Available online at www.sciencedirect.com

Children and Youth Services Review 30 (2008) 674–688www.elsevier.com/locate/childyouth

Bridging the divide between child welfare and domestic violenceservices: Deconstructing the change process

Kerry Moles ⁎

The Children's Aid Society, 150 East 45th Street, New York, NY 10017, United States

Available online 31 January 2008

Abstract

In spite of the long and well-documented history of tension between the domestic violence and child welfare systems in theUnited States, a number of communities have developed effective collaborations between the two in order to better meet the needsof families involved with both. After setting the historical context for the tensions between providers of child welfare and domesticviolence services, the changing relationship between the two systems is examined from the perspective of professionals in bothfields in one large urban community, New York City. Recommendations are made for continued progress. Communities seeking toimprove their own response to the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment may be able to gain from developinga broader understanding of the challenges and successes of the change process in a community which has struggled to improvecollaboration.© 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Domestic violence; Intimate partner violence; Child welfare; Systems change; Change process; Collaboration

1. Introduction

From the time that the first organized services for battered women appeared in the United States in the 1970s,domestic violence services operated separately from child welfare services, with little collaboration and often a greatdeal of tension and distrust between the two (Fleck-Henderson, 2000; Findlater & Kelly, 1999; Magen, Conroy, &DelTufo, 2000; Mills, 1998a; Peled, 1996; Schechter, 1996; Schechter & Edleson, 1999; Stark, 2007). Until recently,child welfare agencies have largely ignored the presence of intimate partner violence (IPV) in families when there wasno indication that a child was being directly abused (Findlater & Kelly, 1999; Gordon, 1988; Stark, 2007; A. Williams-Isom, personal communication, April 21, 2006). At the same time domestic violence service providers have oftenavoided collaboration with child welfare agencies because of their distrust in that system's willingness or ability to besensitive to the needs of abused mothers (Beeman, Hagemeister, & Edleson, 1999; Findlater & Kelly, 1999; E. Roberts,personal communication, September 20, 2007; Stark, 2007).

Practitioners in both the child welfare and domestic violence service systems may agree on broader common goals,including the well-being of families, the empowerment of non-abusive parents to protect their children, accountability

⁎ Tel.: +1 212 503 6837; fax: +1 212 972 7790.E-mail address: kerrym@childrensaidsociety.org.

0190-7409/$ - see front matter © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.childyouth.2008.01.007

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for the abusive partner, and the interruption of the intergenerational transmission of family violence. Improvedcommunication and collaboration between the systems is necessary to achieve these goals (Conroy, 2000; Findlater &Kelly, 1999; Fleck-Henderson, 2000; Schechter & Edleson, 1999). Collaboration, or the act of working jointly towardcommon goals, in this case entails two distinct social service systems working together to address the overlappingissues of intimate partner violence and child maltreatment in a population which is served by both. This collaborationmay be served if members of both communities develop a better understanding of the history, values and missions ofboth systems, as well the current struggles to reconcile the conflicts between them.

This paper examines the progress in the collaboration of the two systems, using New York City as an example todeconstruct the change process. While it is acknowledged that IPV occurs with similar frequency among same-sexcouples as heterosexual couples, and that women perpetrate IPVagainst men, this discussion generally refers to abusedmothers whose perpetrators are men, as these are the vast majority of cases that come into contact with the child welfaresystem.

2. The historical context

The first social agencies devoted to issues of family violence arose in the United States in the 1870s, called Societiesfor the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (SPCC's) (Gordon, 1988). While these agencies focused on child abuse, childwelfare workers were well aware of the high incidence of IPV in their caseloads. In her analysis of hundreds of caserecords of child protection agencies in the United States from 1880 to 1960, Gordon (1988) identified IPV in 34% ofthe cases, found that 28% of battered women were alleged to be neglectful, 13% of abused mothers were also childabusers, and 41% of men who abused their wives also abused their children. In light of the current themes of distrustmany abused women feel for child welfare workers, it is ironic that battered women “ … virtually dragged the childprotection workers into wife-beating problems …” in spite of a strong professional disinclination on the part of childprotection workers to get involved (Gordon, 1988).

Battered mothers turned to child protection agencies in part because of the inadequacy of police protection, but childprotection workers were not much more helpful. Gordon (1988) traces the evolution of what domestic violence serviceproviders today term ‘victim blaming’ on the part of child protection workers. When they were unable to ignore thewife-beating but could not reform violent men, many caseworkers began to define IPV as a problem for the woman towork on (Gordon, 1988). Victim blaming became even more pervasive after the 1930s, in part due to changes inprocedures that required social workers to “map the problem onto the client who was present and influenceable”(Gordon, 1988, p. 281). Fewer men were seen as casework became increasingly professionalized and moved out of thehome and into the office; women were more introspective and self-critical, while men were more defensive about theirbehavior. “In search of any ways to influence troubled families, social workers not unnaturally focused on those mostopen to influence” (Gordon, 1988, p. 282). Then in the 1950's, the psychiatric influence led social workers topathologize and blame women for their husband's abuse, with labels like ‘masochist,’ ‘neurotic,’ ‘frigid’ or‘provocative’ (Gordon, 1988). This theme has been a constant to this day: Mills et al. (2000) found a tendency amongchild welfare workers to view the battered woman, rather than the batterer, as responsible for the abuse, and to perceivea woman who stayed in an abusive relationship as complicit.

During the revival of feminism in the 1970's, as the first domestic violence shelters were established and large-scaleorganized activism began, the feminist movement declared domestic violence a social and political issue. Until thispoint, family violence in general was treated as resulting from individual maladies: child abuse was attributed to poorparenting skills, anger management problems, stress, substance abuse or mental illness, while IPV was attributed topoor interpersonal relations, the stress of poverty, a man's alcoholism or short-temper, or a woman's emotionalinstability. In the 1970's, IPV was redefined in terms of the social and political maladies of patriarchy, sexism, and thehistorical subjugation of women. The Battered Women's movement developed its own set of philosophies, responses,institutions, legislation and funding. Thus the problem of family violence had ‘split’ into two distinct issues: childabuse and woman abuse. This was an important paradigm shift which greatly widened the chasm between domesticviolence and child welfare service providers.

