Nora McCarthy
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Articles by Nora McCarthy
How Zohran Mamdani Can Help Shrink the Child Welfare System in New York City
Recognizing the connection between family safety and community safety is crucial to protecting children. In 2021, New York City asked thousands of NYCHA residents how to improve public safety. Some of the needs they articulated: easier access to public benefits, sports and arts programs, healing spaces like community gardens and restorative circles to address trauma, community centers, and peer support and “credible messengers” with the life experience to help others navigate through a challenge.
'Big Money, Little Victims' 50 years on
The Daily News investigative series “Big Money, Little Victims,” published 50 years ago, set in motion a cascade of city actions, philanthropic investment and advocacy that changed the course of child welfare in New York City. Organized parents, youth, legislators, attorneys and advocates have demanded that the city work toward a more holistic goal for children’s safety: safe from harm at home, and safe from the harm of the system itself.
Child Welfare Reckons With the Harm of Investigations
When New York City’s child welfare agency removed Sharwline Nicholson’s children in 1999, the decision was in line with its unofficial policy: “when in doubt, pull them out.” During the 1990s, the city was regularly taking about 10,000 children into foster care every year. But when Nicholson sued, the New York Court of Appeals decreed that any decision to remove a child from their family must be weighed against the psychological harm to the child that could be created by the removal itself.
2023 Year-End HR Checklist
HR Time flies when you work in HR, especially toward year-end—when, in addition to the usual suspects, certain annual activities require your attention. But with so much to do and so little time, it’s easy for tasks to fall off your radar. Enter Namely’s 2023 year-end HR checklist to keep you on your game! Year-end evaluations, benefits renewals, HR policy updates…with our end-of-year HR checklist, you won’t miss a thing. Prepare to wrap up 2023 with a bow—and start 2024 ready and rarin’ to go! 1.
To Move Forward, Apologize and Atone
When Tahitia Foggie recognized in therapy that she had hurt family members with her actions, she reached out to each child to ask forgiveness. “I wanted them to know: ‘There was nothing wrong with you. The problem was with me,’” she wrote in Rise magazine in 2015.
A Citywide Framework to Hold Upstream Efforts Accountable
Each year, New York City releases a 500-page scorecard on its agencies’ core impacts. Little black dots next to data points indicate “equity indicators.” In 2022, the Human Resources Administration’s equity goals included increasing the number of people receiving cash assistance. The parks department tracked one equity metric: the percent of residents who live within walking distance to a park (83.6%).
Child Welfare Systems Should Be Allies, Not Leaders, in Change
At a City Council hearing this month about the budget of New York City’s child welfare agency, Council member Gale Brewer questioned the wisdom of a proposed $4.3 million cut to “family court mental health services.” That’s the name for mental health evaluations contracted through the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS), which have long been viewed as flawed.
Towards a Pro-Community Process for Government Funding
In February, the anti-trafficking organization Girls Educational and Mentoring Services (GEMS) announced that payment delays in city contracts might put it out of business. Two weeks later, it was the large social service agency Sheltering Arms going belly up, unable to pay its bills because of a similar reimbursement abyss. The business models of nonprofits may seem as distant from radical family policing reform as the banking collapse, but hear me out.
Protecting Children Outside Child Welfare Systems
“I am here supporting the Child and Family Well-Being Fund,” said Embraia Fraizer, stepping forward at a press conference on the New York State Capitol steps last Tuesday, “because who can know the needs of our communities better than the ones who live and serve there daily?” Fraizer, 23, spent time in foster care in childhood and “was raised in the underserved poorly funded communities of Harlem and the Bronx,” as she put it.
Shifting Power Out of Systems, Into Communities
“I am here supporting the Child and Family Well-Being Fund,” said Embraia Fraizer, stepping forward at a press conference on the New York State Capitol steps last Tuesday, “because who can know the needs of our communities better than the ones who live and serve there daily?” Fraizer, 23, spent time in foster care in childhood and “was raised in the underserved poorly funded communities of Harlem and the Bronx,” as she put it.
Upstream City: Developing Restorative Pathways to Safety
Until recently, survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) in New York City had limited options for reckoning with an abusive partner. Survivors could find services for themselves, but in mainstream IPV programs it was almost taboo to plan with partners who had been violent. They could use police and the courts to try to halt violence, but surveys show most survivors do not. Or they could attempt to navigate with their partner on their own.
