By JACK KRESNAK

Kent County Family Court Judge Patricia Gardner was getting ready to leave her Grand Rapids courtroom last month when I got around to returning her phone call.

Judge Gardner, vice chair of the Michigan’s Children Board of Directors, said  she was headed to Lansing that morning to testify before the House Committee on Children, Families and Seniors. She’d been asked to represent the Probate  Court Judges Association of Michigan at the Committee hearing headed by Rep.Kenneth Kurtz, R-Coldwater, in order to explain to Committee members how the Family Court system works.

She was a bit nervous, Gardner said, and she wanted to know what to expect.

I told her to picture the Watergate hearings from the 1970s – television news crews jockeying for space, still photographers elbowing each other to get a better angle, reporters with microphones and notepads, a standing-room-only crowd before a large group of surly officials ready to skewer witnesses with pointed questions or snarky asides.

Just joking!

The hearing before Rep. Kurtz’ committee would be nothing of the sort, I said. There would be about 20 people tops in the room, including the nine members of the committee.  No photographers, no TV cameras, more than likely no reporters, either.

After assuring Gardner that there was nothing to worry about, I wondered how she would do. I am happy to report she did astoundingly well and served as a model for how to give clear, expert testimony while making important points. I learned a lot from her.

She started by stating three points she would cover:

1)    An overview of the Probate/Family Court system

2)    Discussion of child abuse/neglect cases

3)    Suggested legislative changes to the system in order to address efficiencies and case loads

In her remarks, Gardner said she wanted the Committee members to remember three things:  Programs to prevent child maltreatment do work, permanency for children is paramount, and the process that is needed to successfully conclude cases.

She talked about how most parents who find their families in Family Court admit to allegations that they were unable to properly care for their children, and that full blown trials to decide whether a judge should take temporary legal jurisdiction over vulnerable children are relatively few.  The bulk of the court’s time is spent getting the child welfare system working so that the children can either be returned to their parents sooner rather than later, or if and when to decide whether terminating parental rights would be in the best interests of those children.

Parents can and do love their children, but that doesn’t mean that those children will be safe in their care. “Love doesn’t carry the day,” Gardner told the committee. “Most (children) will tell attorneys they do want to be re-unified” with their families.  But due to unaddressed problems like substance abuse or mental illness, that may not always be possible.

Many issues that have plagued the foster care system are being addressed by the consent decree resulting from the class action lawsuit against Michigan brought by the New York-based Children’s Rights organization, she said. But, spending more resources to meet the terms of that settlement has meant fewer resources that prevent child maltreatment in the first place, Gardner said.

“Please do what you can to protect prevention” programs, she urged the committee. “Prevention works.”

Supporting the professionals who work in child welfare also is important, she said. “The child welfare area in general is one of high burn-out,” she said. “We do some things extremely well and yet we are called to improve.”

Clearly, committee members were impressed with Gardner’s testimony, and I will follow up with committee members to reinforce her message – let’s put more resources into helping children stay safely with their families, a more humane and cost-efficient way of helping children succeed.

Michigan’s Children has worked with the House Committee on Children and Families for many years, particularly with its former Chairman, Dudley Spade, who is now a top official at the state Department of Human Services under the new DHS Director Maura Corrigan, a former Supreme Court Justice. 

This Legislative session, House leadership decided to expand the Committee’s work to include senior citizens.

Rep. Kurtz and several other committee members are new to the Legislature and we continue to meet with these members to educate them about how they can support the vulnerable children of our state.   When I testified before the same committee and in my meetings with committee members, I urged them to develop legislation that would create a “P-20 Council” in Michigan to bridge gaps in education and workforce development, to integrate various initiatives trying to help vulnerable children from “Pre-natal” to age 20, and to create connections for useful partnerships between education, health, social development, community resources, businesses and industries – a concept Governor Rick Snyder embraced in his State of the State address.

We are gratified that many members of the Michigan’s Children Board of Directors like Judge Gardner are willing to speak up and advocate on behalf of vulnerable children.  In this era of declining resources and increasing needs, the more voices raised for children the better, and particularly when those voices belong to respected citizens and professionals in our state.