Central Texas Sees 39 Percent Increase In Child Abuse Numbers

The number of abused and neglected children in Central Texas is on the rise at a rate almost 40 times higher than the state average, and more volunteers are needed to advocate for their best interest while in the State’s care.

The total number of children in the Texas Department of Family and Protective Service’s legal responsibility was 47,348 in 2015. That was roughly a 1% increase from the 46,823 children in custody the previous year. In the Central Texas area of Caldwell, Comal, Guadalupe, and Hays Counties, the total number of children in state care saw an increase of 39% from 800 to 1110.

“We are going in the wrong direction,” said Norma Castilla-Blackwell, Executive Director of CASA of Central Texas, a child advocacy organization. “One child being physically, sexually, or emotionally abused is too many. But 1110 should be an outrage.”

While foster care is supposed to be a short-term solution by removing children from an unsafe environment and finding them safe, permanent homes, too often children stay in the system too long and as a result are retraumatized, said Castilla-Blackwell.

“Because something was done to them by adults who should have protected them, the children feel like they are the ones being punished. They are the ones who are removed from everything and everyone they know and often placed with strangers, sometimes far from their homes, schools and friends. And then moved again and again. Imagine how that would affect your own children.”

Court Appointed Special Advocate, or CASA, volunteers can help change the game for children in the foster care system, said Castilla-Blackwell. CASA volunteers are carefully screened, professionally trained, and then appointed by judges to look out for the children’s best interests while in the state’s custody. The CASA volunteer’s job is to help the children through a difficult time during their lives and to help them move out of foster care as quickly as possible and into safe, permanent homes.

CASA volunteers are often the only consistent adult while a child is in foster care and stays with them as they move from one placement to another, as overworked CPS caseworkers change and as they switch communities and schools. Because CASA volunteers are assigned to only one case at a time, they are able to focus their attention on a single child or sibling group.  The state average for CPS caseworker is 30+ cases at any given time.

Justice LaRue, a former foster care child, was placed in a Comal County shelter as a teenager. “The shelter was a nightmare. You are thrown into a strange situation with other kids in the same sucky situation, it is very tense,” she said. “There are a lot of people you don’t know. You have a lot in common with them, but you don’t want to talk to them.”

That is when her CASA of Central Texas Volunteer, Lorie Donley, was appointed.

“My CASA was like my rock. Solid, steady, firm,” Justice said. “She was always there for me, no matter what, and that is a big deal. Lorie was a constant for me in my life when everyone else was changing.”

She said Lorie was her voice in a system run by adults.

“People wave you off when you are a teenager. I was mad that people weren’t listening to me and it was unfair. I felt like, how can you, the judge, speak about me, and say what is best for me when you don’t really know me?” Justice said. “It is important to have an adult step in. That was Lorie, she was my voice.”

Lorie said her goal was to always keep Justice looking forward.

“Justice has a lot going for her, I noticed that very early on,” she said. “I didn’t want her to lose the hope that there was something better out there for her.”

Last year, CASA of Central Texas served 471 children in the four-county service area with 213 CASA volunteers. But, there were an additional 639 additional children who did not have the voice of a CASA Volunteer.

“We appoint our volunteers to one case at a time, so we are only serving as many children as we have volunteers,” Castilla-Blackwell said. “We need more CASA volunteers to speak up for our most vulnerable children and those who are our future.”

The next CASA training session is in March and information sessions are held monthly. For more information, call 512-392-3578 or 830-626-2272 or visit www.casacentex.org.