On November 16, the U.S. Children’s Bureau issued a new Information Memorandum expressing their interest in “reshaping child welfare in the United States to focus on strengthening families through primary prevention of child maltreatment and unnecessary parent-child separation.” The purpose of the Information Memorandum (IM) is to “strongly encourage all child welfare agencies and Children’s Bureau (CB) grantees to work together with the courts and other appropriate public and private agencies and partners to plan, implement and maintain integrated primary prevention networks and approaches to strengthen families and prevent maltreatment and the unnecessary removal of children from their families.” The Children’s Bureau’s top priority is now to “reshape child welfare in the United States to focus proactively on strengthening families through primary prevention.” The IM references the technical package developed by the CDC to highlight effective prevention strategies, and recognizes that “primary prevention of child maltreatment is the least supported [child maltreatment strategy] through federal funding.”
