Beware, I say, beware! Judges and other advocates for children are reserving judgment on the Indiana Department of Child Services’ plans to consolidate reporting of child abuse with a state hotline in place of local methods. Let us hope they continue to reserve judgment, making certain all the facts are in place before implementing new ways to report alledged abuse.

Just what we need. More ANONYMOUS ways to report abuse whether it is happening or not. So far, nothing has come of this but it may, probably will. Keep in contact with legislators and tell them to leave children alone. Judge Charles Pratt said, “We’re dealing with people, we’re dealing with children. Sometimes strict adherence doesn’t work.”

He hit the nail on the head with that statement. Let us use caution. After all, we are dealing with our most precious resource, our children. Make sure you have all the facts before you make damaging calls. You could be destroying the life of a child and his family.

May God care for us all.

Makes a person stop and think!

It has been a few weeks since I have heard anything new about the child welfare system so, hopefully, our prayers are being answered and they are leaving children/families alone. We must always be on guard against these evils but, for now, let us be thankful that we live in this great United States of America and have the freedoms that we do. Thanks be to God for His mercy.

Please feel free to let me know if you need anything and, by God’s grace, I will attempt to help you with your problems with the defective welfare system. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all.

  The editorial entitled “Pull the ad” is copied below:

  Good intentions can sometimes get a person in trouble. Just ask Sharon Pierce.

  Ms. Pierce runs The Villages, a non-profit agency that provides child and family services around Indiana. Non-profit agencies are barred by Internal Revenue Services from engaging in politicking. Pierce missed that rule.

  The Villages won a two-year $12 million contract from Gov. Mitch Daniel’s administration, according to The Associated Press. So when Mitch’s staff asked Pierce to talk in an ad how the governor is helping children and families, Pierce agreed.

  Now the Democrats are asking that the ad be pulled because of the no politicking rule. That is a reasonable request.

  Daniels should be given some of the credit for improving the lot of children and families in Indiana. The General Assembly approved funding for hundreds of child welfare case workers. Those hires were carried out by the Daniels administration and child deaths have dropped in Indiana. Daniels deserves some of the credit for that good news.

  But the Daniels campaign would have been better served by having parents or grandparents of children helped by the administration say so. Asking the head of a non-profit that just received a lucrative state contract to play pitchman for the governor shows someone on Daniels’ campaign staff didn’t think creatively.

  If the ad is pulled, the issue should go away. And the lesson learned should be that campaigns should never run testimonials by someone who is making money off the state.

  I, personally, wonder just how much good has been done. I am still aware of hundreds who have not received any help. Children and families are still in danger! The editorial states that there are fewer deaths now. One death is still too many! Perhaps, by giving money to the child/family welfare agencies, the governor was trying to hide the fact that not enough is being done. Thankfully, he did give money to hire case workers…but they need much more training. You simply dare not put a loaded gun into the hands of  an untrained hunter. Someone is going to get hurt…or worse.

The following is a copy of an article printed in the October 1, 2008 edition of The Goshen (Indiana) News:

        Welfare agency questioned about adoptions of slain girls

*Suspect was still collecting stipend after their deaths.

The Associated Press

  WASHINGTON–A Maryland woman suspected of killing and freezing her two daughters was convicted of a misdemeanor and had past financial problems, but was still able to adopt the girls and collect a monthly stipend for their care even after their deaths, officials said.

  The disturbing case has advocates questioning how the District of Columbia’s troubled social services agency evaluates potential adoptive and foster parents.

  Renee Bowman told investigators the frozen child-sized remains police found in her basement freezer over the weekend were those of her two daughters–age 9 and 11–both adopted from D.C. Bowman, 43, is suspected of killing them and has been charged with first-degree child abuse in the beating and neglect of a third adopted daughter, who is 7. The corpses were discovered after the 7-year-old apparently escaped through a bedroom window and was found wandering in a wooded area.

  Bowman was a foster mother to all three before adopting them in 2001 and 2004.

  “There is pressure across the board to get those adoption numbers up,” Richard Wexler, executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, said Tuesday. “My question is, did the D.C. workers have the time to look at it case by case?”

  It is the latest tragedy linked to the D.C. Child and Family Services Agency, which has been reeling since the January discovery of the decomposing bodies of four young sisters in a home that had a past report of abuse.

  It is unclear when Bowman became a foster mother. Bankruptcy could disqualify a person from becoming a foster parent, Wexler said.

  Calvert County deputies made the gruesome discovery of the frozen remains Saturday in Lusby.

  And I, personally, have to wonder if “getting adoptive numbers up” is worth all this. God, save us all.

Just a few nights ago, I had a dream–a very vivid dream. Now I need you to help me decipher it. Maybe it was nothing but I am feeling deep inside that it is propelling me to do more to protect children/families from the destruction caused by the child welfare system.

In this dream, I was on a bus trip with many other ladies. I think it was just a vacation trip and not far from my home here in Indiana. Suddenly the bus pulled up to a curb in a busy street and Dan Quayle, former vice president of the United States, looked in the bus window where I was sitting. (I have met him on a couple occasions.) He pointed at me then turned to a person beside him and said “So you say only 1 in 10 families is affected adversely by the welfare system so we should leave the system alone, but I want to ask if you would feel the same if yours was that 1 family?” Mine was that 1 family. I think now I must try to contact Mr. Quayle or someone in political power to help me carry on this fight. Or am I just crazy?

Pray for me. I do understand that God will never take us to it if He isn’t going to lead us through it! Thank God for that assurance.

Today I am begging you to consider praying for a friend of mine. He never professed to be a Christian but, I now know, he is. This young man voluntarily committed himself to a rehab center for alcoholics and asked the staff to throw away the key until they feel certain he can get along on his own (with God’s help) on the outside without alcohol. What a brave person he has turned out to be. And, just before he left, he thanked us, his friends, for their support and asked us to pray diligently for his recovery. Thank God for this person’s courage and now understanding that only with God’s help can he win this battle.