Okay, first the LA Times ran an article last Friday titled, “L.A. County will no longer strive to reunite families.”

Like many who at least nominally follow foster care issues, I read the startling headline and the article that followed with a sinking heart.

Reporter Garrett Therolf wrote:

The decision is the most significant of several reforms made by the department after a series of high-profile child deaths last year, some of which involved the department putting too much faith in its ability to rehabilitate families. In 2009, The Times reported that reunifications led to some children’s further injuries and even deaths. Isabel Garcia, for instance, starved to death two months after child-welfare officials deemed that she, her five siblings and their parents were all doing well.

And then Therolf went on to name the other recent cases in which inadequate oversight and poor decisions on the part of social workers, meant that no one intervened when red flags indicated a child was in danger at the hands of his or her family—with hideously tragic results.

But, although the LA Times and others had reported the deaths as a series that suggested a trend, experts in the field noted that, despite ghastly nature of the high profile tragedies, there was no sudden rash of such incidents. According to what DCFS Director Trish Ploehn told the Daily News last week, the number of deaths fluctuates within a fairly close range from year to year. In 2009 there were 17 deaths, higher than the 14 of 2008, but lower than the 20 that occurred in 1998 and 1999 when DCFS was snatching many more children into its care.

[UPDATE: In a chat today, Garrett Therolf rightly reminded me that, due to a difference in the way the deaths are now reported, the 2009 figures and the 1999 figures are not really comparing apples to apples, making the already complex topic still harder to assess.]

However, press-fueled public hysteria and political pressure being what it is, many worried that LA County, rather than analyze the details of its actual systemic failures, would instead go for the politically expedient broad strokes. The agency would be quicker to take kids away unnecessarily from their parents and would make it harder for imperfect, but essentially decent parents to get their kids back when they have made some needed corrections.

The results would be another kind of slow motion tragedy in which kids may not die, but nor do they thrive.

Nevermind that, as the National Coalition for child Protection Reform points out, study after study has indicated that in most cases, kids do much better with their families, even if those families are far from ideal.

Back in September, The Daily News printed a warning that the feverish focus on those awful deaths was creating a panic among Foster Care officials and that bad policy could result.

And now that bad policy seemed to have come to pass.

BUT WAIT—MAYBE NOT

After the LA Times article ran, DCFS Director Trish Ploehn contacted foster care watchdog, Richard Wexler, to state that she and the agency were not abandoning family reunification at all, and that she never said any such thing to the Times.

(DCFS also sent out a press release to that effect.)

AT WHICH POINT…The Times appeared removed its initial headline and replaced it thusly….

AT WHICH POINT watchdog Wexler reported that the Times had evidently backed off of its claim that DCFS was going to push less for family reunification.

AT WHICH POINT….the LA Times Garrett Therolf (who is generally a very good reporter) contacted Wexler and told him that the Times may have changed its headline (because the headline person was bad, bad, bad and got things wrong) but that Ploehn had said what she said, and the Times wasn’t backing off its story once teensy bit.

AT WHICH POINT ….I lost track of the argument.

Unfortunately one point has become obscured by these several days of the Times and DCFS parsing who meant what: Abuse can take place at both ends of the spectrum. Every week parents come before the LA County Supervisors and plead for help in getting their children back from the foster care system. Most of the time nothing comes of it.

I hear from some of those parents on a regular basis. Right now, I don’t have the staff to investigate their cases. (I intend to begin to change all that later on this year.)

But the LA Times, despite its staff cuts, does have the capacity to at least look into some of these troubling stories of kids yanked into the trauma that is foster care for reasons that are filmsy at best. Mr. Therolf has demonstrated in the past, that he is more than talented enough to do it. {Check out his story on the county’s unnerving computerized system for evaluating whether a child should be removed from a home.)

Let us hope he can persuade his editors to allow him to investigate some of the individual cases that show the other sad end of the DCFS continuum.

Such coverage would provide a much needed balance to the horror stories that are still threatening to drive the County into a child-snatching panic.

Laissez les bon temps roulez!!!

HBO has a new movie for television debuting this weekend. It is a bio pic of sorts based on the life and memoirs of writer/biologist Temple Grandin.

If you’re not familiar with Grandin, she is an autistic woman who is considered to be one of the nation’s top animal biologists. She credits her exceptional facility for understanding animals’ fears and needs and actions to the perceptual lens her own autistic condition has—for better and for worse— uniquely provided.

Her 2004 book, Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior, was easily my favorite book I read that year.

Terry Gross has interviewed Grandin three different times on Fresh Air (once for the release of each one of Grandin’s books). This past Friday, Fresh Air played a compilation of the interviews to coincide with the launching of the HBO movie.

