ArVoices/Issues

Policy Issues Confronting Children of Incarcerated Parents

Please go to www.sfcipp.org and read the Bill of Rights for Children of Incarcerated Parents for a policy framework to improve the security and well-being of these children and families.

These rights are derived directly from interviews with the children and indicate the direction policy-makers should be considering when legislation concerning corrections and children, TANF programs for relative caregivers, law enforcement protocols and training, support for the children, ranging from light-weight interventions to full interventions to prevent further traumatizing of these children by ill-conceived policies.

Current Legislative Initiatives of Arkansas Voices for the Children Left Behind for the 2011 General Assembly follow:

Mandatory training for law enforcement and protocols concerning the conduct of an arrest in a home where children are present;
Continue funding for the One Per Cent to Prevent fund to enable non-profits to create services for children of incarcerated parents, their caregivers, and their parents during incarceration and after release; this fund was created in 2003 and has been used as match for federal grants of more than $1.8 million dollars in the state of Arkansas. Administered by Arkansas Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention State Commission;

Legislation to ban the use of any sort of restraints during medical or other transport purposes, during labor and delivery of a mother who is incarcerated in any detention facility, including the state’s prison system, local and county jails, and juvenile detention facilities.
Create and fund a kinship navigator program to provide information and support for relative caregivers caring for a family member’s child for all of the reasons the children come into the relatives’ homes.