Other sources of tension are the differing and sometimes conflicting missions of child welfare and domestic violenceprofessionals. The priority of child welfare organizations is the protection of children and the preservation of families,while the priority of domestic violence services is the safety and empowerment of women. These philosophicaldifferences affect the approach, focus and impact of each system's interventions with clients. The child protective

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system, in its ability to challenge parental rights, can disempower women, while the battered women's movement, in itscommitment to a woman's right to make her own choices, can neglect child safety (Fleck-Henderson, 2000).

Many domestic violence programs define child protection as the enemy of battered women, removing theirchildren precipitously and blaming mothers for the violence that their male partners perpetrate. For their part,CPS workers often see domestic violence advocates as blindly loyal to women and as willing to ignore female-perpetrated child abuse and neglect. (Schechter, 1996, p. 62)

A related source of friction is the coercive vs. voluntary nature of services. Child welfare agencies can leveragethe legal system to charge a parent with a crime, mandate participation in social services, or order the removal ofchildren. Domestic Violence advocates see a victims' voluntary participation in services as core to their philosophy ofempowerment and self-determination (Fleck-Henderson, 2000; Mills, Grauwiler, & Pezold, 2006; Schechter, 1982).While the presence of coercive power is a significant aspect of any governmental intervention, its meaning can beparticularly weighty for a mother who has experienced domestic violence, as the relationship of a child protectiveworker to the victim of IPV can in many ways replicate the power imbalance and coercion of an abusive intimaterelationship (Fleck-Henderson, 2000). Fleck-Henderson (2000) points out that the child protective worker who strivesto empower a victim of domestic violence is implicitly in a paradoxical position.

The Child Welfare and Domestic Violence systems also have important structural differences. Child welfare inthe United States today is a highly regulated government bureaucracy, while domestic violence services are usuallyprovided by community-based, non-profit organizations that operate under a combination of government grants,fundraising and private donations. In fact, domestic violence organizations developed in large part because of women'sfrustration with government agencies, including law enforcement and child welfare, which were not responding to theneeds of abused women and were experienced as victim-blaming (Fleck-Henderson, 2000). The advent of domesticviolence services in the 1970s was seen as a threat to some in the child welfare system who worried that acknowledgingdomestic violence would open a political Pandora's box, and that funding to help battered women could diminishfinancial support for children's services (Stark, 2007).

The treatment of domestic violence and child maltreatment as two separate phenomena began to change in the 1990sas a growing body of literature documented a high incidence of co-occurrence (American Humane Association, 1994;Appel & Holden, 1998; Hangen, 1994; Straus & Gelles, 1990). Efforts to coordinate services and develop collaborativerelationships between domestic violence and child welfare providers has now become commonplace in the UnitedStates (Findlater & Kelly, 1999; Stark, 2007; Whitney & Davis, 1999).

The historical tension between the child welfare and domestic violence systems has evolved around differences inthe two system's missions, priorities, politics and organizational structures. The philosophical emphasis on voluntaryvs. coercive nature of services, as well as the different perceptions of the underlying causes of maltreatment as personalvs. social maladies, have resulted not only in a lack of collaboration, but at times distrustful and even antagonisticrelationships. While some tension between the two systems may be necessary and at times even useful, manycommunities in the United States have recognized the need to improve collaborative relationships in order to addressthe needs of both children and mothers who have been affected by family violence.

3. The change process in New York City

The remainder of this article explores the changing relationship between child welfare and domestic violence serviceproviders in New York City (NYC). This particular community was chosen as the subject of this examination becausethe author resides and works in this community, has a working knowledge of its systems, and has access to bothdomestic violence and child welfare service providers in it. To understand these events and relationships, the authorinterviewed members of both the domestic violence service community and the child welfare system in NYC, many ofwhom have been involved with efforts at collaboration and integration over the past three decades.

New York City's child welfare system has undergone numerous changes in organizational structure and name. Forthe sake of consistency, the city-operated child welfare services will be referred to as Children's Services regardless ofthe name of the agency during the time period under discussion. The city's child welfare system is partially privatized.Children's Services investigates allegations of abuse or neglect and contracts private non-profit organizations toprovide over 95% of foster care services. The city also contracts out the vast majority of what is known as PreventiveServices. The goal of Preventive Services is to prevent child maltreatment and the need for foster care placement by

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providing services to increase safety and improve family functioning (City of New York, 2005). Preventive Servicesare often mandated by the city when a child is deemed at risk but removal from the home is not warranted.

3.1. Early dynamics between domestic violence and child welfare providers

During the first two decades or more that domestic violence organizations operated in NYC, child welfare anddomestic violence advocates provided parallel services to frequently overlapping populations, but typically did notwork together (Connect, Inc., 2005b). Some of the city's earliest domestic violence advocates described manifestationsof the distrust they felt toward the child welfare system. A founding board member of the NewYork State's first publiclyfunded domestic violence shelter, established in Brooklyn in the mid-seventies, remembers a debate about whether staffshould report cases of child abuse to Children's Services, and whether the shelter should avoid hiring professional socialworkers because they were mandated reporters. She recalls that there was an assumption that professional socialworkers could only “pathologize” survivors of domestic violence (K. Conroy, personal communication, April 18,2006).

The founder and former Director of a shelter that opened in 1983 said that at the time, shelters were required to runchecks on incoming residents and report to Children's Services any mother who had an open child protectiveinvestigation. Although the Director refused to comply because she knew it would jeopardize the women's safety, therewere cases when Children's Services did track down a woman who was in shelter with her children and remove thechildren on the basis of ‘failure to protect’. While this kind of situation did not happen often, when it did the deep senseof injustice felt by battered women and their advocates pervaded the community (A. DelTufo, personal communication,April 5, 2006).

Another example comes from an official in the field education department of a major university's school of socialwork, who recalls a local domestic violence service provider requesting an intern who would sign a written agreementnot to report suspected child abuse to child protective services (K. Conroy, personal communication, April 18, 2006).

The above are examples of what child welfare workers charged was the ‘blind loyalty’ of battered women'sadvocates toward victims of domestic violence, at the expense of their children. In NYC, one exception to this trendwas a domestic violence program that grew out of a private child welfare agency, which provided contracted foster careand Preventive services. According to the founder of the project, there was no discernable animosity toward Children'sServices staff, because the project grew out of a child welfare orientation (K. Conroy, personal communication,April 18, 2006).

