Guide for Detained and Removed Parents with Child Custody Concerns
Women’s Refugee Commission (June 2014)
Coinciding with the release of ICE’s Directive on Facilitating Parental Interests in the Course of Civil Immigration Enforcement Activities, the Women’s Refugee Commission has released a two-page guide for detained and deported parents with child custody concerns. This guide, which ICE will make available in all immigration detention facilities housing adults for more than 72 hours, provides parents with steps they can take to protect their parental rights; information on family court proceedings, parent-child visitation, and coordinating care of children; as well as helpful ICE resources for detainees.
Read Full TextBarriers to Support Service Use for Latino Immigrant Families Reported to Child Welfare: Implications for Policy and Practice
Megan Finno-Velasquez, MSW, PhD Candidate, University of Southern California School of Social Work (June 2014)
This brief highlights the findings of a study that explores the extent to which immigration status impacts referral to, and receipt of, concrete services by Latino families reported for child maltreatment. Data were drawn from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-being II (NSCAW II), a federally funded and nationally representative sample of families investigated by child welfare agencies for maltreatment between April 2008 and September 2009. The brief concludes with recommendations for policy and practice.
Keeping Immigrant Families in the Child Protection System Together
ABA Child Law Practice (April 2014)
Written by Ann Park, this article discusses the barriers to family reunification that children in foster care experience when they have a detained or deported parent. The author identifies federal and state legislation that helps to reduce these barriers and provides practice recommendations for child welfare agencies, dependency courts, and attorneys.
Read the full textImplications of Important State Child Welfare/Immigration-Related Appellate Court Opinions
Migration and Child Welfare National Network (April 2013)
This brief, written by Howard Davidson, Director of the ABA Center on Children and the Law, American Bar Association, reviews a number of state appellate court decisions that have involved immigration issues in child welfare cases. For each case, a summary of the appellate court opinion is presented, along with implications for child welfare and legal systems.
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Falling Through the Cracks: The Impact of Immigration Enforcement on Children Caught Up in the Child Welfare System
American Immigration Council (December 2012)
This article highlights the unique challenges that federal and state immigration enforcement actions pose to child well-being and family unity, including the repercussions for children and families involved in the child welfare system.
Read Full ArticleThe Intersection of Immigration Law, its Enforcement, and Social Work Practice
Presented by Yali Lincroft, First Focus, & Alan Dettlaff, Jane Addams College of Social Work
Council on Social Work Education, Washington, DC (November 2012)
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California Senate Bill 1064: Reuniting Immigrant Families
California Senate (September 30, 2012)
Signed into law October 1, 2012, the Reuniting Immigrant Families Act prioritizes keeping children with their families and out of the public child welfare system when possible. SB1064 authorizes more time for child welfare agencies to find and reunite detained and deported parents with their children or find placement with relatives, regardless of their immigration status. It requires the California Department of Social Services to provide guidance on filing special immigrant relief options and for working with foreign consulates regarding the custody of children of deported parents.
View BillShattered Families: The Perilous Intersection of Immigration Enforcement and the Child Welfare System
Race Forward: The Center for Racial Justice Innovation (formerly the Applied Research Center) (November 2011)
This extensive report is the first national investigation on threats to families when immigration enforcement and the child welfare system intersect. It explores the extent to which children in foster care are prevented from uniting with their detained or deported parents and the failures of the child welfare system to adequately work to reunify these families.
Access Full ReportDisappearing Parents: A Report on Immigration Enforcement and the Child Welfare System
Southwest Institute for Research on Women & Bacon Immigration Law and Policy Program, University of Arizona (2011)
This report describes families entangled in two vast bureaucracies – the federal immigration enforcement system and the state child welfare system. The report is based on over a year of research, including over fifty surveys and twenty interviews with juvenile court judges, attorneys representing children and parents in juvenile court, and case workers in Child Protective Services.
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