Recently, another child tragically died in Brooklyn. As a recently retired New York Family Court judge who implemented and presided over Brooklyn’s unique emergency child removal hearing part for two years, the child’s death while under Administration for Children’s Services supervision is evidence of the continuing weaknesses in the New York City child welfare system observed in my courtroom.
Notwithstanding the best intentions of most ACS case workers, they lack the masters’ level education, training, skill and expertise in the necessary multidisciplinary subjects, including mental illness, substance abuse, child development and domestic violence, to make the required complicated and critical determinations as to when a child’s life is at risk in order to seek court intervention at a minimum, and removal, if a child’s life is at imminent risk.