The movie, which would have been all to simple to wreck, is thankfully reported to be excellent. Mary McNamera at the LA Times said it was:

Utterly and gorgeously unsentimental, “Temple Grandin,” arriving Saturday, clomps across the screen with all the wild-eyed grace of its main character, chronicling the life of a woman who not only overcame a host of physical, mental and social obstacles but actually used her autism to create a career for herself in animal husbandry.

The film stars, of all people, Claire Danes, who in the clips that I have heard, is stunningly good.. The Huffington Post says of Danes:

Finally, she has a found a role where she is beyond great, she is stupendous. Claire Danes is revelatory as Temple Grandin animal behaviorist, best-selling author, autistic and expert in autism. This is a fascinating movie and I learned so much about this woman and about autism. Temple did not speak until she was four and if not for her mother would have probably ended up spending her life in an institution. What a loss that would have been.

I’ve got it TiVOed and plan to watch it tonight.. (It is playing off and on during much of the week.)

But, whether or not you watch the movie, at the very least, if you don’t know about Temple Grandin, do yourself a favor listen to the interview mash-up. Her unique and entirely unsentimental ability to feel into an animal’s perspective tells us a great deal about our fellow creatures and also, frankly, about ourselves.

UPDATE:

I saw the film late last night, and it’s so, so incredibly good. Claire Danes is spectacular. She utterly vanishes into being Grandin.

Please, just see it. You’ll thank me. If you don’t have HBO, wait until it’s on DVD and go for it then. But if you miss it, you’ll be missing out. So don’t.

My friend Joe Domanick is part of a new online criminal justice journal called The Crime Report.” It should be an every day destination for anyone who is interested in the many-faceted world of criminal justice.

This week Joe has a two-part story about the drop in crime in America-–and about what has, and what has not, caused it.

In Part I he looks at the role of smart policing and at the change in gang culture in California, including the tighter grip that the prison gangs have on the gangs in the street.

In Part II he talks to an A-list lineup of experts who nearly to a person agree that the one strategy that cannot be credited with the crime drop, is the ramping up of incarceration.

Here’s how the story begins:

During the 1990s, the favorite solution to reducing crime was incarceration. That is, mass incarceration: mandatory minimums and 25-to-life three-strikes sentences for stealing a slice of pizza. The consequence today is more than two million people behind bars, the world’s largest per capita incarceration rate. No one among the experts I spoke with, however, suggested that as a factor in 2009’s crime drop.

Quite the opposite.

“The dramatic increases in incarceration did contribute to the crime decline in the 1990s,” says Richard Rosenfeld, of the University of St. Louis-Missouri. “The bulk of the evidence shows that. But from 2000-2009, the rate of incarceration slowed. In New York, for example, it’s flat or in decline. So the current decline can’t be ascribed to incarceration.”

John Jay Professor David Kennedy agrees. Recent incarceration rates have been marginal,” he says, while decreases in crime have been dramatic; so any new increases “are likely to be grabbing low level [criminals]. Anything going on is taking place at the margins in terms of incarceration, and is not very powerful.”

Carnegie Mellon University Prof. Al Blumstein also dismiss incarceration as a factor. “We’re close to equilibrium in terms of changes in incarceration,” he says. On the average, the inflow is roughly equal to the outflow. We’re way down to less than one percent increase [in imprisonment], whereas for most of the ’80 and ‘90s the rate was going up by 6 to 8 percent a year.“

Meanwhile, Todd Clear, a noted criminologist from John Jay College, points to mass incarceration’s corollary: lengthy prison sentences. “The length of stay in prison in England and hasn’t changed that much and England’s violent crime rate has gone down very similarly to that of U.S; same with Canada,” he says. “The increasing length of prison stay in the US has been a pattern for about 20 years, so I’m not persuaded that that’s a big cause of the current decline.”

Read on.

Thursday has been one of those days.

* The stock market tanked Thursday morning based on the newest perception of a stumbling global economy.

*Thursday afternoon Mayor Villaraigosa did what the City Council would not and ordered the layoffs of 1,000 city employees to help balance the city’s budget. (Naturally, the layoffs will pretty much apply only to the poor schlubs who are not represented by a union.)

*And also, Thursday, Scott Brown was sworn in as U.S. Senator meaning, according to the AP’s Laurie Kellman (and run in, among other places, the Washington Post) that “Obama and the Democrats, who still enjoy big majorities in both the House and Senate, can do virtually nothing between now and the November elections without the GOP’s say-so. ” (You know what, AP & WaPo? Screw you. If you can’t say something more insightful than that stale toast, just STFU.)

So…..ahem, now that it’s Thusday evening, I recommend we all take a brief mental health break. Let us all pause and think about….. whales, Nice, big, intelligent whales— leviathans. Actually one whale in particular, a baby who has been hanging around the Malibu Pier for the last few days. (And, yes, I know that whales kill penguins and all that. So don’t leave a comment informing me of this fact. Call me Ishmael. At least whales don’t have lobbyists.)

