Empowering Advocates for Children and Youth in LA’s Foster Care

Support for foster and systems-impacted youth

Long Beach Antelope Valley South Bay Gateway Cities San Fernando Valley West LA San Gabriel Valley South LA East LA Central LA City of Los Angeles (select only if your project has a citywide benefit) County of Los Angeles (select only if your project has a countywide benefit)

Expand existing project, program, or initiative (expanding and continuing ongoing, successful work)

There are currently 14,139 children in foster care in Los Angeles County, and the adults who care about them, including their relatives and caregivers, are often their greatest advocates. They know the children best but face daunting challenges when they seek to bring a child to the attention of the juvenile court to ensure that their needs are met and their rights are protected. Our CA juvenile courts are where decisions about every child’s placement, relationships, treatment, and future are ultimately made, but without legal expertise, intervening in court proceedings to fight for a child is daunting. The playing field for unrepresented family members, caregivers, and concerned community members in juvenile court is not level, and the justice gap is wide. Free legal services and support to ensure that these independent voices are heard improves the lives of children in foster care and brings a critical measure of accountability.

Advokids’ Empowering Advocates for Children and Youth in LA’s Foster Care provides critical and essential free legal services to underserved adults seeking to navigate the child welfare and juvenile court system to advance the rights of children in foster care, prevent traumatic stressors, and ensure their safety and security. Over the past 12 months, Advokids served 181 clients seeking to advocate for 253 children and youth in foster care, providing direct legal services and support for days, weeks, months, and years as the child’s court case advanced through the court process. Over 40% of the clients we served were relatives, non-related family members, and siblings seeking placement of or visitation with a child in foster care. We know from the data we collect on every case that juvenile dependency court judges make better and more informed decisions about a child’s case when they have firsthand information about a child’s history of trauma, current vulnerabilities, and socio-emotional and developmental needs from the child’s caregiver, relatives, treatment providers, and other concerned adults. Our casework also allows our staff attorneys to have a unique “ear to the ground” and gather data to track the Los Angeles Department of Children and Families’ strict adherence to our laws and regulations that protect children.

Advokids’ vision of success is the opening of the Los Angeles Juvenile Courthouse doors and “access to justice” for all Angelenos seeking to advocate for a child or youth in foster care or at risk of entering care, empowering them to:
Engage effectively with the juvenile court and advocate for a child’s right to safety, security, and a permanent home.
Bring concerns to the court and seek a court order to protect a child from an unnecessary placement disruption or traumatic event
Seek visitation with or placement of a child with whom they are related
Seek to secure necessary medical treatment or mental health treatment for a child
Access to justice is critical because our child welfare courts are presumptively closed to the public, allowing for minimal public scrutiny and accountability, and that can be dangerous for children. Advokids’ programs work to keep the doors of the courthouse wide open for anyone seeking to advocate for and protect a child.