O/T Sister has a run in with family services

Well my sister has to fight DFS and I get the fun of going to court tomorrow. They say her house is not clean enough for her to raise her kid in it. Person from DFS has no kids so she is telling my sister how it should be done. Book learning type of person who has no clue what real life is. Since when should a person who has not done a thing tell a person who has how to do it?? Yep I'll be in court tomorrow and well hope I do not get to hot under the collar and make the judge to mad. Ya ranting a bit sad when the courts have to waste $$ this way. Oh by the way my sister lost her husband a few years ago and she is a cancer servitor

I sense some jeff foxworthy material in the making :roll:

Good Luck.

Dave

My BIL had authorities called when they delivered a new refridgerator! They deemed the place too dirty! Best wishes to your sister AND yourself as you do NOTHING to make things worse! Greg

I doubt that Family Services goes around making random house inspections, even in Missouri. Something or someone tipped them off to a potential problem. I'm not saying their actions are warranted, but I don't believe they came out of the blue. What's the rest of the story?

Please........

Theres a reason they came out. Im sorry she has had problems, but I dont buy it.....Im sure the person who came out, parent or not, knows the difference between cleanliness and filth.

(quoted from post at 19:29:42 10/24/10) Please........

Theres a reason they came out. Im sorry she has had problems, but I dont buy it.....Im sure the person who came out, parent or not, knows the difference between cleanliness and filth.

Click to expand...

Someone's people skills just went in the toilet............

they dont show up at a home unless they have been called.
someone called believing childs well being needs looking after.

Like it or not but CPS is a needed goverment agency

Well since none of us have seen your sisters house, I don't think we can say one way or another. Of course there's a difference between filth and clutter, our house having seen the latter with two kids and two working adults. (I've always told my wife we spent an awful lot for that table to fold the laundry on, in the dining room!)
Having said that, I've seen many places I wouldn't keep a dog in, and I'm not even a dog lover.

As a retired Law Officer, I can tell you there are probably more times they came out over a feud, than when and where they were really needed. This is a LONG post, but has many of the areas covered. Not good for the State though. I had them come to a scene where a 10 year old boy was chasing a truck his Mom was in, heading for a night out with a known doper. The driver stopped, and the kid hit the side of the truck, and fell under it. The driver took off real fast, and ran the kid over. A broken leg, and some ribs, but the kid survived. CPS (Child Protective Services) came out, and spent 5 hours doing an investigation. Left the kidS with the Grandparents ( over 70 and one with a stroke), while the Mom went on to party (she has a Right to some personal time they said). The Doper went to jail because of the dope found ON him, and the alcohol in his system. 3 weeks later, a call to the same place. She had slapped one of the kids, and when he fell off the steps, cracked hi skull, and died..... Another time, a Mom was in our jail on Federal drug charges. Her boyfriend came to visit, and brought HER son (not his). All visitors are checked for warrants etc. He had State felony drug warrants from another county, and a Fed warrant. I had to take him into custody right then, and try to figure out what to do with the kid. CPS comes again. They were called at 8:30 AM.and arrived at the jail at 10:45 AM. Only had to travel 30 miles to get there, but it was a Sunday and apparently no one was available to make an emergency investigation that morning. So..... After interviewing her sisters, her parents, and her Grandparents, they could not find anyone eligible to take custody of him. At 5:15 P.M., the caseworker left to take him to a foster home. I was dispatched to a call in the County to assist CPS. They wanted to investigate a Mom and Dad. They each had had trouble in the past. Both had taken care of it, and were woring and doing decent. CPS came in, and wanted to take the kids, because it was not clean enough for the kids. Wasn't surgical clean, but not bad. Again, BOTH parents worked, and kids were from 1-4 years old and cared for by one of their parents during the day. 3 hours later, it was decided to let the Grandparents have control of these babies, and a hearing set in County Court for a final determination. It was supposed to be 90 days, but "with some help" is was in 7 days. They got the kids back, and did real good with them. An old dope associate had turned them in. I saw many who were "By the book parents", never had any direct contact other than helping a family member or friend by watching their kids for a while, and none of their own. Maybe too much Dr. Oz or Phil for them...

