Giving Up Child Custody For Mental Health Care

There are a group of Connecticut parents who feel they must relinquish custody of  their “high needs” children in order to get them into residential treatment programs when in-home services are inadequate to meet their needs. 

Many years ago, the Connecticut Department of Children and Families chose to move children out of residential treatment centers and back to their families or foster care. Most agree it was a good move; residential care is expensive and many kids do better at home.

Some wonder if we've gone too far. The combined effect of the closing of residential centers, budget restrictions, and lack of available community resources to fill the void have led to a perfect storm. 

Connecticut is not the only state to use the 'custody-for-care' loophole. It still happens in 44 states, even though 26 of those states have statutes or policies to prevent it. Connecticut has significantly decreased its use over the last decade, but not enough.

No one is a bad actor in this story. Parents do the best they can under difficult and stressful circumstances. DCF does the best they can within the reality of political and budgetary pressures. And there are systemic problems with the way insurance, hospitals, and schools are set-up to deal with the expensive and complex needs of some children.  

Today, we take a look. 

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