Domestic violence advocates today explain that in the seventies and eighties, there was little knowledge of thelong-term effects of witnessing domestic violence on children, and there was a resistance to even considering thepossibility that an abused woman might, herself, be an abuser. A former shelter director said that there was anelement of “not wanting to look at the problems of mothers. You were either a victim or a perpetrator. If you were avictim, you couldn't be a perpetrator.” The possibility of a battered woman also being abusive or neglectful was toocomplex, too gray, she explained, and the position of absolute support for battered women came out of a need tocounter the victim-blaming culture of society, including the child welfare system. If you allowed for the possibility ofa battered woman being a child abuser, then you opened the floodgates of victim blaming (A. DelTufo, personalcommunication, April 5, 2006).

Another advocate said, “There used to be this rigidity around not making it appear that battered women weredysfunctional. We took a stance about not pathologizing women, because survivors already feel pathologized. Butpeople have gotten a lot more sophisticated about this issue” (S. Lob, personal communication, April 20, 2006). Thisdefensive stance may have prevented advocates from seeing the needs of children, as well as the mental health,substance abuse and other service needs of victims. While shelters were required to provide individual and groupcounseling for women, most did not offer parenting skills, family therapy or any form of therapy for children (Messinger& Eldridge, 1993).

As for Children's Services personnel, there was also a tendency to look away from IPV when there was no directabuse of children. It was not considered a child welfare issue. There was no protocol for screening for IPV, and when itdid come to the attention of child protective workers, the extent of the procedure was to provide phone numbers fordomestic violence advocacy organizations (S. Urban, personal communication, April 12, 2006). A Children's Servicesofficial recalls that “Domestic violence would come up, but child welfare folks thought, ‘that's not my issue’” (A.Williams-Isom, personal communication, April 21, 2006).

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3.2. Beginnings of collaboration

The early seeds of collaboration between the two fields came in the late-seventies, when the NewYork City InteragencyTask Force on Domestic Violence was convened. Several people from Children's Services attended the meetings out ofpersonal interest, and it was there that informal collaborations began to develop as people from both sides got to know andtrust each other. Domestic Violence advocates began to reach out to their new allies at Children's Services and ‘whisper intheir ears’ about their issues with the agency. The Children's Services employees would advocate within the agency, andbegan to affect small measures of change (S. MacNichol, S. Urban, E. Wolfe, personal communication, April 12, 2006).

The event that galvanized members of the child welfare and domestic violence communities to join forces in aformal way in 1987 was the brutal killing of six-year-old Lisa Steinberg by her guardian, Joel Steinberg. Steinberg'spartner Hedda Nussbaum was also a victim of severe domestic violence and was the subject of great controversy andcriticism for not protecting the child, though she was never charged with a crime in the case. In response to this extremeexample of the co-occurence of child abuse and IPV, members of the Interagency Task Force on Domestic Violencefrom both the child welfare and domestic violence communities formed the Child Welfare Committee. Foundingmembers said the case compelled them to finally ‘dig their heels in’ to address the issue that had been ignored for toolong (A. DelTufo, personal communication, April 5, 2006).

The Committee, initially co-chaired by the director of a domestic violence shelter and a Children's Services staffmember, studied the co-occurrence of IPV and child maltreatment and released a position paper recommendinginteragency collaboration toward a number of goals, including training for child protective workers on domesticviolence; redirection of foster care funds to battered women so they may provide violence-free homes for children;better enforcement of protective orders; and removal of violent parents, rather than abused children, from homes (ChildWelfare Committee of the Interagency Task Force on Domestic Violence, 2002). Members provided training to childwelfare agencies, commented on Children's Services policy, and served as a resource on family violence for thecommunity (Connect, Inc., 2005b). They developed a domestic violence resource card which the head of Children'sServices agreed would be attached to the letters that were sent out to all subjects of child protective investigation,but the initiative died quickly because it wasn't followed through by front-line staff or enforced by administration(S. MacNichol, S. Urban & E. Wolfe, personal communication, April 12, 2006).

The Committee later developed the Child Protective Service's Domestic Violence Protocol, which was formallyaccepted by Children's Services in 1990, to be used whenever domestic violence was found to be present in a case.However, the document quickly became ‘invisible’ in the agency, and many Children's Services workers did not evenknow of its existence (Messinger & Eldridge, 1993).

In 1992, a task force on family violence was convened at the urging of domestic violence advocates, co-chaired bythe Manhattan Borough President and a member of City Council, to investigate and research the city's response todomestic violence. After more than 100 interviews with city officials, domestic violence service providers and victimsof domestic violence, the report, Behind Closed Doors, was issued in April 1993. The report concluded that the city'sexisting services were not only ineffective in combating the dual abuse of women and children, but that they oftentriggered re-victimization of children by putting them in foster care rather than removing the abuser from the home(Messinger & Eldridge, 1993). Behind Closed Doors made many specific recommendations for changes in policy andpractice in city agencies, including retraining all child welfare staff, development of a protocol for assessing domesticviolence in all child abuse investigations, increased shelter and non-residential services for women, and counseling forchildren in domestic violence shelters (Messinger & Eldridge, 1993). The report was strategically published in themidst of a Mayoral campaign, and both candidates referred to it in campaign speeches and made public commitments toimprove the way family violence was addressed in NYC. This raised the dialogue on the issue of family violence andcreated political momentum for change (A. DelTufo, personal communication, April 5, 2006).

The ChildWelfare Committee's ongoing efforts to pilot a protocol for screening Children's Services cases for IPVwerefinally realized after Behind Closed Doors made explicit recommendations on the issue. Children's Services, the FamilyViolence Prevention Project (FVPP) of the Urban Justice Center, and the Columbia University School of Social Workentered a collaborative pilot project in field offices in the area known as “Zone C,” inManhattan. All child protective staff,supervisors and managers were trained in the use of a domestic violence screening protocol, and were required to performthe assessment in every investigation of child abuse or neglect during the six-month pilot period (Conroy et al., 1994).

