Los Angeles County has one of the largest populations of foster children in the world, with a striking overrepresentation of Black children.
In 2023, more than 23,400 children were under the supervision of the county’s Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS). Black children accounted for nearly one-fourth of foster youth, though they made up only 7% of all county kids. About 100 Indigenous youth were foster kids, double that of their county population. Latine children accounted for almost two in three foster children, consistent with their county presence.
The ideal steps needed to decrease the large number of L.A. County’s foster children, including the root causes for the racial disparities, have remained elusive for decades.
The UCLA Pritzker Center for Strengthening Children and Families is tackling the challenge of child welfare reform with research and community input as part of a multidisciplinary approach across campus and L.A. County. Their self-described mission is to “safely reduce the need for foster care” in furtherance of “equitable” child welfare system reform.
Perhaps lofty goals. But, the key to that mission might be simpler than imagined.
“In a county as racially diverse as ours, if you look at the way Black families — even Native American families— are so overrepresented in the system, why aren’t we asking different questions?,” said Tyrone Howard, UCLA education professor and co-founder of the Pritzker Center.
Howard, whose research centers equity, culture, race, teaching, and learning, said if the goal is to decrease the large number of children in foster care, logic suggests looking for ways to reduce the overrepresentation of children of color.
“The way we do that is with research, education and partnerships making sure we are engaging policy recommendations using our research chops,” he said.
An overlooked challenge in child welfare
“What we discovered is that there is this large elephant in the room that no one was talking about and that was racial disproportionality,” said Howard, after talking to others working in child welfare.
Racial disproportionality is a mismatch in the proportion, either too many or too few, of children of specific race or ethnicity in the child welfare system, compared to their portion in the overall population. Racial disparity occurs when there are unequal numbers of one race or ethnic group compared to other races or ethnic groups.
The overrepresentation of children of color, especially Black children, is already evident in the families who are referred to child welfare, so in part, the agencies bear an undue burden of societal racism.
Nationwide, a multitude of reasons contribute to the disproportionate number of youth of color in foster care, including poverty, domestic violence, lack of family and community resources, intrinsic biases among child welfare workers, and historically grounded institutional racism.
The murder of George Floyd galvanized a “series of hard conversations about the child welfare system,” said the center’s executive director Taylor Dudley. “For the first time, the system became more honest and open [about racial disproportionality],”
Dudley and Howard said having those conversations helps raise awareness about racism and implicit bias in the system. Implicit bias, unconscious prejudice against a specific group, can negatively impact decision making in child welfare cases.
Advocating for equity and reform
Since the Pritzker Center was established in 2019, staff have completed or participated in 10 projects, including a test of blind removal.
Blind removal is a decision-making process about placement of children and families referred to child welfare which eliminates all information that could identify their race or ethnicity. A blind removal program in New York’s Nassau County demonstrated success, though limited.
To address color consciousness and anti-racism, the blind removal pilot program was launched by Pritzker researchers in partnership with DCFS, at the request of District 2 Supervisor Holly Mitchell, who represents areas primarily in South Los Angeles.
In a motion to the Board in 2021, Mitchell said, “From my perspective, the data compels us to seek out every practice that will help us guard against bias and, ultimately, the overrepresentation of children of color in our child welfare system.”
The results of L.A.’s blind removal pilot were mixed, due in part to the small number of families evaluated. Social workers often cited concerns for children’s safety as the reason for not using the blind removal process.
Currently, no DCFS offices are using blind removal protocols.
