Proposed California law would make it easier for Native Americans to argue their side in child custody cases

California lawmakers are considering a proposal to make it easier for Native American tribes to make their arguments in child custody cases.
Technically, the proposed legislation, AB 686, would let lawyers or other representatives of Native American tribes appear by phone or electronically in cases involving the possible removal of Native American children from their families and tribes.Such hearings are held as part of the Indian Child Welfare Act, a federal law enacted in 1978 to stem the systemic removal of tribal children from their families and cultures — a practice that at one time touched as many as one in three Native American children. But the problem AB 686 aims to fix is as much about geography as culture.
Often, the hearings that determine where Indian children are placed are held hundreds of miles from tribal lands, making it difficult for all sides to be well represented in court. And without tribal presence during those proceedings, judges are denied information that might make their decision more compliant with the federal law, according to a statement from the Juvenile Court Judges of California to the Judiciary Committee, which passed the bill April 2.

GREAT NEWS: Proposed California law would make it easier for Native Americans to argue their side in child custody cases

Maine's apology for Indian Adoption Projects

Maine signs Historic 'Truth and Reconciliation' Agreement with Indian Tribes Related Media Maine signs Historic 'Truth and Reconciliation' Agreementhttp://www.mpbn.net/DesktopModules/PDGNews/MediaPlayer.aspx?PDGNewsStoryID=22562&PDGNewsMediaID=5517&TabID=36&ModuleID=3478   Duration: 4:14

archival photo Chiefs from all five of Maine's tribes joined Gov. Paul LePage today (06/29/2012) in signing an historic agreement to create a Wabanaki-State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission.  It will examine child welfare practices that once resulted in large numbers of Indian children being forcibly removed from their homes. The ceremony in the State House Hall of Flags marks the first time that such an effort has occurred in the United States between Indian nations and a state government. Tribal members consider the agreement crucial to their healing process. The statistics are sobering. Chief Brenda Commander of the Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians says at one time, 16 percent of all Maliseet children were in state custody. In the 1970's the Federal Indian Policy Commission backed that up with a report that found Indian children in Aroostook County were being placed in foster homes 60 percent more often than non-native children. Chief Kirk Francis of the Penobscot Nation says children were placed in foster homes or sent away to boarding school in a cruel attempt at assimilation. They were separated from their families, their language, their cultural identities--and in some cases, he says, subjected to horrific abuse.  Read article here:  http://www.mpbn.net/Home/tabid/36/ctl/ViewItem/mid/3478/ItemId/22562/Default.aspx

Indian Child Welfare, three interviews

Click here: http://stephaniewoodard.blogspot.com/

Indian Child Welfare Act, three interviews; part one

By Stephanie Woodard

Excerpt:

Native parents face extraordinary hurdles in keeping their children—including cultural misunderstandings and legal barriers that are unimaginable to many non-Native people. In this second decade of the 21^st century, American Indian children in states across the country are still taken from their families and placed in foster care or adoptive homes at a much higher rate than other kids—just as they were before the passage of the 1978 Indian Child Welfare Act, a federal statute intended to help keep Native families intact.

In Alaska, Native children make up 20 percent of the child population but 51 percent of those a state agency has placed in foster care; Montana, Nebraska, Oregon, Utah, North Dakota and Washington also have highly skewed numbers. In Minnesota, the percentage of Native children in foster care isn’t just high, it’s gotten worse in recent years. “Disproportionalities exist nationwide at every stage in the process, starting right from the initial reports of possible abuse or neglect of a Native child,” says Kristy Alberty, Cherokee, spokeswoman for the National Indian Child Welfare Association.

As those who read this blog are aware, the removal of Indian Children was supposed to end with the ICWA of 1978 and sadly, it's still a crisis and unacceptable. Poverty is a powerful weapon and is still being used against Indian people.  Trace

FINALLY! Good news in Utah!

Utah Appellate Court Decides ICWA Case by Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here is the as-yet unpublished opinion in In re M.J.

An excerpt:

A.J. and J.J. (Mother and Father, respectively) appeal the juvenile court's order terminating their parental rights in M.J. and S.J. (the Children). On appeal, Mother and Father argue that the juvenile court erred in determining that it did not have “reason to know” that the Children were Indian children under the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), 15 U.S.C. §§ 1901–63 (2006), and that ICWA, therefore, did not apply in this case; that the evidence was insufficient to justify termination of their parental rights; and that the juvenile co urt committed plain error by failing to follow the proper procedure when ordering the Children to be removed. We affirm.

BAD NEWS: Children of Color Disproportionally in State Foster Care

young Indian men in residential boarding school, the first step in assimilation

Yes, more bad news!
A new report Children of Color Disproportionally in State Foster Care published in May 2011, proves there are still persistent problems of Native children living in state foster care in America.  Native children are still being lost to their system today!
This 2011 study shows Native American children represented 2.6% of the foster care population, yet only encompassed 1.2% of the general child population.
Why is this? Traditional kinship adoption (children being cared for by relatives) is not implemented as in past centuries. State social workers are rarely trained on Indian customs and tradition. They do not appreciate our long history and many lack formal education about Indians.  Tribes have insisted, over and over, they want to run their own programs to care for their children, but monies from the federal government are still channeled to the states instead of the tribes!
Add to that, there are not enough Native people providing foster care services to raise these children.
Programs of assimilation, like residential boarding schools, attempted to end Indian Country by stealing children to erase tribal culture and languages.
For over a century now, Indian Country barely survived these genocidal practices of rampant racism.
A few tribes do well now with economic development like casino gaming, but most tribes suffer devastating cycles of poverty, the result of America's neglect or misguided programs.  

Regular Americans had a glimpse of rez reality with Diane Sawyer's recent 20/20 program Hidden America: Children of the Plains that aired on 10-10-11. In case you missed it, watch a clip here: http://abcnews.go.com/2020/video/hidden-america-children-plains-14708439
Pine Ridge (where they filmed over one year) is only one rez - many more Indian children suffer and are hidden right here in America. 
After the wars, Indian Reservations were isolated for a reason - out of sight, out of mind; this is one reason why Indian Country has such severe epidemics and no one in America seems to know.
Indian's isolation in grass prisons was on purpose.

If you are reading this blog and thinking or writing about adoption, the figures in this report are recent and evidence that the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 is not working as it was intended and enacted! State systems are violating federal law!
Who can stop this? Educated politicans who are made aware by voters.

FROM THE REPORT:  Comparisons of Disproportionality by State: Native American Children
Across the United States, Native American children are overrepresented in foster care at a rate of 2.2 times their rate in the general population. While not all state show disproportionality, 21 states do have some overrepresentation. Twenty-six percent of the states that have overrepresentation have a disproportionality index of greater than 4.1.  In Minnesota, the disproportionality is index 11.6.
Read the complete report here:
http://www.ncjfcj.org/images/stories/dept/ppcd/pdf/disproportionality%20tab.pdf