Children in Poverty : Reconciling Children's Interests with Child Protective and Welfare Policies: A Response to Ward Doran and Roberts

Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) is the primary assistance program for low-income families. A number of these families are also involved with the child welfare (child protective) system. For a conference on TANF this article was prepared as a response to another conference article, Ward Doran & Roberts, Welfare Reform and Families in the Child Welfare System, 61 Md. L. Rev. 386 (2002), which focuses on the impact of TANF and child welfare on mothers. This article takes a more child-centered view and elaborates on the overlapping issues of the child welfare system and TANF, identifying both positive and negative aspects of these two systems. The article concludes that parental responsibility should not be used as a justification for depriving children of basic needs and proposes that child welfare be considered more as a joint parent-community responsibility