Quarterly "Checkup" Analyzes Child Protection Reform in Los Angeles

San Francisco, CA, August 07, 2014 --(PR.com)-- Fostering Media Connections, a San Francisco-based nonprofit journalism organization and publisher of the news website, The Chronicle of Social Change, released its first quarterly “checkup” analyzing the developmental health of Los Angeles County’s child protection reform effort.

The 23-page “Los Angeles Child Protection Checkup” tracks the implementation of the 42 recommendations issued by the Los Angeles County Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Protection in April 2014. The county’s Board of Supervisors created the Blue Ribbon Commission in June 2013, following a spate of bad press centering on child death and systemic issues that have plagued the county’s child welfare system for decades.

The Child Protection Checkup divides the commission’s recommendations into seven broader categories: 1) Consolidation of Authority, 2) Maltreatment Prevention and Early Intervention, 3) General Health and Children’s Health, 4) Workforce and Contracts, 5) Child Placement, and 6) Law Enforcement. The report finds that the recommendations related to the consolidation of authority and children’s health have seen the most activity so far, while reforms related to law enforcement, originally set in motion in February have failed to materialize into concrete action.

The transition team tasked with creating the county’s new Office of Child Protection and prioritization of the Blue Ribbon Commission’s recommendations was scheduled to deliver a progress report to the Board of Supervisors on August 5. However, the Board of Supervisors, at the request of Supervisor Don Knabe, has rescheduled that report for August 12.

“Understanding the news media’s unique power to impel action, Fostering Media Connections is offering these quarterly checkups in the hopes that they will spur continued attention and nourish the reform effort,” reads the checkup.

The current Child Protection Checkup is available on Fostering Media Connections’ website here: http://fosteringmediaconnections.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/L.A._Child_Protection_Checkup_08.05.14_FINAL.pdf. The second quarterly checkup will be released in October.

About Fostering Media Connections (FMC): FMC harnesses the power of journalism and media to advance child welfare and juvenile justice reform by covering emerging solutions to the systems’ challenges. FMC accomplishes this mission by reporting and producing in-depth news stories, which are published in The Chronicle of Social Change. FMC also trains student journalists, policymakers and social workers in solution- based journalism. Learn more at www.fosteringmediaconnections.org and www.chronicleofsocialchange.org.
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Christie Renick
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