Between July 1, 2019, and June 30, 2020, the State of Louisiana contracted for 13.4 billion dollars worth of services for citizens. If you search every word and phrase of the Louisiana Division of Administration’s Office of State Procurement’s Annual Report of Professional Services Contracts for the Fiscal Year 2019-2020,…
Posts published in “musings”
This morning I read an appeal for help on Twitter regarding Louisiana’s Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) from a Louisiana legislator: when “something catastrophic happens; a (sic) under compensated, overworked staffer loses their job, yet, the six figure earners remain in the ivory tower gainfully employed. No accountability…
As it often does regarding the Department of Children and Family Services, Governor Jindal’s name popped up in Louisiana news this week in stories about children poorly protected by DCFS. It is hard to dispute his administration’s impact on Louisiana’s child welfare system, but in my opinion, those who still…
According to the Southern Regional Education Board, Louisiana’s Children lagged all other southern states for high school graduation rates from 2016 to 2019. Louisiana also has the lowest 6-year graduation rates from 4-year public colleges. Outcomes like these do not occur by chance. Causes have effects.
Every parent has heard it from the back seat, “Are we there yet?” No. We are not there yet. Louisiana is still working to gather the pieces for a sound foundation upon which we might create a healthy environment for our Children. This coming Thursday, our House of Representatives will…
One of the larger newspapers in southwest Louisiana and a regional television station published news articles last week about the sexual exploitation of two Children. The articles incorrectly identified the two Children as prostitutes. Children are never prostitutes. These two Children were sold and raped. I contacted the news desk,…
Endings are complicated. Typing was once a more physical experience. Each page of paper was inserted and rolled around a platen. Each keypress was a levered, mechanical event. With each inked letter impressed on the paper, a third of the typewriter’s mass, the part called “the carriage,” would move one…
That a state would have insufficient intensive residential care for children is more common than one would expect. South Carolina’s Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) is desperate for access to psychiatric residential treatment facility (PRTF) beds for children. That state’s PRTF beds are filled with children from other states, leaving…
While reading this morning’s news reports about child welfare among the states, the following problems seem to be the most prevalent and significant problems of child welfare agencies around the country. 1. First is the problem of children being removed from parents and placed into foster care for reasons of…
Louisiana's definition of "battery" is remarkably like our state's definition of "corporal punishment", making it difficult not to see today's vote as blatant approval of battery against children.