Children's Services staff resisted the project because they were not consulted on the development of the protocol,they were uncomfortable asking screening questions they believed were ‘prying,’ and they worried that if they

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identified domestic violence, they would not know what to do with it, because they did not have adequate resources forthe victims (K. Conroy, personal communication, April 18, 2006). The project organizers wanted to remove, to theextent possible, any disincentive for child protective workers to implement the screening protocol. So child protectiveworkers were invited to meet with the project organizers to review the protocol, and the screening questionnaire wasmodified to include some of the workers' suggestions. This increased the ‘buy in’ of the workers. Another importantfactor was a guarantee by an official in the city's Human Resource Administration, which monitors domestic violenceshelters, that she would find shelter for a mother and her children any time it was needed to prevent removal of a child(K. Conroy, personal communication, April 18, 2006).

Domestic violence advocates also resisted the project because they feared that any time domestic violence wasuncovered children would automatically be removed. However the final evaluation found that while the identificationof IPV doubled, there were no more removals during this period than during any other six-month period in the previousfive years (K. Conroy, personal communication, April 18, 2006). After the project was complete, the training wasinstitutionalized as a two-day segment of the ‘core training’ which every new worker receives. The project evaluationshowed that the training significantly reduced workers' victim-blaming and justification of IPV, increased workers'belief in offender accountability, and increased workers' belief that services should be provided to assist familiesaffected by domestic violence (Magen & Conroy, 1998). Magen and Conroy (1998) concluded that the increasedidentification and changes in workers' attitudes should have led to workers offering mothers and children moreprotection and assigning abused mothers less blame.

In 1995, another high profile tragedy occurred that resulted in dramatic changes to the city's child welfare system.Six year-old Elisa Izquierdo, whose abuse had been repeatedly reported to Children's Services, was beaten to death byher mother. In response, in January 1996, NYC's child welfare services were taken out of the purview of the city'sHuman Resource Administration, and a stand-alone agency, the Administration for Children's Services (ACS), wascreated. In December 1996, the agency issued a reform plan which named as an operating principle that “Anyambiguity regarding the safety of the child will be resolved in favor of removing the child from harm's way”(Administration for Children's Services, 2006). Critics have dubbed this the “When in doubt, yank ‘em out” rule. Therewas a dramatic increase—nearly 50%—in the numbers of children entering foster care between 1995 and 1998(Administration for Children's Services, 2001).

Also during the 1990s, domestic violence advocates successfully lobbied for stronger laws to protect victims of IPVand their children. The New York State legislature made findings concerning the devastating effects of domesticviolence on society, victims and children. Legislation was enacted strengthening the criminal justice response todomestic violence, and requiring courts to consider domestic violence in making custody and visitation decisions.However, domestic violence advocates' efforts at educating the legislature and courts about the effects of domesticviolence on children in some ways backfired. Court rulings invoking those legislative findings to rule that batteredmothers neglected their children by “failing to protect” them from exposure to domestic violence became commonplacein New York, reflecting nationwide trends (Zuccardy, 2005).

In 1997, Children's Services appointed a Domestic Violence Coordinator, the first person at the agency to have anyofficial role related to domestic violence. This was an important step for the agency, one the Child Welfare Committeehad long advocated for, but a limited one, considering the role was buried inside an existing full-time job (S. Urban,personal communication, April 12, 2006). However the person who was appointed to this role had been a long-timemember of the Child Welfare Committee and now had an official platform from which to push for the Committee'sagenda, analyze agency initiatives with respect to their impact on domestic violence cases, and make policyrecommendations. She also kept the domestic violence community informed of developments at Children's Servicesthat affected it (S. Urban, personal communication, April 12, 2006). But her ability to effect meaningful change withinthe agency was limited, both by her lack of resources and politics. She was seen by some inside of the agency as overlyallied with the domestic violence community, and this may have limited the agency's responsiveness to herrecommendations (A. Williams-Isom, personal communication, April 21, 2006).

4. The Nicholson case and its impact on collaboration

In early 1999, a Brooklyn mother of two, Shawrline Nicholson, was assaulted by the father of her youngest child.While she was in the hospital recovering from her injuries, her two children were taken into the custody of Children'sServices, seemingly without any assessment of whether the children had been harmed or were at risk of harm if they

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remained in their mother's care. Nicholson was charged with two counts of neglect for “engaging” in domestic violencein the presence of a child, although she was indisputably the victim, and for allegedly failing to cooperate with servicesoffered by Children's Services, although there were no specific indications of what services she had failed to cooperatewith (Nicholson v. Williams, 2002). Children's Services asserted that the children had per se suffered emotional harmby witnessing domestic violence, even though one child was in school at the time of the assault, the other sleeping inher crib, and there had been no previous physical violence in the relationship (Zuccardy, 2005).

Nicholson was mandated by the Family Court to attend domestic violence counseling, so she sought services from alocal domestic violence agency, where her counselor brought her case to the attention of the legal advocates. Theagency's legal service department assumed representation of Nicholson, secured the return of her children andultimately the dismissal of the Family Court case against her (Zuccardy, 2005). In early 2000, Nicholson filed a lawsuitagainst the city. Other women whose children had been removed because they were victims of domestic violence cameforward, and a class action lawsuit was certified, alleging that Children's Services, as a matter of policy, removedchildren from mothers and charged the mothers with neglect solely because they were victims of domestic violence(Nicholson v. Williams, 2002).

In January 2002, the federal district court in Brooklyn found that the city had violated the civil rights of the mothersand their children by removing children and charging mothers with neglect for ‘failing to protect’ the children fromwitnessing domestic violence. The court issued an injunction ordering, among other things, that Children's Servicesnot charge mothers with “engaging in domestic violence,” or “failure to cooperate” with services unless they specifiedhow the child had been harmed by the lack of cooperation. It also said Children's Services could not remove a childwho might be endangered by a batterer, unless it first tried to remove the batterer from the home through a court order,or to obtain shelter for the mother and child (Nicholson v. Williams, 2001).

The city appealed, and the federal appeals court referred the case to the New York State Court of Appeals to clarifythe state's Family Court Act's definition of neglect and determine whether Children's Services practice was in factunlawful. In 2004, the New York State Court of Appeals unanimously held that a mother's inability to protect a childfrom witnessing abuse does not constitute neglect, and that not every child exposed to domestic violence is at risk ofimpairment. It determined that in order for there to be a finding of neglect, Children's Services must prove that thechild's physical or mental condition has been or is in danger of being impaired as a consequence of the parent's failureto exercise a minimum degree of care. The Court also ruled that before removing a child, Children's Services mustprove that no steps could be taken to mitigate the need for removal, and the court must perform a ‘balancing test,’ toweigh the risk to the child in the home against the harm to the child that would be caused by removal (Zuccardy, 2005).

