Iowa Chief Justice: Court system turned on its head but did not succumb to pandemic William Morris, Des Moines Register
How Iowa’s judiciary branch adapted to COVID-19 What to watch next
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New procedures, new technology and a whole lot of employee effort and ingenuity have combined to keep Iowa s judicial system afloat in a year wracked by the coronavirus, Supreme Court Chief Justice Susan Christensen said Wednesday.
The global pandemic loomed large over the Condition of the Judiciary address, given annually by the chief justice to legislators and the general public. Christensen, who was elected chief justice by her colleagues in February, spent much of her first Condition of the Judiciary speech discussing the impact of COVID-19 and the ways courts have had to adapt since trials were abruptly halted in mid-March.
Foster care program in Colorado could be model for others to follow
By: Scripps National
and last updated 2021-01-08 16:48:36-05
A program in Colorado to place children with foster families could soon be a model for other states to follow.
The Family First Prevention Services Act of 2018 will restrict the number of children going into residential care starting this year.
The team at the Tennyson Center for Children came up with a program that allows kids without a family to stay there temporarily. The goal at Tennyson is for advocates to spend 30 days finding the right foster family for that child.
Clara Haizlett reported this story
Leading up to the pandemic, lawmakers and advocates were making significant strides to improve Virginia’s foster care system. But now, advocates say they’re back to where they started.
Allison Gilbreath is the policy and programs director at Voices for Virginia’s Children.
“It s not necessarily that anything extraordinarily new is happening within foster care,” Gilbreath said. “It s just, we hadn t even gotten the band aid on correctly in the first place. And then this happened.”
In 2018, Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission performed a year-long study on the foster care system. The report revealed systemic issues in Virginia’s foster care system, including a lack of adherence to “basic safety requirements.” Gilbreath says the findings were “devastating” to the General Assembly.
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, which focuses on the stories of vulnerable communities. The first story explored how COVID-19 has affected young adults aging out of the foster care system; the second focused on grandparents raising kin; and the third was on how the pandemic impacted parents and reunification efforts.
The pandemic, its associated isolation, and economic challenges prompted child welfare to sound the alarm: COVID-19 will likely result in a spike in child abuse.
But whether such a trend is certain fact or educated intuition is still open to question. Complete data won t be available until mid-2021, at the earliest.
Some experts fear that at-risk children won t be seen because stay-at-home orders are keeping them away from the watchful gaze of mandated reporters, especially teachers, who report one in five cases of suspected abuse and neglect to hotlines and responsible agencies.