As of this afternoon, it seems that the little gray whale, who was providing photo ops for anyone who could manage to make the drive to see the seemingly friendly (or at the very least, curious) creature, has wandered off back into the deep blue (in a swimmy kind of way).. But he (she?)—everyone’s been calling the beast Willie—left behind many snapshots like the one below taken by the concessionaires at Malibu Pier.

Okay, now back to the regularly-scheduled dour and fractious stuff we call news.

PS: One more thing: in addition, on Thursday it was reported that a group of 18 scientists from Australia, France and New Zealand are steaming by boat toward Antarctica to challenge—philosophically, not physically—the Japanese scientists who have weaseled around the 1986 international whaling ban and manage to kill around 1000 whales a year in the name of research. The 18 consortium researchers aim to disprove the supposed necessity of whale hunting in the name of science. “We don’t have to kill whales to learn about them,” said one of the Australians.

Indeed. Go scientists. Go whales.

Photo—-and whale updates—by Malibu Pier.

I would love to have been at this event Wednesday night. The LA Times’ Carol J. Williams reports that U.S. Supreme Court Justice (and wildly powerful court swing voter) Anthony Kennedy addressed a crowd of LA lawyers with courtly humor—except for the part where he took a couple of hard round-house swings at the state’s prison policy and at the CCPOA, the prison guards union.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy criticized California sentencing policies and crowded prisons Wednesday night, calling the influence that unionized prison guards had in passing the three-strikes law “sick.”

In an otherwise courtly and humorous address to the Los Angeles legal community, Kennedy expressed obvious dismay over the state of corrections and rehabilitation in the country. He said U.S. sentences are eight times longer than those issued by European courts.

“California now has 185,000 people in prison at $32,500 a year” each, he said. He then urged voters and officials to compare that expense to what taxpayers spend per pupil in elementary schools.

“The three-strikes law sponsor is the correctional officers’ union and that is sick!” Kennedy said of the measure mandating life sentences for third-time criminal offenders.

POW! JAB! POW! POW!

Interesting. Particularly so in that the Supremes still have one more big case to hear in the near future regarding California’s prisons and the panel of three federal judges who are attempting to force a reduction in the state’s prison population.

MEANWHILE, THE LA CITY COUNCIL DELAYS PLANNED BUDGET-DRIVEN LAYOFFS IN RESPONSE TO EMOTIONAL PROTESTS BY COMMUNITY MEMBERS AND PRESSURE FROM VARIOUS EMPLOYEE UNIONS

As to how the council is going to trim the necessary $$$ off the budget, it is not clear. David Zahnizer and Phil Willon have the gory details.

I was reading Lit, Mary Karr’s alcohol-soaked but sequin-bright third memoir, when I received this second essay from Venice High School senior Nina Montoya. Nina, if you’ll remember, is one of English teacher Dennis Danziger’s students and part of a PEN-in-the Classroom workshop run by author Amy Friedman., who is also Danziger’s wife.

Due to her age, Nina is pretty new to this matter of writing. But as you can see from the earlier essay posted here (which you should read along with this one, if you haven’t), she has a knack for the work, however nascent. I bring up Mary Karr because, although when The Liars club, the memoir that forever put Karr on the literary map, was published in 1995, Karr was 40 and had behind her one marriage, the birth of her son, an MFA with a famous writer as mentor, and a whole lot of therapeutic hours logged talking about her spirit-gouging and deeply abusive childhood, there is thread of similarity linking Karr’s books and Nina’s newly-minted efforts.

By contrast, Nina has not yet graduated high school. Yet she has a budding writer’s voice and the willingness to wrestle with the hard stuff—both of which merit nurturing.

Scattered across Los Angeles, there are other talented kids like Nina who also have important stories to tell, and voices that merit nurture. With any luck, some of those LA stories—along with more of Nina’s—will find their way to WitnessLA.

Here’s Nina:

Inexplicable Love

by Nina Montoya

I believe that the love you have for your family is incredibly strong. Your family member can do something so horrible that it makes you want to hate them and never speak to them again, but in the end you will still love them, still end up contacting them in some way. Even if you claim to not love that person or state that you disown them. Deep down you know in your heart as much as you want to deny it, it’s there, that unexplainable love.

