L.A. County Reverses Its Policy On Foster Children
AP
Feb 4, 2010 6:22 pm US/Pacific
The Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services have suspended efforts to reduce the number of children in foster homes following the deaths of several children who were under its care.

DCFS Director Trish Ploehn said Thursday that the department has changed its policy of working to reunite families and reduce the ranks of foster children because placing some children with their birth parents could be unsafe.

The policy reversal is part of reforms following the deaths of several children who went back to their birth families last year.

Previously, social workers had been encouraged to keep children in their original homes by helping parents deal with problems believed to have contributed to abuse.

LA Times
2/4/2010
The Department of Children and Family Services will suspend its effort to reduce the number of children in foster care in the wake of the deaths of several children formerly in its care.

Los Angeles County has suspended a long-standing effort to reduce the number of children in foster homes because keeping more of the children with their birth families could be unsafe, the county's top child-welfare official said.