The Nicholson case had major implications for child welfare practice statewide, including new legislation in 2002requiring comprehensive domestic violence training for all child protective workers. But the lawsuit also had a chillingeffect on the working relationships that had previously been established between Children's Services personnel anddomestic violence advocates in NYC. A Children's Services official described a ‘shutting down’ of relationships inreaction to the agency's having to take a defensive stance (A. Williams-Isom, personal communication, April 21, 2006).Another official agrees that the active litigation phase made it muchmore difficult for Children's Services staff to partnerwith domestic violence advocates. “It threw the conflict into high relief. It was polarizing because here we had folksgoing into court on one side or the other … domestic violence advocates giving a narrative that felt to me like it wasminimizing and marginalizing the effect of domestic violence on children. And I'm sure others felt we were minimizingthe impact of the domestic violence on the women …” (E. Roberts, personal communication, September 20, 2007).

Another impact on Children's Services was that the agency's newly formed Office of Domestic Violence Policy andPlanning (ODVPP) had to invest most of its resources in defending itself against the allegations and responding to thelawsuit. ODVPP carried out the court-ordered training of all Children's Services Staff members (nearly 6000) tocomply with the judicial dictates (C. Morrison, personal communication, April 21, 2006). Children's Services officialswere concerned about whether this was an effective way to influence practice. “When you go to Child Protectiveprofessionals and say ‘you now have to practice in a certain way because of a court order,’ the risk is that it becomes justanother set of rules to follow. We want our staff to do skillful assessments, and practice with survivors of domesticviolence in a meaningful way … having litigation as a way to change practice can be tricky because we don'twant people to say ‘Let me comply with the rules,’ rather than ‘Let me understand and help’" (E. Roberts, personalcommunication, September 20, 2007).

The idea of using litigation as a way to force change was met with reservation in the domestic violence communityas well, even in the beginning stages of the lawsuit. One of the attorneys for the plaintiffs said that the local domestic

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violence community did not “get on board” with the lawsuit immediately, because they were concerned that it wouldimpact relationships with the city or even have repercussions on funding (J. Zuccardy, personal communication,September 28, 2007). Some of the national experts on the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child welfare optedout of testifying as expert witnesses in the Nicholson case because, while they said they supported what the lawsuit wastrying to accomplish, they were conflicted about using litigation as a tool to achieve it. They felt they had been makingprogress in their efforts to get child welfare systems to respond differently to domestic violence, and didn't know if alawsuit would make the situation better or worse (J. Zuccardy, personal communication, September 24, 2007).

But many local domestic violence advocates believe that litigation was the only way. The founder and Director ofthe Voices of Women Organizing Project, which organizes domestic violence survivors to advocate for changes withinChildren's Services and other city systems, sees the lawsuit as a remedy. “We could have been talking until we wereblue in the face … we were writing letters to commissioners for years. Once Nicholson was filed, they were working onthe issues we'd been raising” (S. Lob, personal communication, April 20, 2006).

In fact, the people who had been advocating for change for years through the Child Welfare Committee, from bothinside and outside of Children's Services, and who often felt their advice was falling on deaf ears, laid the groundworkfor this case. An attorney for the plaintiffs said,

Nicholson was successful because of this little group of women, who had been pushing and pushing theseissues for years, and they didn't get anywhere, but they kept a paper trail. They had notes on little scraps ofpaper all over the place—you should have seen the coffee stains! But without them we never could have shownthat the city had notice there was a problem. Because Sue Lob [a domestic violence advocate and member of theChild Welfare Committee] kept meticulous notes from her meeting with [then Commissioner] Scoppetta, thisgave us evidence that the city has known they were handling DV cases wrong and they didn't do anything aboutit. (J. Zuccardy, personal communication, September 24, 2007)

Most of the people interviewed for this paper agree that the lawsuit dramatically sped the progress of change. Itgreatly raised the level of consciousness about the issue, and created a mechanism for accountability. A Children'sServices official says “There was tremendous learning, because there was a tremendous focus on the issues. Hearingthe various perspectives hashed out in such a public way forced us to grow and learn. I think the final decision fromthe appeals court was very helpful. It was good law and we're fortunate that we have it” (E. Roberts, personalcommunication, September 20, 2007).

5. Changes at children's services

While relationships between child welfare and domestic violence service providers may have been damaged duringthe litigation, the lawsuit also created an incredible momentum to forge improved collaborations (A. DelTufo, personalcommunication, April 5, 2006). Even prior to the lawsuit being filed, but during the discovery phase in 2000, a strategicplanning session took place at Children's Services that brought together the agency's top managers and domesticviolence service providers from around the city. While some domestic violence advocates believe it was the impendinglawsuit that compelled Children's Services to make this effort (A. DelTufo, personal communication, April 5, 2006), aChildren's Services official said the agency had finally decided it needed to develop guiding principles for domesticviolence cases, and they knew it was critical to bring external partners into the planning process in order to ensureaccountability and buy-in on the part of both communities (A. Williams-Isom, personal communication, April 21,2006). Conference participants developed recommendations that became the foundation for Children's Services'Domestic Violence Guiding Principles: All children deserve to live in homes free of domestic violence; All families indomestic violence situations deserve assessment and proactive services that meet their individual needs and respecttheir unique strengths; Abusive partners must be held accountable for their actions; and every person and systeminvolved with a child's care must work in partnership to ensure positive outcomes for children and their families.

In January 2001, Children's Services established a new Office of Domestic Violence Policy and Planning (ODVPP)to work across the agency's program areas and promote a coordinated response to domestic violence. The office's firstDirector had many years experience working in the Massachusetts system of collaboration between domestic violenceand child welfare providers that would serve as a model for some of the changes at Children's Services. The DomesticViolence Subcommittee of the Commissioner's Advisory Board was convened to help bring those principles to life inthe agency's day-to-day practice (E. Roberts, personal communication, September 20, 2007).