In the past I have been physically and mentally abused by my father. He has told me many times that I am stupid, that I should just give up, quit. When I would speak of college he told me that I shouldn’t bother, that they don’t care if you are smart or stupid, the only reason why they want you is to take your money. He has threatened me, put me in many unnecessary dangers, even threatened my friends as well. Inexplicably, I still love him. I always will love him, for he is my father and though he makes not the best decisions, I know in the end he loves me too. That he is proud of me, I have heard him brag to his friends. I just wish that I could hear the compliments myself, that he would tell me to my face that he is proud.
Even my mother who abandoned me I love her. She left me when I was merely a toddler. She even attempted to do drugs while she was pregnant with me, but I still love her. Though I wish not to speak to her, when she does contact me I tolerate it. This is because as much as I hate her, my love is stronger. Of all the times I have yelled and screamed that I never want anything to do with her, it is false. I do wish to be around her, I do wish to show my love towards her, but she has lost the opportunity. As much as I wish for this communication it cannot happen, she has chosen the needle over her own children, so for that she will not be able to experience that love.
As much as there is something wrong with each of my parents I still love them, no matter how much pain each of them has put me through, I do. That’s the thing, a love like the one you have for your family is not like any other love. I believe that this familial love is almost indestructible, can never disintegrate. There have been so many times I have felt that deep fiery anger of hate toward both of my parents but, the love that I have for each of them is stronger, especially for my father. He raised my sister and me and that is something I will always be thankful for. I have seen him break down, cry even and he has seen the same from me. In those times of need we are always there for each other, in the end we will always have one another.

NOTE: More news stories a bit later this morning, so check back.

The very excellent Jim McDonnell has been named Chief of the Long Beach Police Department. As you all remember, the longtime LAPD Assistant Chief recently short-listed for the job to replace Bill Bratton.

Long Beach is a complicated city of more than 367000 residents spread over 52-square-miles. It has the tenth busiest port in the world, a bunch of major corporations, and some very active gangs—so there will be plenty of challenges for a new chief.

In other words, the LBPD position will be feature loads of opportunities for McDonnell to put into practice his innovative ideas about policing. (He has long been a strong advocate of community policing and some of his concepts were adopted by Bratton. But there are still more ideas where that one came from.)

Go, Chief Jim! And kudos to Long Beach for being smart enough to pick him!

Andrew Blankstein (who like me is very distinguished this week. We are…um… distinguished, are we not, Andrew?) has more on the story.

Okay, here’s the deal: Each year for many years the Greater Los Angeles chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists has honored four journalists, “members of the profession who demonstrate good news judgment, a strong sense of ethics and a passion for getting the story right”. The honors are given to journalists who work in print, radio and TV.

This year SPJ’s Distinguished Journalist honorees are my pal Andrew Blankstein, of the LA Times (for print publications of 100,000 circulation or more); Denise Nix, from the Daily Breeze (for under 100,00 circ). The TV award goes to Dave Lopez, for CBS2/KCAL9 News, radio to Claudia Peschiutta of KNX 1070 Newsradio.

Then in 2008, SPJ added a fifth award—for Distinguished Work in New Media. The award is given for using “…new media’s unique characteristics and capabilities while striving to uphold traditional journalism’s highest standards of honesty, accuracy, responsibility and accountability. ”

In it’s first year the new award went to Kevin Roderick for LA Observed.

This year the very nice folks at SPJ are giving the award to…..well….me, for my work with WitnessLA.

Wooo-hooo!!! (Ooops. Sorry. That didn’t sound very distinguished.)

Anyway, I’m very grateful to SPJ for the extremely kind honor. And I wanted to share the good news with y’all.

Should people who are convicted of downloading pornographic images of a child have to pay the victim? It is a new and controversial question. Some people feel the download is a victimless crime. But read on:

And The New York Times has a story about the issue on Wednesday

When Amy was a little girl, her uncle made her famous in the worst way: as a star in the netherworld of child pornography. Photographs and videos known as “the Misty series” depicting her abuse have circulated on the Internet for more than 10 years, and often turn up in the collections of those arrested for possession of illegal images.

Now, with the help of an inventive lawyer, the young woman known as Amy — her real name has been withheld in court to prevent harassment — is fighting back.

She is demanding that everyone convicted of possessing even a single Misty image pay her damages until her total claim of $3.4 million has been met.

Some experts argue that forcing payment from people who do not produce such images but only possess them goes too far.

In February, when the first judge arranged payment to Amy in a case in Connecticut, Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, called the decision “highly questionable” on his blog and said it “stretches personal accountability to the breaking point.”

Here’s the rest. Read on. Then tell me what you think.

Meanwhile, the Urban Institute released a report on Tuesday that examines the effects of immigration enforcement on children.

This is from the abstract:

This report examines the consequences of parental arrest, detention, and deportation on 190 children in 85 families in six locations, providing in-depth details on parent-child separations, economic hardships, and children’s well-being. The contentious immigration debates around the country mostly revolve around illegal immigration. Less visible have been the 5.5 million children with unauthorized parents, almost three-quarters of whom are U.S.-born citizens. Over several years, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) intensified enforcement activities through large-scale worksite arrests, home arrests, and arrests by local law enforcement. The report provides recommendations for stakeholders to mitigate the harmful effects of immigration enforcement on children.

Read more here.