Expanding Healing at the Community Level
As her son entered young adulthood, conflict triggered in Dr. Kimberly Nao “physical reactions of stomach tightening, shoulder and neck muscle retracting, teeth clenching, breath holding, heartache.” She found healing in yoga. “As Black mothers we are often unsettled so that coping with stress is completely normalized as a constant way of life,” she has written.
Narrowing Mandated Reporting Laws in New York
Over the first four columns in this series, I’ve focused on “upstream” investments that can minimize stress on families and increase family support. But child welfare also entangles families because overly broad mandated reporting laws fuel hyper-surveillance. In New York City, 44% of Black children, 43% of Latino children and 19% of white children experience an investigation in childhood. It’s just not plausible that this many children require state intervention — and they don’t.
Investment in Neighborhoods Can Lift Families
When Paulette Bazil moved to Brownsville in 1996 with her mother and two young children, she invested not only in the house she bought across from Betsy Head Park, but also in the family life of her block. She joined a church around the corner and, bearing leftover donuts that she picked up near her job on Wall Street, hosted programs for local kids at the church, at her kitchen table and in her backyard. “I have to raise my children in this neighborhood,” Bazil told herself.
How Neighborhood Conditions Drive Child Welfare Involvement
In 2016, South Bronx Rising Together ran student absence numbers for schools in the Morrisania neighborhood and found that 40% of kids were missing a month of school or more each year. In 2018, United for Brownsville learned that the Brooklyn neighborhood had very low rates of enrollment in Early Intervention services, which support kids under 3 to reach developmental milestones. While it wasn’t the goal of either organization, both unearthed key opportunities to prevent child welfare involvement.
Upstream City: Policies that Scaffold Family Life
This month I’ll look at state and city policies that scaffold healthy family life — and those that are known to put families at risk of investigation and separation. Let’s begin with two real families who became involved with New York City’s Administration for Children’s Services: ● Ms. R was investigated when she had her oldest child stay home from school to watch his little brother while she went to work. She was charged with educational neglect.
Introducing Upstream City - The Imprint
How investment in social supports and community can go further than family surveillance in New York City On Dec.
New York’s Child Welfare Laws Will Advance Justice
Two bills, awaiting Governor Andrew Cuomo’s signature, would help reduce the punitive impact of the child welfare system on kids and their families, including formerly incarcerated parents. iStock / Getty Images Plus Nora McCarthy Nov 13, 2019 Share Two bills, awaiting Governor Andrew Cuomo’s signature, would help reduce the punitive impact of the child welfare system on kids and their families, including formerly incarcerated parents.
The Harmful Effects of New York City's Over-Surveillance
Image: The Century Foundation In recent years, New York City’s child welfare leadership has proudly told the story of how the system has dramatically reduced the number of children in foster care while maintaining child safety. To be sure, that is a major accomplishment. But there is another, troubling NYC child welfare story worth telling. For low-income black and Latino families, child protective surveillance is growing.
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This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own. Featured Classified | For Sale Nora McCarthy, Neighbor Framingham, MA | 2m https://www.teepublic.com/user...
How to Work With Parents Who Lost Their Children to Foster Care
A group of parents who had children placed in foster care with the New York City nonprofit Graham Windham celebrate completing Rise Magazine’s parent writing program, with Graham Windham President Jess Dannhauser (far right) and Rise founder Nora McCarthy (back left). Photo: Rise Lakisha had an idea: “Why don’t they give us a handbook?” Lindsay added: “Yeah, why am I finding out about my rights here?
11 HR Influencers You Need to Follow
In the HR profession, it pays to keep good company. Whether you need to “phone a friend” about a workplace curveball or just want to exchange tips and tricks, maintaining a strong professional network can make all the difference in your career. Don’t know who to connect with first? We’ll help you get started. Below we’ve highlighted some of our favorite HR influencers, their areas of expertise, and where you can find them online.
Our Foster Care System Is Increasingly Recognizing the Importance of Reuniting Families
Last June, a mother stood up in Manhattan Family Court to tell a story that is familiar to child welfare professionals but likely not to the public. “Hi, I’m Sara,” she said. “Last year I reunified with my son, Aaron, who spent his first two years in foster care.” Parents like Sara Werner are not part of the public image of the foster care system. Neither are children like Aaron, even though more than half of children in foster care return home to their parents.
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