Florida Senate - 2009                            (NP)    SR 2784
       
       
       
       By Senator Wise
       
       
       
       
       5-04515-09                                            20092784__
    1                          Senate Resolution                        
    2         A resolution calling on the United States Congress to
    3         authorize and President Barack Obama to convene a
    4         White House Conference on Children and Youth in 2010.
    5  
    6         WHEREAS, many children in the United States face serious
    7  challenges, including an estimated 3 million reports of child
    8  abuse and neglect, and nearly 900,000 reports of child abuse and
    9  neglect are substantiated each year, and
   10         WHEREAS, more than 500,000 children and youth are in foster
   11  care at the end of the federal fiscal year and nearly 800,000
   12  spend at least some time in care throughout the year, and
   13         WHEREAS, while 50,000 children are adopted from the public
   14  child welfare system each year, more than 117,000 children are
   15  waiting to be adopted, and
   16         WHEREAS, each year approximately 22,000 youth leave the
   17  foster care system not because they have found a permanent
   18  family but because they have reached the age at which foster
   19  care assistance ends, and
   20         WHEREAS, there is an over-representation of certain
   21  populations, including Native Americans and African Americans,
   22  within the child welfare system, and
   23         WHEREAS, the number of children being raised by
   24  grandparents and other relatives is increasing and should be
   25  encouraged, and the Federal Government has recognized through
   26  federal law that kinship care is an important permanency and
   27  placement option for many children, and
   28         WHEREAS, the state courts are key decisionmakers in the
   29  lives of children involved in the child welfare system and
   30  should be supported as they determine whether abuse or neglect
   31  has occurred, whether a child should be reunified with his or
   32  her family, or whether the child should be adopted or placed in
   33  another setting, and
   34         WHEREAS, the child welfare system includes a professional
   35  workforce in the courts, public and private child welfare
   36  agencies, mental health and health care programs, education
   37  settings, citizen review panels, and volunteers such as court
   38  appointed special advocates, which should be strengthened, and
   39         WHEREAS, the challenge of child abuse cannot be effectively
   40  addressed in a sustained manner until the nation addresses the
   41  outcomes for children in a comprehensive way, and
   42         WHEREAS, the White House Conference on Children and Youth
   43  had been the oldest White House conference starting in 1909 and
   44  continuing every 10 years until the last conference in 1970, and
   45         WHEREAS, these conferences resulted in significant policies
   46  over the decades, including the creation of the Children’s
   47  Bureau and standards of care for children, and focused attention
   48  on critical needs of American’s children, NOW, THEREFORE,
   49  
   50  Be It Resolved by the Senate of the State of Florida:
   51  
   52         That the Senate respectfully calls on the United States
   53  Congress to authorize and President Barack Obama to convene a
   54  White House Conference on Children and Youth in 2010.