarily on their financial situation. In many cases, this has led to needless and harmful family separations, punishing parents for circumstances beyond their control rather than offering the assistance they so desperately needed.
As Carr aptly put it, the government solved the wrong problem. Instead of providing concrete supports that could help families meet their basic needs, we created an arbitrary standard of parental fitness that has led to devastating consequences for countless families. Her presentation was a stark reminder of how structural inequities, particularly those rooted in racial and economic discrimination, have shaped our child welfare system — and continue to do so today.
Hearing Carr’s analysis was a powerful call to action for us all. It’s time we confront these inequities head-on and work to reshape the narrative around what it means to support American families. Instead of perpetuating policies that further harm those already under resourced, we must advocate for systems that provide real, tangible assistance and give families the tools they need to thrive without stigma.
I encourage anyone who was as moved by Prudence Carr’s presentation as I was to connect with her directly to learn more about her legal research and advocacy work. Her voice is a crucial one in the fight for justice and equity in child welfare, and her evidence-based insights are a necessary guide as we strive to create a fairer, more compassionate system for ALL children and families.
Together, we can work to end the criminalization of poverty and build a system that genuinely supports families. This is the change our children deserve.
To learn more or to connect with Prudence Carr, feel free to reach out to her. Let’s continue this important conversation and take action to create a better future for all families. If you have ideas of how this history should inform our effort to support families going forward leave me a comment and let’s work together.
#ChildWelfareReform #EndFamilySeparation #SupportNotStigmatize #PCAAmerica #ChildrenTrustAlliance
