From Punishment to Partnership: A Practical Roadmap for Replacing the Child Welfare System

I’ve Been Inside. Now I'm Rewriting the System

Many people agree the child welfare system is broken. But almost no one can tell you what to build instead.

I can!

I was raised in the church, rooted in scripture, and taught that justice without mercy isn’t justice at all. My parents taught me to live the gospel, not just recite it. I grew up believing the Bible wasn’t just for Sunday sermons. It is a blueprint for how we live, lead, and serve, especially when it comes to how we treat the most vulnerable.

I spent 22 years working inside Florida’s child welfare system. I sat at the tables. I reviewed the files. I watched parents, especially Black parents, be punished for surviving systems that were never built to support them.

And every piece of that journey has led me to this blog: a practical, principled, faith-rooted roadmap for replacing the system entirely.

This blog is not just a vision. It’s the beginning of something bigger. A new system that holds institutions accountable, funds families instead of strangers, and ends forced separation in the name of protection.

If you identify as a Christian, this framework aligns with the teachings of Jesus. It challenges us to rethink how we define safety, justice, and care. And in a nation that calls itself Christian, we must ask: how can we follow Christ while defending a system built on harm?

The Blueprint: 7 Steps to Replace the System

This is not a tweak. This is a replacement of the current system.

These seven pillars form the foundation of a child and family well-being system rooted in dignity, grounded in Biblical principles and common sense, guided by truth, driven by science, and accountable to the very people it exists to serve.

These are not suggestions. They are non-negotiables for any system that claims to protect children without punishing their parents.

And if children had the power to choose, I’m confident they would choose this framework over the one we have now, which removes them from their parents, inflicts system-induced trauma, and then scrambles to treat the very harm it caused while chasing “permanency.”

1. Use Science to Inform Practice

This new system will be grounded in what we already know to be true: the science of bonding, attachment,  family-finding, trauma, and resilience. We don’t need more data. We need to make decisions that honor it. Trauma-informed can’t be a label. It must be a commitment to humanity, especially for families who have long been dehumanized.

2. Hold Agencies Accountable

When government systems or community-based nonprofits are paid to serve families but fail to deliver, the system, not the parent, should be held accountable. Public funding must come with public responsibility. If an agency cannot show that it strengthens rather than surveils families, it should not receive funding. Period.

3. Redefine Child Welfare's Role: From Prosecutor to Partner

Parents are not criminals. They’re citizens. Taxpayers. People. In this new system, DCF does not stand across from the parents in court. It stands beside them. The real adversary is the system or organization that failed to deliver, not the parents doing their best to survive.

4. Fund Parents Like You Fund Strangers

We currently pay strangers to raise children, offering them money, services, and support, while denying that same help to birth parents. That ends here. In the new system, a child’s biological family will be resourced, respected, and prioritized.

5. Restore the Dignity of Choice

Families deserve the dignity to define their own path to healing. No more forced case plans. No more one-size-fits-all mandates.

This new system will trust families to lead, offering real options, not ultimatums. It will level the playing field, treating every family with the same respect, autonomy, and humanity we would want for our own.

The current system is built on the legacy of slavery where it was acceptable for some to be controlled while others were free. But we know that God created all of us equal. Dignity, agency, and choice must belong to every family, not just the privileged few.

6. Stop Designing Systems Around Exceptions

Yes, there are rare, severe cases. But we’ve built an entire system around those exceptions and used them to justify widespread harm.

The truth is, tragic situations happen in both birth and foster families. Most parents and most foster parents are not causing irreparable harm.

There are extraordinary cases, like a baby left at a fire station, where no family is known. Of course, we need a plan for those moments. But they are the exception, not the rule.

In most situations, there are parents or relatives ready to care if they’re supported.

A just system must be built on truth, not fear and punishment.

7. End Forcible Family Separation

This is the core of the new model: remove the state’s power to take children from their families. That power has been abused for decades. Reforms have failed. The timelines imposed on parents are rigid and unforgiving, yet the system has had years to get it right and has not. It’s time to terminate the system’s right to forcibly remove children. Period.

What This Looks Like: A Practical Example

A mother raising a child with autism applies for help from the Agency for Persons with Disabilities (APD). She’s placed on a waitlist. Her stress builds. Her husband leaves. She is overwhelmed, exhausted, and still waiting.

She calls the agency. The response? “Be patient. Your child is on the waitlist”

The situation at home continues to deteriorate. Eventually, a concerned school social worker calls the abuse hotline.

In today’s system, that report is made against the mother as the alleged perpetrator. DCF arrives to investigate her.

She could lose her child.

The agency that failed to provide services? Untouched.

She is given a case plan with a compliance timeline. And if she doesn't meet it, her parental rights could be terminated.

The courtroom becomes State vs. Mother. DCF on one side. The mother and her attorney are on the other.

But in the new system...

The report is filed against APD, not the mother.

The investigator contacts the mother, not to accuse, but to understand: when the application was submitted, how long her child has waited, and what support she’s already tried to access.

The focus shifts from parental failure to systemic failure.

If the situation requires court intervention, the mother sits with the State and APD must answer for its inaction. The judge can then order the agency to act based on the investigator’s findings.

If immediate support is needed, a trained foster parent is assigned, not to replace the mother, but to support her with respite, in-home care, and temporary relief. That foster parent still receives a stipend, but this time it’s used to preserve the family, not dismantle it.

This is what it looks like when a system is built on compassion, not control. A system that lifts up families, holds public agencies accountable, and reflects the justice and mercy God calls us to extend.

Reimagining the Role of the State

In this new framework, DCF workers are not compliance monitors.

They are resource navigators. Advocates. System gap identifiers.

They know what’s available.

They advocate for families.

They hold other systems accountable.

DCF becomes what it should have always been: a state agency that walks alongside families, ensuring they have what they need for their children to thrive.

And that vision aligns with scripture.

Jesus didn’t judge struggling families. He sat with them.

He didn’t punish the poor. He challenged the powerful.

He didn’t separate. He restored.

This Isn’t a Dream. It’s a Design.

This isn’t wishful thinking.

It’s cost-effective. It’s evidence informed. It’s morally urgent.

We already have funding.  We just allocate it backward.

We already have the people.  We just train them to police instead of serve.

We already have the need  What we’ve lacked is the will.

But that changes now.

This blog introduces the full framework and, in the weeks ahead, I’ll go deeper into each of the seven pillars in individual posts. Because each one deserves its own attention. Together, they are part of something bigger.

From Theory to Action

This is not just a critique. It’s a construction.

It's not just abolition. It’s resurrection.

If you’ve ever asked, “If not this system, then what?”

This is your answer.

If you’ve ever wondered how we stop punishing families and start supporting them.

This is how.

We don’t need better investigations. We need different intentions.

We don’t need better training .We need a different purpose.

It’s time to stop protecting systems and start protecting families.

Let’s build it together.

Join me in this movement for change that doesn’t just protect families.  It strengthens generations to come.

We’re breaking the cycles of system-induced trauma that have been passed down for far too long.

Because God heals.

God restores.

God transforms.

The enemy divides, punishes, and coerces, but healing is God’s way.

It’s time to choose restoration over removal, justice over judgment, and love over fear.

The future begins now.