Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Intergenerational Impacts of Residential Schools or Foster Care?
"We are the generations who are suffering the legacy of colonization: residential schools, over-representation in youth & adult correctional facilities, exploited in sex trafficking, afflicted with addictions, Hep C & HIV. When residential schools were closed down, foster care became the place to hide stolen children … thousands & thousands of First Nations & Metis girls & boys have been raped, maltreated, had their ancestral history & spirit beaten out of them under the contracted ‘care of the Crown’.”
Life Story of Sherri Lynne McQueen
Life of Sherri Lynne McQueen
Born 1971Dryden,
Thunder Bay, Gull Bay First Nation ,Dryden, Ont.
I was born November 25, 1971 in Dryden, Ontario. I resided with a family for the first 11 years of my life which in fact turned out not to be my biological family. When I was 11 years old Dryden CAS came into the picture and told me that I would have to go to Thunder Bay to live with my biological mother. I was upset because I didn’t even know who she was, and had no relationship with her for all those years. Thunder Bay, Ont.My biological mother came to pick me up in Dryden and I went to live with her in Thunder Bay. This is where I was sent to HELL.
The first night I arrived, I witnessed people smoking marijuana and that is when the abuse started. I was slapped across my face for calling her by her name, Wanda. She told me that I was supposed to call her mom. We were living in a house on Ontario Street .. I had two brothers who used to come on the weekends. My mother was involved with CAS in 1978 the first time and then again in the 1980’s. I went to live with her in 1982-83. It was a hard a lonely life being taken to this place where I didn’t even know where I was going. I was placed in a bedroom with three boys - my two brothers, and my mother’s boyfriend’s son, SL. This man later became my perpetrator. I used to wake up in the middle of the night and witness him sexually assaulting my brothers - S in particular. He was the younger brother and lived with us full time. Jason used to come for weekend visits. S later started fondling me under my panties, and showed me his penis. He used to make me perform oral sex on him. I was scared to say anything, because I knew that my mother would beat me.
I was pretty much slapped around everyday and beaten with plastic racecar tracks. We then moved to Alberta Street. This is where LL Sr., SL and LL Jr. raped me. SL took my virginity when I was 11-12 years old. The second perpetrator was L L Jr. He had sex with me in his bedroom on the main floor of this house right off the dining room. Keep in mind all the abuse I was still suffering from my mother. I really wanted to die at this point. My last perpetrator was her boyfriend, an old alcoholic man, LL Sr. My brothers and I were swimming at St..Jude’s pool and L came there and told me I had to go home. I went with him and he asked me to make him a vodka and orange drink. I told him that I didn’t know how to so. He told me what to do. I did it because I would be beaten if I didn’t do it. I was then told to lock all the doors. I was then told to sit down. He came to me and started kissing me, took down my pants and asked me if I was a virgin. He then went into the kitchen and got a broom. He started to have oral sex with me then he inserted the broom into my vagina and took it out then he put his penis inside of me. I was scared. (When I am telling this story it is like it happened yesterday).
Then my brother,Jason, came knocking on the door and interrupted L. My brother knocked and knocked on the door. Finally my brother came around to the front of the house and knocked on the dining room window. L finally stopped and pulled up his pants and told me that I better not say anything or he would kill me. I was scared and I wanted to run away and go back to Dryden.
I did run away and went to CAS and I informed them that I didn’t want to go back there. I told a worker who came out to visit me in the receiving home what had happened. The first home I was in was the xxxxxxxx. This is where more hell came. In this home I witnessed a girl who lived there being touched and fondled all the time by Mr. xxxx. Her name was Dawn. She was handicapped and confined to a wheelchair. I used to help him give her a bath and he would stick his fingers inside her vagina. I was then moved around from home to home. In the years 1983-86 I was in approxi-mately 15 different foster homes, girls’ group homes and receiving homes. I hated all of them except for two - the xxxxxx in Dryden, and the xxxxx in Thunder Bay. This is where xxxx sexually assaulted me. He was a military man who wore a kilt. I lived with xxxxx and xxxxxxxxxxx for a period of time. They had two small children, a daughter named Katie, and I forget their handicapped son’s name but he had no arms. I enjoyed living there because I had my first job at age fourteen and I had my own space in the basement. xxxxxx was really kind to me.
One morning she came down and asked me if I could watch the kids because xxxxxhadn’t come home yet. I agreed. xxxx finally came home and I went downstairs to go back to sleep. He was drunk because he was being loud and belligerent. I heard footsteps coming downstairs and then he came into my waterbed with me and started kissing me. I was quiet and said nothing. I was scared. He proceeded to have oral sex with me and had intercourse with me. I was told not to say anything. I believe I ran away that day and never looked back.
I lived on the streets of Thunder Bay and slept under a tree at the marina. I became drunk with the alcoholics who lived outside. The year would have been 1986. I met T T around the same time I was living at the xxxxxxx’s home. He used to bother me when he saw me in Keskus mall where I was working at Doodle’s restaurant. Gull Bay First NationI later saw TT and he took me to Gull Bay. I was 14-15 at this time. I stayed with him there because I didn’t want to go back into care as I had enough of being sent from one home to another. It wasn’t long before I was being beaten up physically, verbally and mentally. He used to lock me in the house with a padlock on the outside of the door. I was at my wit’s end. I had no family, nowhere to go, I was lost. I was still a Crown Ward at this time.