We went through the crap Human Services puts on you. Our problem??? My two sisters mad at me for getting the home farm. I HAD TO BUY IT. They called and reported that our house was unfit for kids. They came in and tried to take the kids away to foster care until we could prove we where "fit" parents. Thank God that I know the county court judge personally. He came over while they where here. After some messing around they finally told him who caused the visit. We where in the middle of remodeling the house and did not have the furnace hooked up. We had electric oil heaters in the bedrooms and a big wood stove in the living room but they where going to take the kids because of the "unapproved" heat source. He issued a court order stopping any action from HS. He charged each of my sisters with falsifying a report. It cost them $500 each and a year probation. We had to have home visits for a year.

That left a sour taste in my mouth about government. I used to respect the law and the people enforcing it. Now I just tolerate it. If you look real close most of the ones enforcing the rules are the first to break those rules.

Amen to that.

Is the home a pigsty? 16 dogs and 23 cats in the home and it smells like a barn?

(quoted from post at 19:34:41 10/24/10)

(quoted from post at 19:29:42 10/24/10) Please........

Theres a reason they came out. Im sorry she has had problems, but I dont buy it.....Im sure the person who came out, parent or not, knows the difference between cleanliness and filth.

Click to expand...

Someone's people skills just went in the toilet............

Click to expand...

Im not knocking old or his family by any means, I feel sorry for what she had to go through, I really do, and I do know what its like to raise kids! I have 2. Sometimes things get behind, I know they do here! But to insult the girl who came out, saying she doesnt know what its like and shes never been in the real world is rediculus to say. It doesnt matter if she has kids, or works for thegov. in the real world, I would assume she was smart enough to know the differnece between filth and clutter. Its not her fault and he shouldnt be knocking her for doin g her job. For some reason, DFS was called. I dont think its fair to judge the person who came, kinda like the pot calling the kettle black.

Good luck! I'm not sure how they work by you, but here in New York we have "CPS", i.e. "Child Protective Services." They can and will, legally, repsond to any phoned in complaint - even if it's anoymomous. They will come to your house and ask to come in to look around. If you refuse, they call the cops and then force their way in. Note also - if they find nothing wrong - the occupants of the house still get put on a State-register "watch list" for 10 years. I'm on it. Why? One day I was out in the field running my tractor. Somebody phoned in a report that I had an unattended baby in the house while I was outside (probably my ex-wife). So, the investigators came. The "baby" was out with his mom, i.e., not home. Regardless they came in, checked the baby's room, took paint samples to check for lead paint, etc. They finally decided the report was officially "unfounded." That means it was bogus. And me? I am now on the State watch-list anyway. My wife isn't, I guess because she was not home at the time.

My first wife worked for CPS for many years. She was a tolerable "wack-job" when she started there, and a complete power-mad "mental-case" within a few years. That basically from getting a little power over people and it went to what was left of her head. She finally married a cop, who later lost his job after some sort of mental-breakdown. Sounds like they're made for each other.

Now? My ex-wife, ex-CPS worker who now lives on mental disability just did this. She is taking our 27 year-old daughter to court, trying to get court-ordered grandparnetal "custody and visitation" rights. That because my daughter cut off all visits from her mom to her own daughter (my grand-daughter). Note my ex-wife self-medicates, drinks (a lot),and also takes a brew of legally prescribed brain-fixing drugs. She also spent a year as an in-patient in a mental hospital. She has also claimed to have killed her own mother who had been living in a nursing home (with rat poison). I told the family court judge about that claim, and he dismissed it as "not rellevant" since the alledged event took place over 20 years ago. My argument was/is - it makes little difference if she really did it, or it's all in her mind. Either way, she's a bit scary.

