(oregonlive.com) Native American and African American children make up just a fraction of Oregon’s population but they’re represented in larger numbers in Oregon foster homes.
It is also true nationally that a disproportionate number of minority children live in foster homes.
The “Kids Count 2007 Databook,” to be released today by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, reports that 32 percent of children living in foster homes in 2005 were African American. At the same time, African Americans made up 15 percent of the total population of U.S. children.
In Oregon, recent numbers from the state Department of Human Services show that 12.4 percent of the more than 16,000 Oregon children in foster care last year were Native American, while Native Americans account for 1.3 percent of the Oregon population 18 and younger. Seven percent of children living in Oregon foster homes in 2006 were African American, yet African Americans make up 1.9 percent of the state’s children.
Researchers have known about a larger share of minorities living in foster homes in Oregon and nationally for several years. But it has only recently become a top concern for child welfare experts.
The Casey report concludes that African American children are “vastly overrepresented in the foster care population; therefore, they face a significantly greater risk of growing up without a strong, permanent family than do white children.” (more…)
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