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State of the African-American Family Symposium (2010):
The Migration Pattern of Chicago Public Housing Residents
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The Illinois African-American
Family Commission held its State of the African-American Family Symposium on
June 22, 2010. This event brought together key stakeholders, including
elected officials, public policy makers, researchers, family advocates and
public housing residents to identify the impact that the Illinois Housing
Choice Voucher Program has had on participants.
The "Illinois assisted Housing and Residential Mobility Data Guide" was
developed for the symposium and is presented here. This guide provides
information as to where low-income assisted households are moving in
relation to the local attributes of each community. |
Results of The Black Executive Directors Coalition (BEDC)
Membership Survey (June 2009):
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The Black Executive Directors
Coalition is a group of 34 African-American Executive Directors of
community-based social service agencies providing services in the
metropolitan Chicago area of Illinois.
This document summarizes the BEDC Membership Survey conducted by the
Illinois African-American Family Commission. It provides information
that communicates the range of services offered by BEDC member organizations
in the communities they serve, identifies common service areas and
opportunities for funding and collaboration, and supports the BEDC
legislative platform statement. |
Permanency
Enhancement Initiative
Data and Focus Group Summary (June 2009)
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The Illinois Permanency Enhancement
Initiative is a statewide effort to examine and address factors that hinder
permanency and contribute to racial disproportionality among children
involved with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (IDCFS).
Data from the DCFS administrative data base and U.S.
Census data were compiled by the Center for Adoption Studies (ISU), DCFS
staff, and the Children and Family Research Center (UIUC). Committees
comprised of DCFS staff drew upon these sources to summarize statistical
data that described patterns of permanency achievement and
disproportionality within each region.
These patterns were described in
presentations made to the stakeholders in community forums and permanency
symposia focusing on each region.
In June 2009, the Commission and its
university partners published the Data and Focus Group Summary report.
The data summarized in this report and presented at the community forums and
symposia document evidence of lags in permanency and disproportionality of
African-Americans in the Illinois child welfare system. |
Springfield Expungement
Summit 2008
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This report presents a
summary of findings and recommendations derived from an expungement summit
held in Springfield, Illinois in 2008 by the Illinois African-American
Family Commission.
The Commission believes that the recommendations
presented in this document, coupled with public policy changes aimed at
expanding access to expungement information and removing barriers to social
services, will dismantle the revolving door of the criminal justice system
and save a generation of children while reunifying families and maintaining
public safety. |
Eliminating Illinois' Educational Achievement Gap
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An action plan developed from
a symposium held on March 27, 2006 sponsored by the Illinois
African-American Family Commission and
Southern Illinois University Carbondale's Office of the Associate
Chancellor for Diversity and the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute.
Policy makers, educators and community activists were gathered together to
formulate recommendations for eliminating the debilitating disparities in
academic performance. |
Southern Illinois
Forum
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On June 25, 2005, the Illinois
African-American Family Commission convened a forum at Southern Illinois
University to assess the needs of African-American families in the state’s
southern region. The forum focused on child welfare, economic development,
criminal justice, health, welfare, human relations, and
education.
Some of the agencies and individuals
represented included: the Illinois Department of Employment Security,
Southern Illinois University, the Illinois Department of Children and Family
Services, the Illinois Prisoner Review Board, the Illinois Department of
Human Services, the Illinois Department of Corrections, the Illinois
Department of Healthcare and Family Services, the Carbondale Human Relations
Commission, the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute, and a wide array
of civic leaders and private citizens.
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Social
and Economic Profile of
African-Americans in Illinois
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Compiled and published by the
African-American Family Commission and the African-American Family
Research Institute, this document presents facts regarding many challenges
faced by African-Americans in Illinois.
Tables and charts are included relative to:
demographics, education, employment and income, poverty, housing, health,
child welfare and criminal justice. The
geographical areas covered encompass the state of Illinois and select
Illinois counties (those with the largest African-American populations). |
State
of The African-American Family
Symposium (2004)
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The African-American Family
Commission, the African-American Family Research Institute, the Jane
Addams College of Social Work, University of Illinois at Chicago, and the
Institute for Research on Race & Public Policy, University of Illinois
at Chicago, convened a symposium on April 6, 2004 to access the state of
the African-American family and community.
The symposium brought together advocates, consumers,
practitioners, policymakers and researchers from across the state. |
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Additional
Child Welfare Facts:
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African-American children represented 77% (35,499) of the 46,103
children in the Illinois foster care system in FY'98. |
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Of the 43 agencies with Home of Relative contracts in FY'99 (representing 37% of the child welfare agencies in Cook
County), 16 were
African-American. |
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Of the 16 agencies, 75% (12) provided a wide array of human services
in addition to child welfare services. |
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Ten of the agencies referenced above have been in existence between
five and eighty years. |
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The majority of the African-American child welfare agencies, like
most agencies, are managed by competent, degreed professionals. Most are
accredited by the Council on Accreditation of Services for Families and
Children (COA) or other accrediting bodies and are licensed by the Illinois Department
of Children and Family Services. |
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African-American child welfare agency staff are qualified and
capable of providing child welfare services. These agencies face the same
risk factors in caring for children as other child welfare agencies, but may
face greater scrutiny. |
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African-American agencies with Home of Relative contracts in FY'99,
cared for 5,728 children who represent 28% of that population in Cook County. |
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African-American agencies contributed significantly in securing
permanent families for children, which resulted in Illinois receiving national
and presidential recognition. In FY'99, African-American agencies achieved
30% or 1,757 permanent family placements for the nearly 5, 900 children under the Home
of Relative performance contract. |
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Of the 16 agencies that have Home of Relative contracts, 94%
performed at or above the required permanency contract goal. |
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Of the child welfare agencies that were classified as the top ten
performers, 43% were African-American agencies. Those agencies accounted
for 44% of the children who received permanent families. |
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