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The membership of the Domestic Violence Subcommittee consists of domestic violence service providers, contractedprivate child welfare agencies, and Children's Services staff. It is co-chaired by a high-level Children's Servicesrepresentative and an outside domestic violence advocate, which helps to ensure buy-in from both communities. Theprimary task of the subcommittee in its early days was to advise the agency on the development of its domestic violencestrategic plan, whichwas published inMay 2003. The strategic plan outlined goals related to training, clinical consultation,protocol development, service needs for children, accountability for abusive partners, coordinated community responseand quality improvement (Administration for Children's Services, 2003). The strategic plan was circulated to domesticviolence and child welfare service providers for comment before publication, and received almost universal approval frommembers of both communities (Administration for Children's Services, 2006; Child Welfare Watch, 2003).

Since the strategic plan was published, ODVPP has focused on implementation of the plan. The office hasdeveloped detailed domestic violence protocol for contracted foster care and Preventive Services agencies, along withChildren's Services' own child protective staff. The protocol calls for consideration of an abused parent's prior help-seeking behavior, safety planning as a way to empower the survivor, and a careful assessment of not only whatconstitutes risk to the child remaining in a home where there is IPV, but what risk would be posed to the child byremoving him or her from the home (C. Morrison, personal communication, September 21, 2007). ODVPP has alsoimplemented a “partnership agreement” with local batterer's intervention programs to develop a referral network ofprograms which include content on the effects of domestic violence on children and “responsible fathering,” in theircurricula, and meet certain other parameters (Administration for Children's Services 2006).

One of the largest initiatives to come out of the strategic plan is the Clinical Consultation Program, which placesspecialists in the areas of domestic violence, substance abuse and mental health in child protective field offices toprovide ongoing training, case-specific consultation and referrals for child welfare staff. The specialists are contractedthrough community-based organizations (Administration for Children's Services, 2006). Some disagreed with thedecision to contract out this work, because they believe this structure shifts the responsibility for responding todomestic violence outside of the child welfare system (S. MacNichol, S. Urban, & E. Wolfe, personal communication,April 12, 2006). Others feel that having the specialists employed by outside agencies creates an additional level ofaccountability and oversight (C. Morrison, personal communication, September 10, 2007).

For domestic violence advocates, ODVPP provides a measure of recourse when they come across practice in thefield offices that they don't think reflects the new policies and principles of Children's Services. While ODVPP doesnot have direct authority over the case workers at Children's Services or its contract agencies, advocates are encouragedto contact the office when they have concerns about how domestic violence issues are being handled. The ODVPP staffis able to act as liaison, review cases, problem solve with case workers and supervisors, and educate child welfare staffon ‘best practice’ with domestic violence cases. ODVPP staff members are strategically chosen allies of the domesticviolence community; the current Director's previous experience was in a local domestic violence agency's batterer'sintervention program, and other staff members have a balance of child welfare and domestic violence experience. TheDirector of the office believes that when members of the domestic violence community see that their concerns are beingresponded to in good faith, without defensiveness, they know that the change process is well under way. She believesthat one of the most important roles of the office is negotiating the necessary tensions between child welfare staffand domestic violence advocates and building collaborative relationships (C. Morrison, personal communication,September 10, 2007).

6. Non-governmental programs

The change process does not take place only within the public child welfare agency, but includes externalstakeholders as well. To make this point, two noteworthy collaborations that have been institutionalized by non-governmental organizations in NYC are highlighted. The Family Violence Prevention Project (FVPP) of Connect, Inc.(formerly the Urban Justice Center), grew out of a recommendation of Behind Closed Doors and today providesintensive domestic violence training and consultation to more than 50 Preventive Services agencies and a number offoster care agencies throughout the city, with funding from Children's Services. Contract agency staff members aretrained in screening for and managing cases where there is domestic violence, and in skills for working directly withsurvivors, perpetrators, child and teen witnesses, and parents (Connect, Inc., 2005a). An evaluation of the FVPP'sdomestic violence screening questionnaire found that the project led to a 300% increase in the number of womenidentified as having been abused (Magen et al., 2000).

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The Children's Aid Society (CAS) is a private non-profit agency that provides foster care and Preventive Servicesunder a contract from Children's Services. CAS took the initiative in 2000 to develop its own model program fordomestic violence services in response to concerns from agency workers that the city's existing domestic violenceservices did not meet the complex needs of many of the families they served. The Family Wellness Program (FWP)provides domestic violence services specifically designed for families involved with the child welfare system, andworks with survivors, abusers, children and teens. The FWP staff also provides training and consultation for agencystaff on working with families affected by domestic violence.

This discussion has been intended to capture the struggles of both child welfare and domestic violence advocates tolet down their defensive stances, incorporate each other's knowledge and values, and collaborate in the interest of thecommon goal of safety for mothers and children. It is clear there has been unprecedented progress in the collaborationand integration of domestic violence and child welfare issues. In NYC, there is a general consensus that the rightpolicies are in place, at least on paper. This represents tremendous accomplishment, but this progress has taken thebetter part of three decades, at least two child fatalities, a very costly lawsuit, and countless cases in which mothers andchildren were not provided with the services they needed to remain safely together.

7. Discussion

New York City has an unusually large and complex social service system. The lessons learned here can notnecessarily be generalized to other communities, but they may inform the strategies of leaders in other communitieswishing to improve collaboration between child welfare and domestic violence service providers. Key elements beginwith coalition building and the recognition of common goals, validation and legitimization of divergent perspectives,as well as the development of a common understanding of the problem. In NYC this coalition building took placeinformally and formally in several forums, including the Child Welfare Committee, the Family Violence Task Force,and the Children's Services' Domestic Violence Subcommittee. Next, a joint assessment of the efficacy of existingservices and outstanding needs, as the Family Violence Task Force performed for the report Behind Closed Doors(Messinger & Eldridge, 1993), ideally leads to the identification of strategies and solutions that both communities canembrace. Once a plan is developed there must be continuous involvement by the various stakeholders in imple-mentation. Finally, a mechanism to hold all systems involved accountable for the agreed-upon change is critical. Theabsence of such a mechanism in NYC ultimately led the domestic violence community to see a lawsuit againstChildren's Services as its only remedy when the agency failed to institutionalize changes in practice.

While NYC has made great strides in improving collaboration and integration of domestic violence and childwelfare services, the change process is far from complete. The relationships have matured over time and throughinteraction; now the partners need to continue to find ways to work together effectively to continue to strengthenthe system's response to a very complex set of societal problems. The discussion below offers a summary of criticalareas that NYC must continue to address, and that other communities may consider in the development of their ownstrategies for change.

