Child abuse; Comey power trip; waste of $1 million
Child abuse
Thank you for your thoughtful look into child abuse, an important issue not only for our community, but all of Texas (“A voice for children,” June 4).
I have a picture on my desk of one of the subjects in your report who spent over a year with a foster family.
Their care gave the child a chance to heal from unimaginable physical and emotional trauma until a relative was found to provide a safe home.
Our community depends on more than 900 foster parents, the unsung heroes who offer a temporary home and critical levels of care to approximately 60 percent of vulnerable children who for their own safety must be removed from their biological family.
Improvements to the child welfare system were deemed a top priority by Gov. Abbott and significant reform was recently passed into law.
A central focus was to expand the model of “community-based foster care” modeled right here in Tarrant and six surrounding counties. This approach has successfully produced better results for kids in foster care and will now be expanded to other parts of the state.
Thank you for bringing to light that this is our community and these are our kids—they are counting on us to get this right.
Wayne Carson, ACH Child and Family Services, Fort Worth
Several times I submitted information to Child Protective Services about a family regarding abuse and neglect of their children, giving as much information as I could — ages, names type of abuse and neglect., etc.
The Tarrant County office decided it wasn’t bad enough to even investigate. That’s what the workers told me.
Katherine Ferdinandsen, Fort Worth
The one thing that you did not mention is the role of CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) in helping these children by advocating in court and with CPS.
CASA does a fantastic job of having a profound, direct impact. When a child enters the child welfare system due to abuse or neglect, a judge can appoint a committed volunteer to advocate for the child’s best interest in court and other settings.
We work to do what is best for these children.
Susann M. Eller, Burleson
Comey power trip
After listening to all the back and forth on the Comey issue, I found it odd that former FBI Director Comey precipitately closed the email investigation of Hillary Clinton and announced that fact publicly in spite of the voluminous evidence that he had amassed against her.
Yet, with President Trump, with no known evidence against him of any collusion with Russia, Comey refused to announce publicly that Trump was not under investigation in spite of the fact that he privately told Trump that he wasn’t under investigation several times. He just sort of dangled that fact over Trump at meetings.
Trump wanted Comey to publicly put the issue to bed by a public announcement so that the whole thing would die down and Trump and the Republicans in Congress could get on with the program that they were elected to accomplish.
Why did Comey refuse to publicly acknowledge that Trump was not under investigation?
Was it simply a power trip on Comey’s part based on nothing other than that or did Comey just want Trump to squirm a little because of the perverse rush of power that it gave Comey?
William Brown, Arlington
Waste of $1 million
Governor Abbott has just wasted almost $1 million of our tax dollars by calling for a special session of the legislature to talk about bathrooms and vouchers, two issues that have been debated ad nauseam and rejected.
What happened to the fiscal conservatism of the Republican Party for which I cast my first vote in 1988?
What happened to the concept of limited government as promulgated by Ronald Reagan in 1980? Are taxpayers okay with Texas Republicans tossing our money down the drain so that they can pander to their political base?
When the governor called for a special session, he said that “we need a law that protects the privacy of our children in our public schools.”
Wrong, Gov. Abbott.
We need a law that protects children in our public schools from the idiocy of Texas politicians.
William W. Thorburn, Benbrook
This story was originally published June 9, 2017 at 5:09 PM with the headline "Child abuse; Comey power trip; waste of $1 million."