Casey Family Programs statement on family separation
Casey Family Programs’ Board of Trustees and Executive Team issued the following statement on the current issue of immigrant family separation.
Casey Family Programs is deeply pained by the current situation involving the tragic and trauma-inducing separation of immigrant children from their parents and families. Our nation’s history and decades of research have clearly documented the lifelong impact of childhood trauma on both the mental and physical growth and development of human beings.
This foundation’s more than 50-year history of working with babies, toddlers and older children in foster care, tribal communities, and communities of need across the United States has shown us that there is no more important charge for us as a people than to nurture and care for our children.
To this end, Casey Family Programs is committed to ensuring that the “standard of our own” be the driving force as we seek to work with others to foster an environment of hope for all of our children. The “standard of our own” simply states that if a level of treatment would not be good enough for our own children, then it should not be allowed for any child in America.
Casey Family Programs will work through the relationships that we have developed in all 50 states to ensure that our staff and our organizational capacity are leveraged in order to ensure that every child and every family is accounted for. As a people, we cannot allow there to be any unnamed and unknown children.
We will work with others to ensure that every child and every family has a voice because we cannot allow there to be any children who remain voiceless and whose cries go unheard. We will work to ensure that every child and every family has a pathway to having their immediate needs met and that they have a pathway to being reunified with each other.
As a people, we cannot accept any child being sentenced to a heartbroken life and a life of unresolved separation from his or her family.
As the many people, organizations, advocates, government leaders, business leaders, philanthropic leaders and community leaders across this nation are coming together to address this current challenge, Casey Family Programs is committed to working with you to ensure that not only the approximately 440,000 children in our foster care system, but all of our children, know the life-saving impact of hope.
Every Child Deserves a Community of Hope,
The Casey Family Programs Board of Trustees and Executive Team
David C. Mills, Chair
Joan B. Poliak, Vice Chair
America Bracho, Secretary
Sharon L. McDaniel, Treasurer
Doug Patejunas, Trustee
Dr. William C. Bell, President and CEO
Joseph Boateng, Chief Investment Officer
Dave Danielson, Chief Financial Officer
Marva Hammons, Executive Vice President
Roxanna Nowparast, Chief Program Counsel
Laura Sagen, Executive Vice President
David Sanders, Executive Vice President