7.1. Improved assessment skills

The ability to perform highly differentiated assessments is the key to providing effective services for victims of IPVand their children. Screening child welfare cases for the presence of IPV is important but does not go far enough. In thepast, some child protective workers have assumed that all children in homes where there is domestic violence aredetrimentally affected, but the literature does not support this view (Wolfe, Zak, Wilson, & Jaffe, 1986; Rossman,Hughes, & Rosenberg, 2000), and professionals are now cautioned against assuming that witnessing domestic violenceconstitutes child maltreatment or warrants child protective services intervention (Aron & Olson, 1997; Findlater &Kelly, 1999; Spears, 2000; Whitney & Davis, 1999). More research and practice experience is needed to developimproved assessment tools to determine whether a child exposed to IPV has been harmed, what the risk of future harmis, what the protective factors are, whether a coercive intervention is warranted, and whether a given intervention wouldincrease risk to the child and/or parent.

Petrucci and Mills (2002) suggest that a comprehensive assessment method could focus child welfare workers onproviding supportive services to battered mothers, which would in turn assist battered mothers in developing theinternal and external resources they need to help their children. “Ample theoretical and empirical evidence exists to

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suggest that the safety of children might best be served by focusing on the strengths and competencies of batteredwomen so that they are prepared to provide the long-term emotional support and physical protection that will keep theirchildren safe and healthy” (p. 169).

The literature on maternal-child attachment is rich (see Karen, 1998, and Howe, 2005). The application ofattachment theory to child welfare is a step that may improve our ability to make informed decisions. By assessinga child's attachment to his or her caretaker, we will be better prepared to predict the effects of separation fromthe parent, and may also make a more informed assessment of the parenting skills, which in turn may inform ourinterventions.

7.2. Expanded training

Training on the complexities of domestic violence and its impact on children can help prepare child welfareprofessionals to perform skilled assessments. Curricula should go well beyond the basic dynamics of domestic violenceto address such complex issues of assessing protective as well as risk factors, understanding that “pushing for safety”can increase danger, and managing the frustration and powerlessness of working with families affected by domesticviolence (see Fleck-Henderson, 2000). A better understanding of the reasons abused mothers remain with abusivepartners will assist workers in reducing victim-blaming and forming better alliances with domestic violence survivorsand advocates. Training on the effects of trauma on parenting behavior may also help workers to understand thespecific needs of families. Because families involved with the child welfare and domestic violence systems are oftenalso impacted by substance abuse, mental health and medical problems, training must reflect the full gamut ofintersecting issues. Because of the high turnover of caseworkers in the field of child welfare, and because of deeplyingrained views that tend to blame victims for the abuse committed against them, training of child welfare staff ondomestic violence issues should be mandatory, ongoing and multi-faceted.

Domestic violence service providers should be trained on child welfare issues as well. One of the most commonreasons abused women leave their abusers or seek help is because they have realized their children are being hurt, eitherphysically or emotionally, by the abuse (Schechter & Edleson, 1994; A. DelTufo, personal correspondence, April 5,2006). Training on child development, the effects of exposure to domestic violence, trauma symptoms, and strategiesfor increasing children's resilience will help domestic violence service providers address one of the most pressingconcerns of their clients, the safety and well-being of their children.

Furthermore, domestic violence advocates should be trained on the policies and procedures of local child welfareproviders. In NYC, advocates indicate that familiarity with Children's Services' policies and procedures related todomestic violence allows them to more effectively advocate for their clients and to believe child welfare workers willbe held accountable if they treat clients unfairly. Domestic violence service providers should also be trained on thedetection and reporting of child abuse. While domestic violence advocates' distrust of the child welfare system isunderstandable, it is concerning that some may allow their animosity toward the child welfare system to cloud theirjudgment when it comes to reporting even serious cases of abuse.

7.3. Improved supervision

Skilled and adequately resourced supervision can go beyond what training can do to ensure that child welfareprofessionals can provide appropriate support and resources to families affected by domestic violence. Yet lack ofadequate supervision was one of the most often cited concerns by persons interviewed for this paper regarding the NYCchild welfare system. Supervisors should be expected to do more than monitor caseloads and compliance. Supervisorsshould be prepared to assist workers in preventing and addressing vicarious trauma, which is a major concern for childwelfare workers (Cornille & Woodard-Meyers, 1999), and can result in an inability of workers to treat clients withempathy (Muhlberger, 2004). They should also assist workers in identifying and processing their own misconceptions,biases, value-judgments and counter-transference issues. This may in turn prevent workers from conveying victim-blaming attitudes to abused parents. This is crucial because abused women who perceive workers to be blaming will beless likely to disclose abuse or to seek help (Mills, 1998b).

Agency administrators must ensure that supervisors implement domestic violence policies in day-to-day practice.Domestic violence advocates in NYC believe that while Children's Services' policies have improved, change in front-line practice is lagging far behind in many cases (S. MacNichol, personal communication, April 12, 2006). Supervision

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from the top of the agency down must include a clear system of accountability to ensure all agency staff members arecarrying out agency policies and good practice.

7.4. Increase resources

The need for increased resources goes without saying, across social service systems. Considering the number offamilies involved with the child welfare system that are affected by domestic violence, the amount of resourcesallocated to address this issue is inadequate. Domestic violence advocates have suggested the redirection of foster carefunds toward services that will help keep abused parents and their children safe and together. In NYC, since thedecrease in the foster care census, unused monies allocated for foster care services have been ‘redirected’ to PreventiveServices (Administration for Children's Services, 2005). Child welfare agencies should consider allocating fundsdirectly for domestic violence prevention and intervention services, which would serve the goal of Preventive Servicesby helping to keep children and non-abusive parents together and safe.

