New Federal Legislation Will Keep More Children Together with their Families

Imagine being in the shoes of a low-income family: caring for your children without running water because you must choose between buying food and paying your water bill. Your childcare provider doesn’t show up and you are forced to choose between leaving your children with an older sibling — or losing the low-paying job that enables you to provide food and a home. Imagine your children being removed from your custody and put in foster care because you can’t afford to pay your rent, or are escaping domestic violence and must flee your home.

Every day, in Virginia and across the US, thousands of families are separated by the government — simply because they don’t have enough money.

Thankfully, Congress held meetings this year in which they heard from families, youth, and advocates—and sent a crucial but little-noticed bill to President Biden, who signed it into law on January 4, 2025: the Supporting America’s Children and Families Act.

This bipartisan bill makes important changes to America’s child welfare system. While we are led to believe that children are “abused or neglected” because their parents are physically abusive, willfully neglectful, or in the throes of addiction, a large number of Child Protective Services (CPS) reports are due to lack of access to resources that many of us take for granted.

While we sometimes hear of an “epidemic” of child abuse or neglect, the majority of the 93,000 calls to Virginia CPS in 2023 were invalid. Of the remaining two-fifths (37,000) that merited assessment or investigation, 70% were allegations of neglect. Of all the cases, only a small number—fewer than 3,000—resulted in any finding of abuse or neglect.

Many, if not most, of these neglect cases are what is known as “Poverty-Adjacent Neglect.” However, a better term might be “Neglect-adjacent Poverty”: When families don’t have enough money to provide for their needs, loving, caring parents can appear neglectful. But removing children from families is traumatic, and the harmful effects can last a lifetime.

In recognition of this, the Supporting America’s Children and Families Act now allows states to use federal dollars to address the “acute needs of families living in poverty that might otherwise lead to investigations for neglect.”  Further, it requires states to make policies that ensure that poverty, absent abuse or neglect, does not separate children from their parents.

Many caseworkers, lawyers, and even judges are not trained to assess the difference between neglect and need. Virginia will need more than just a “policy in place” to prevent family separation for “poverty-adjacent neglect,” but must truly shift how we think about low-income families.

Funding to provide for immediate family needs will enable caseworkers and courts with options—that is to say, money— to prevent the separation of children from families: from a mother who fled domestic violence but has no place to live; or a father at risk of eviction due to money he owes the state. Families and advocates have been asking for this for a long time.

Other services covered by the Act are expanded mental health services for children in foster care and extended assistance to older youth in care. It will also increase funding to states to support the many grandparents and relatives raising children who might otherwise enter care.

During the pandemic, we learned that remote court hearings can help families, allowing parents and youth to participate in court proceedings without transportation difficulties or taking a whole day off from work or school; the Act funds states’ improvements to remote courtroom technology; and facilitating access to legal services.

Importantly, the Act also tells states they must include children and parents in the process when developing policies. This is vital, because families know best what they need.

The Act will allow caseworkers to focus on reuniting families and ensuring children do not simply “age out” of the system, by reducing the amount of paperwork. For Virginia, where too many youth age out of care despite changes in the law over the past five years, this is good news.

Finally: some Virginia departments don’t help children in foster care maintain relationships with their parents if they are incarcerated — or provide required services to these families. Visitation for children with their parents, including a minimum number of in-person visits, will be required — and states must consult with families on how best to do this.

Virginia must pass its own version of this Act to enable these changes. We must also implement family-friendly policies: paid sick leave, childcare support, livable-wage laws, and fully-refundable child tax credits, so no families are separated simply due to poverty.  Let’s give Virginia children the security of knowing they won’t be sent to live with strangers simply because we don’t provide families with what they need, when they need it.