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Los Angeles County is condemning older foster youth to lengthy, destabilizing stints of homelessness and couch-surfing by failing to offer them with applicable properties, a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges.
In a 108-page criticism, attorneys with 4 regulation companies argue that L.A. County, answerable for the native foster care system, and the state of California, which displays that system, are shirking their obligation to make sure foster youths between the ages of 16 and 21 have a secure and steady place to reside. As an alternative, the submitting alleges, native authorities has created a “foster care to homelessness pipeline.”
In California, eligible youths can choose to stay in foster care till they flip 21. Final 12 months, L.A. County was answerable for greater than 4,200 youths between the ages of 16 and 21, in line with the lawsuit.
One of many county’s chief obligations: making certain these youth have each steady housing and behavioral well being companies they might want to sort out lengthy histories of trauma and abuse.
Leecia Welch, a deputy authorized director at Kids’s Rights, a New York-based baby advocacy group, stated the county has failed on each fronts.
“When L.A. makes the choice to take accountability for elevating these younger folks, and step into the sneakers of their dad and mom, on the very least, it might probably’t depart them homeless,” stated Welch, whose agency joined Public Counsel, Munger, Tolles & Olson, and Alliance for Kids’s Rights within the lawsuit.
The 4 companies sued the county’s Kids and Household Providers and Psychological Well being departments — which discover placements for foster youths and supply them with behavioral well being companies — and properly because the state’s Well being and Human Providers Company, Division of Well being Care Providers and Division of Social Providers, all three of which play a task in overseeing and administering these companies.
The swimsuit argues each the county and state violated the constitutional rights of older foster youths by subjecting them to “excessive housing instability and homelessness” whereas they continue to be in foster care. The swimsuit asks for a choose to require youth be supplied with “secure and steady placements always.”
The county Departments of Baby and Household Providers and Psychological Well being stated in an announcement that they take the allegations “very severely” and had been conscious younger folks exiting the kid welfare system confronted “important stressors,” together with lack of housing.
The 2 county departments “assist transition-age youth navigate these and different challenges by offering help with training and housing plans, job preparedness, transportation and psychological well being companies,” the assertion stated. “The county is dedicated to making sure the psychological well-being of younger folks as they enter maturity and offering out there companies to help with that transition.”
The three state companies declined to touch upon the continued lawsuits.
The swimsuit was filed as a category motion on behalf of all county foster youth between the ages of 16 and 21. Six plaintiffs, all given pseudonyms within the filings, say their time in foster care as a teen or younger grownup has been punctuated with stints of homelessness, violence and instability.
Onyx G, 17, was positioned in a number of residential services the place she skilled harassment and an tried sexual assault, in line with the lawsuit. After being sexually assaulted by a roommate at a unique residential program this Could, she left the ability and was homeless for 3 months.
Erykah B., 19, was faraway from a foster house “marked by abuse” at age 17 and was put in no less than three new properties — in one in every of which she additionally skilled an tried sexual assault, in line with the lawsuit. After that, the 19-year-old was briefly homeless, sleeping exterior for 2 weeks together with her girlfriend.
Rosie S., 20, was supplied solely referrals to a homeless shelter by the county after a 12 months of couch-surfing, in line with the submitting. The lawsuits stated she is anticipating a toddler, however was advised by the county there have been no out there placements for younger dad and mom on the sorts of transitional housing she hoped for.
The obstacles to housing for foster youth with youngsters of their very own are notably formidable. The submitting alleges younger moms and dads in foster care are repeatedly barred from placements that might enable them to reside with their youngsters or given entry to applications with “arbitrary guidelines” on the place youngsters may be fed, forcing dad and mom into “inappropriate and unstable placements as a way to reside with their youngsters.”
“There’s clearly an inadequate variety of placements, there’s an inadequate array, and there are additionally insurance policies and practices that lead to instability as a result of younger folks aren’t getting the assist they want,” stated Tara Ford, a senior lawyer with Public Counsel.
Sometimes, some older foster youths reside largely independently, discovering a house to hire with the county paying a month-to-month fee, stated Rachel Stein with Public Counsel. There are additionally transitional housing applications for older youths who want extra assist. She says youths typically battle to entry placements via each sorts of applications.
Youths with critical behavioral well being points have confirmed notably tough for the county to put. The Occasions reported in Could that the county had been putting foster youth in rented lodge rooms. The kid welfare company stated on the time the inns had been a final resort because it grappled with a extreme scarcity of licensed foster properties.
Sarah Manimalethu, drector of native advocacy on the Alliance for Kids’s Rights, stated the county is struggling to put youth partly as a result of identical housing disaster that has left folks throughout the area priced out of their properties and compelled onto the road. The distinction between the final homeless inhabitants and foster youth, she says, is that the county is legally obligated to get a roof over their head.
“On a intestine degree, we all know housing is a human proper, however Congress and the California Legislature have put it into regulation that housing is a authorized proper for foster youth,” stated Manimalethu. “It’s DCFS’ accountability to be sure that there’s someplace for them to go.”
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