So now my daughter has to borrow money to pay a lawyer, to defend her rights as a parent - to protect her own daughter - from her wacked-out ex-CPS worker mom.

I laughed the whole thing off a first. But after doing some research, I'm finding that many family courts are actually awarding such rights to angry grandparents.

That is a load of BS. In many states in the USA, child services investigators are "bottom of the ladder" entry-level jobs for anybody that has a four-year college degree and no real-world experience. My ex-wife first got her job there with a four-year degree in English Literature. That after she'd lived on welfare for many years.

Once you work there (at least here in NY), you have to use whatever guidelines the State hands to you. I have a friend who lived off-grid. He had his kids removed because he did NOT have a hard-line telephone in the house. He finally got them back after a court-battle. A farmer near me got his daugther removed because she helped milk cows in the morning before school.

Granted there are some real problems and kids really getting hurt. Thus the reason why these so-called "investigative experts" are given so much power. But, the vast majority of reports that get phoned in turn out to be 100% bogus. That because it is so easy to do.

How many of these investigators do you actually know? I suspect not many.

By the way, I had to take the same training as them, when I got certified to adopt a child in the great State of New York. This after I'd already raised four kids of my own to adulthood. Who was traing me how to be a good parent? Clueless kids in their 20s fresh out of college.

That is the kind of belief that has flushed all of our freedoms down the crapper. CPS and all other state and federal run social services are staffed by lazy, inept minorities who don't care about anything except their paychecks and benefits. Try finding one of those ''concerned'' staffers on a holiday or weekend.

Not passing judgment on the "old" family. But...

Over the years, I have been in homes of strangers that were filthy with dirty dishes all over the place, ants, cockroaches everywhere. Made my skin crawl. Doesn't mean the kids were in "danger". Never thought of calling Social Services on anyone else either. I've also heard of questionable cases like posters have described.

The frustration comes from the fact that Social Services HAS to investigate every complaint. How many times have you read about a serious abuse or death case where SS gets blamed for not intervening? How are they supposed to predict the future, i.e. is a "slob" of a parent also a "dangerous" or "unfit" parent? Tough call for anyone to make.

As for the "qualifications" of the social services worker: In most cases, they are following guidelines. They MAY not be parents but as Social Workers, they are NOT at the top of the pay scale and I would imagine most get into it because they have an interest in helping their fellow man. Hope things work out for you and your family.

JDemaris makes some very good points, adoptive parents go through a screening that is not required of people who just go out and make a baby.

Again, the problem stems from the fact that everyone looks to the government to solve all of our problems. If an abused kid gets hurt or killed, the first question is: where was protective services? Thank god, my kids are all adults. Nowadays if you take your kid to the doctor or school and they see a "suspicous" bruise or other injury, they are REQUIRED to call authorities. My kids (all very active in sports) ALWAYS had bruises and healing injuries. I'd probably still be in jail trying to explain some of them. :roll:

Around here the "Welfare", and "Child Protective
Services" people are a bunch of nosey busybodies,
"We know whats best for you", people. A bunch
of frustrated "old maids" sticking their noses
into other peoples business. Most are buck tooth
cross eyed,too ugly to find a husband types, who
get their satisfaction harassing honest people
based on groundless claims of jealous neighbors.

Old, take some time and get a fresh haircut and shave and put on your suit. You can easily look more believable than the DFS worker and whoever filed the complaint. The complainer will be there but you might not get to find out who it is.

See if you can look at the correspondence from DFS and find out what the actual "issues" are according to the DFS worker. Then you can tell the judge that your sister will have help from the family in addressing the issues. The judge will approve a parenting plan and your sister may have to go to some meetings and talk to more DFS workers.

Call me if you need to.

Very well put. I agree with just about every word you wrote.

