Who Will Protect the Children? : L.A. County’s Shameful Foster-Care Reputation Needs a Prompt Transformation

Faced with additional allegations of shoddy foster care, Robert Chaffee has finally resigned as head of Los Angeles County’s troubled Department for Children’s Services. As state officials continue their scrutiny, the Board of Supervisors must quickly put in place new leadership.

Today the board should decide to name an interim director and ignore Chaffee’s plan to stay at the helm until Oct. 31. New direction is needed now to reassure skeptical state officials, who have taken over the licensing of foster homes, and the Legislature, which has expressed no confidence in the county’s foster-care system.

Foster care, when it works well, provides a protective and nurturing respite for abandoned, abused and neglected children. Tragically, some very vulnerable youngsters have gotten neither care nor comfort in several questionable foster homes.

The most recent revelations are appalling. Two controversial foster homes were allowed to operate despite allegations that the foster parents had sexually and physically abused children. State officials moved last week to revoke the licenses of the two questionable homes, a step the county should have taken long ago.

In one case, a man who had a history of alleged child abuse was allowed to provide foster care. After he was arrested for allegedly molesting three foster children and ordered by a judge to enter counseling, he was allowed to continue as a foster parent. Where were the safeguards to protect the foster children?

In the second case, a foster mother allegedly beat children with an electric cord and a foster father allegedly fondled and tongue-kissed several youngsters. No children are in that home now, but it remains licensed.

Both controversial homes were operated by prominent leaders of foster-parent groups. Did their activism protect them? County investigators had recommended closing down the homes but were overruled.

Foster children have also endured substandard and overcrowded conditions in Los Angeles County. Ten youngsters were found earlier this year sleeping on the floor of a foster- home garage, according to state officials; at that same house 10 additional children were living in a single bedroom. At another home licensed for four children, state officials found 20 babies doubled up in 10 cribs. The severe shortage of foster homes cannot justify these shameful conditions.

The county’s 10,000 foster children deserve safe shelter. No child in the name of protection should be placed instead in peril.