SPRINGFIELD, IL (Chambana Today) – The General Assembly unanimously approved a law requiring the Department of Children and Family Services to ensure that children removed from their home were to have “appropriate baggage and other items.”
The legislation, House Bill 10, would require DCFS to purchase luggage the agency can’t otherwise provide through donations from nonprofits or grants. It requires the DCFS to record and report instances where the agency failed to provide the luggage. The luggage would also belong to the foster child.However, HB 10 isn’t moving forward this year. The sponsor, Representative Margaret Croke said that after she filed the legislation, DCFS informed her that the agency was largely in compliance with the 2021 law.
“These bills are supposed to be conversation starters,” she said. “It’s a problem that the department knows that I’m now paying attention to. And if it persists, then we’re going to have to figure out some different ways of solving it.”
“At the end of the day, DCFS is responsible for everything that happens to a child, for making sure the child is safe, for making sure the child has an appropriate placement, for making sure that the child isn’t treated like garbage by giving them garbage bags for their possessions,” said Cook County Public Guardian Charles Golbert, who represents several thousand children in abuse and neglect cases.
DCFS says it provides children with a duffle bag to keep, but supporters say that the legislation was important to inform children of their rights and hold DCFS accountable.
“Unless you add on reporting and record keeping requirements, it’s often not clear whether it’s actually being complied with or not,” he said.
Richard Blackmon, director of education and pathways at Court Appointed Special (CASA) of Cook County, recalls instances where foster children arrived at CASA using “trash bags, milk crates, anything they can really get their hands on, particularly depending on the type of circumstances being moved from.”