Only thing I see a bit different is who goes for those jobs. I've known many who work in that field - since my ex-wife was one of them. A small sampling - yes. Call it my anecdotal observation in Cental New York. Very few that I know are there because they "care." In fact, many who DO go there because they truely care, quit out of sheer frustration. Most that stay that I personally know, have their own severe mental problems, and/or want power over others, and/or . . . are recently out of a abundant Arts college with a four-year degree related to Human Services - and NO other jobs are available with those limited credentials.

I once was accepted for a child abuse investigator job . . . with 30 years of auto-tractor-diesel repair and house building experience that was worthless to them. I also had raised four childen sucessfully and that was also worthless . . . - but I also a few college degrees in History and Cultural Anthropology that made me 100% qualified for the job. I didn't take it. Call it a "weak moment" in my life. I was crippled at the time from a tractor injury and looking for some sort of non-physical work. Local State employment office told me that the County Welfare and Child Protective Services place was the place to find jobs with a college degree and no experience.

One more anecdotal note. The person who ran Child Protective in this county (Otsego) quietly "transferred" to the county next door in Schoharie County, New York. Guess what happened next? He was arrested as a pedophile and for possession of child pornography. And . . this guy was running the place!

CPS is a necessary service, but...

I'm a single father who is currently in a custody battle for my kids. For the second time. First time I took her to court, now she's taking me to court.

Both times my ex tried the "his house is unfit" thing. Funny thing is, my house is CLEANER and LESS CLUTTERED than when she lived there! I was vindicated both times. How would my ex know what condition my house is in now? She hasn't been there in three years. I believe most complaints come from people who have a grudge. CPS figures it out.

The CPS people have a checklist, if you meet the minimum requirements, you're OK. I more than met them, your sister probably will, too. And if there is a problem, they let you fix it.

I'd say the single parent is one of the most scrutinized people in the country. It's terrible. I've visited MARRIED couples with children whose homes are in much worse shape than mine. Bad enough to take their kids away? No, mostly just cluttered!

I guess you have never seen a abused or neglected child.

lucky you

What a load of bull. Anybody can phone in a report and not even leave their name or contact info. As a result, the majority of reports are found to be 100% bogus. Many are phoned in by angry ex-spouses, angry ex girl or boy friends, new neighbors that just plain don't like somebody, city people that hate "dirty" farmers, etc.

To say all people who call in reports truly think there is a problem is absolutely rediculous. Go read some stats. Also, please don't move near me.

I was a police officer, in another lifetime.

The call I dreaded the most was to go pick up an HHS (Health & Human Services) worker and do a child neglect investigation. In my 12 years as a cop, I don't recall one (and I probably was involved in a hundred or better) of these investigations that was not unfounded (note I said "neglect", not "abuse", two totally different things).

The worse was when we had to go to an area that was nothing but low income housing. Three square blocks of 12-plex apartment buildings, 99% of the occupants on some sort of public assistance.

After being investigated, the person who was the subject of being investigated would immediately anonymously call in the two or three neighbors that she suspected may have reported her in retaliation. We would end up back in the same building, but in a different apartment, at least half a dozen times over the next few weeks.

One part of the job I don't miss at all.

"since when should a person who has not done a thing tell someone else how it is done ..." . Well, Old, apparently you haven't been around/worked for a corporation lately, because NO ONE in management has EVER done what they are telling you needs to be done faster with less mistakes by fewer people. As for DFS, they are bad news. Once they get their nose in your business it's nearly impossible to get them back out of your life.

Have someone call in a complaint about yourself and let them second guess the way YOU are raising YOUR kids and then let's see what you have to say AFTER you have learned something about what you are talking about.

This was all because of a Hot line call by some one who is mad at my sister

(quoted from post at 20:49:37 10/25/10) This was all because of a Hot line call by some one who is mad at my sister

Click to expand...

Then it seems that a simple visit by the CPS folks would show that the call is unfounded and all will be well.