7.5. Improve capacity for working with abusive partners and holding them accountable

Holding abusers, instead of victims, accountable for abusive behavior is a principle most agree to, but in reality isvery difficult to achieve within the child welfare system. When abusers are not invested in maintaining or regainingcustody or access to their children, the child welfare system has little power over them. The reality is that mothers arethe caretakers of most children, and when the system has no ability to hold the abuser accountable, it will ultimatelyfall to the mother who is invested in having custody of her children to keep them safe. With that said, the childwelfare system must take every step possible to hold abusers accountable and offer the non-abusive parent allpossible assistance in keeping her children safe. This includes keeping children in the care of non-offending parents,and removing abusive adults, rather than children, from the home whenever possible; requiring supervised visitationfor abusive parents; opening cases in the name of the alleged perpetrator, not the victim; filing charges against theabuser for child endangerment, rather than charging the mother with failure to protect; collaborating with lawenforcement agencies to ensure that criminal offenses are prosecuted and orders of protection enforced (by the policeand courts, not by making the victim responsible for “enforcing” the order of protection); and mandating the abuser,rather than the victim, to services. It also includes using language that is not victim-blaming, and assisting the non-offending parent in overcoming obstacles and hardships that may be caused by the very act of holding the abuseraccountable (i.e., loss of child support if perpetrator is incarcerated or increased risk if she files for a protectiveorder.) Advocates of family preservation should clearly identify that when there is abuse, the family unit to bepreserved is the child and non-abusive parent (Administration for Children's Services, 2003; Fleck-Henderson,2000; Messinger & Eldridge, 1993; Schechter & Edleson, 1994). In cases where mothers are abusive or neglectfultoward their children, or are perpetrators of IPV, domestic violence advocates must guard against the impulseto deny, minimize or justify this behavior in the effort to maintain the political focus on ending violence againstwomen.

Services for abusive partners need to be expanded both in quantity and scope. In New York State there has beena narrow definition of “batterer's intervention programs” which is based on feminist principles and closely tied tothe criminal justice system. The New York State Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence seems to activelydiscourage the development of programs for abusive men in the following statement:

In sum, our experience indicates that offender accountability can be best achieved through more effective andconsistent use of probation supervision and other criminal justice sanctions rather than batterers programs. Ifbatterers programs are to be used by a community, referrals should be in conjunction with a criminal justice orother system response that imposes consequences if the abuser fails to attend the program or re-offends. Abatterers program is not necessary to achieve an effective, coordinated response to domestic violence. (New YorkState Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence, 2006)

This position relies on the criminal justice system to respond to domestic violence, and ignores the fact that the vastmajority of victims don't report their abusive partners and most abusers do not come in contact with that system(Grauwiler & Mills, 2004; Tjaden, & Thoennes, 2000). Abusers who do not come in contact with the criminal justicesystem may, however, come in contact with child welfare agencies and community-based organizations. The partners,

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former partners, and children of these abusive parents can not afford for these organizations to do nothing to addresstheir behavior simply because we have not found a model that has been proven universally effective. While researchnationally on intervention with abusers is generally inconclusive, there have been some studies that have suggestedsuccess with some types of intervention (Gondolf, 2004; Mills et al., 2006), and research on the issue is in its infancy.Alternative models should continue to be piloted and researched, particularly models focusing on the effects ofdomestic violence on children and responsible parenting, and ones that are tailored for perpetrators of IPV who areinvolved with the child welfare system.

7.6. Continue relationship building

It is apparent that the most effective tool for improving integration of child welfare and domestic violence serviceshas been the development of collaborative relationships by persons in both fields. In NYC, the relationships between arelatively small number of committed individuals in the domestic violence and child welfare professions have led toimportant large-scale collaborations between programs, agencies, and systems. It is crucial for both domestic violenceadvocates and child welfare staff to continue to understand and develop greater respect and appreciation of themissions, goals, values and struggles of the other. Fleck-Henderson (2000) suggests that best practice for familieswhere children and parents are both at risk will draw from, but evolve beyond, the accumulated wisdom of both theChild Protection System and the Battered Women's Movement.

At the same time, the web of collaboration needs to continue to expand outward—not only to additional childwelfare and domestic violence service providers, but also to the wide range of government and social service systemswith which our clients come in contact. We must be ever mindful that the issues of child well-being and domesticviolence are inextricably linked not only with each other, but also with other pressing concerns, such as substanceabuse, mental health, poverty and issues of oppression that cross race, class, gender and culture.

8. Conclusion

Studying the development of social service systems allows us to better understand some of the key mechanisms bywhich society evolves. If we are able to identify the ‘critical junctures’ of the systems' evolution, then we may be ableto improve upon the efficiency of the change process in parallel or similar systems, or future change within the samesystem. In studying the change process, some of the questions to be asked include: What are the goals of the system;what are the characteristics and events impacting the system which have moved it closer to or further away fromachieving its goals; to what extent are services guided by false assumptions; how does the system acquire newknowledge, and adjust based on that knowledge; what forces internal and external to the system have propelled change;what have been the factors resisting change; what have been the positive and negative, intended and unintendedconsequences of the efforts at change; and how might the negative results have been avoided and the positive resultsachieved more expeditiously?

In order to build on our progress in the collaboration between domestic violence and child welfare service providers,New York and other communities will need to consider how both systems continue to evolve their missions and theirpractice. If child welfare has truly evolved in its response to domestic violence, it is not out of a series of knee-jerkreactions to tragic child deaths and lawsuits. Rather, it is because the system has committed to broadening its missionfrom child protection to child well-being. It will be compelled, then, to refocus some of its resources to understand andrespond to much more complex issues within families and communities that impact children.

The domestic violence service system is also compelled to make a shift. More than a decade ago, Heise (1996) wroteof the need for this system's evolution.

Feminist groups, especially those emerging from the Left, have traditionally been reluctant to engage with theState, preferring to provide parallel services and criticize from afar, rather than make demands for governmentaccountability. This strategy has come with costs, in both terms of coverage and energy available for prevention.In my opinion, women's groups in the next decade will have to concentrate more on working with State actors toenact gender-sensitive programs if lasting change is going to occur. Feminist NGOs can and should strive todevelop model services and interventions, but eventually they must shift from being sole providers to helpingadapt model services for mainstream systems. (p.19)

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This shift is evident in the case of the collaboration between domestic violence service providers and Children'sServices in New York. Within domestic violence agencies, advocates are paying more attention to the needs, wants andcomplex situations of the individual survivor of abuse. Tending to these needs requires accepting the knowledge andexpertise of service providers in other realms, such as child welfare, mental health and substance abuse, and also beingwilling to share their own expertise to assist other systems in better responding to survivors of domestic violence. It alsoincludes broadening the scope of both research and practice to address the needs of parents who choose to remain withabusive partners or to remain in the community rather than go into shelter, of parents in same-sex relationships, andrelationships in which mothers are mutually or primarily abusive partners.

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