Miami Herald reports that over the past six years, 41 percent of all children who died of abuse or neglect in Florida had been the subject of at least one prior contact with child protection authorities. Florida leads the nation in this horrible statistic. The average for all other states: about 12 percent.
And the statistic has gotten worse each year. In 2009, 64 of the 120 child deaths nationally with a history of prior reports occurred in Florida – or 53 percent.
Our state isn’t protecting those most vulnerable. The number of Florida children under protective supervision — meaning authorities allowed them to remain with their parents while caseworkers monitored the home and provided services geared toward improving safety —also declined dramatically, from 17,300 in 2003 to 7,350 in 2008.
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