CAS knew my biological father had died, but they didn’t even contact his family. I remember the Judge saying something about this when I became a Crown Ward. I didn’t find my birth dad’s family until 2006. My second home away from Gull Bay was at the Faye Peterson Transition House…a home for battered women. I was in and out of there on numerous occasions. I was even medivaced from Gull Bay to Thunder Bay by air ambulance because of T T’s abuse. I ended up in McKellar Hospital because of the beatings. xxxxxxx used to kick me in the head with his cowboy boots. Kick me in the stomach when I was pregnant. Pulled a gun on me and told me that if I left he would kill me. He threw me and my newborn son out of the house in the middle of the night in February, in minus-30 degree weather. My son was only 1 1/2 months old. Thank God for the pulp truck that stopped and picked me up and drove me to Thunder Bay. (Gull Bay, Armstrong, and Thunder Bay police were involved with this abusive relationship.) Gull Bay police even had to get me out of the house to testify against T in Armstrong. I was locked in the house and they had to get me out.
The Judge said that he was not leaving until he saw me at court that day.In 1989-90 we were driving down Simpson Street in Thunder Bay and this was the last punch in the face I was taking from him. My mouth and nose was bleeding. I had enough. I kissed my baby goodbye and ran for my life. Later that evening my friend bought me a ticket and I was on the bus to Winnipeg with only the clothes on my back and not even a penny in my name BUT I was safe and never returning until sixteen years later to see my grandson. I believe there wasn’t a day that went by that I was not hit, punched, kicked, hair pulled, kicked in the stomach and verbally abused while living in Gull Bay with Mr. T.
My only question now that I am older is why I wasn’t protected by the Thunder Bay Children’s Aid Society as a Crown Ward under their care?. They were supposed to protect me and help me become a flourishing young adult. Why didn’t they do anything about the mess that happened to me? I want answers to these questions. Under their legal ‘care’ I had a young life filled with hate, abuse, rape and sexual abuse, misery, loneliness, alcoholism, drug dependency, being promiscuous, anger, shame, guilt, physically and psychologically impaired. I had a lack of parenting, lack of love, lack of education, and so on. I was a child who needed love, guidance and education. Why did all of these things happen to me? What did I do so wrong in my childhood to deserve this life?
In 1989-90 when I finally left I was 17-18 years old. This is my story as I can remember. I am sure that there is more but this was enough to remember for one day.
Sincerely,
Sherri-Lynne McQueenNovember 18, 2006
Call for Inquriy into Foster Care Abuse
Call for Inquiry into Foster Care Abuse
Women claim abuses occurred while they were under Child and family services care
Wawatay News June 01, 2006
Joyce Hunter
joyceh@wawatay.on.ca
Three women who claim they were abused both sexually and physically while under child and family services care have come forward declaring the system failed them.
Sherri-Lynne McQueen, Diane Ogima Moir and Debi O'Kane are also claiming today's child-care system remains a failure.
On May 19 the trio walked approximately five kilometers from Children's Aid Society of the District of Thunder Bay to the offices of Liberal MP Joe Comuzzi and Liberal MPP Michael Gravelle to raise awareness about their concerns.
"I was raped and beaten while I was a Crown ward," McQueen told Comuzzi and Gravelle. Ogima Moir said she was raped by a foster parent while in care. O'Kane said her foster father prostituted her to his friends during drunken parties.
Rob Richardson, executive director of Thunder Bay Children's Aid Society, the agency that had care of the women when they were children, said the issue of abuse is something the agency takes very seriously. "It goes against everything we stand for," he said. "The cases (from the women) go back as far as 40 years." Richardson said children's aid programming has changed dramatically in the last 40 years.
"Forty years ago, the sexual abuse of children wasn't talked about," he said. "Today we take the issue of child abuse more seriously. We have better screening and better training. If someone came forward with allegations today, it would be thoroughly investigated."
Richardson met with the women prior to their walk to hear their stories. "How do we bring closure to these women?" he said afterward. "That is a big question. I've spoken with the organizers of the walk and we've agreed that we will talk." Richardson said the CAS welcomes the opportunity to sort out the women's issues.
Upon arriving at Gravelle and Comuzzi's offices, McQueen read a prepared statement to them. McQueen said she was so negatively affected by the system she never recovered from it. Her own children were taken by Children's Aid in 2003, she added. "This is a disease that affects one generation and is carried down to the next either indirectly or directly."
After years spent being abused sexually, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually, McQueen said she had no meaning left in her life. "I used alcohol and drugs so I wouldn't have to face the truth," she said. McQueen's drug and alcohol use led to her separation from her five children. Three of them were adopted out. The other two are
still in care but McQueen is not allowed to visit with them. "My children will grow up without a sense of identity," she said. "They will know they don't belong where they are today."
McQueen said she would like to see a "family preservation program" become part of the Child Welfare Act, noting that parents need to be able to spend enough time with their children in care to bond with them. McQueen also said she would like to see programs specially designed for foster children who are survivors of sexually, physical, mental, emotional and spiritual abuse.
"I would also like to see people who encountered this failure by the system to work in these programs," she said. "It is hard sitting in front of a counselor who has never experienced anything like this and hear them say 'I know what you mean' when they really have no clue how it feels to be left to struggle through life alone without an identity."
Had the child-care welfare system been better organized and structured, McQueen said she, and others like her, would ot have had to go through what they did. "Since I came back (from Winnipeg) a lot of the people I grew up with in foster care have died as a result of drug and alcohol abuse and suicide," she said. "I'm here today on behalf of the people who cannot speak for themselves because they have not yet found the strength to do it and for the people who cannot because they have died."
McQueen wants an inquiry called to define how pervasive the issue of abused foster children is. Because child-care is provincially legislated and administered, Gravelle said he would take McQueen's recommendations to Mary-Anne Chambers, Minister of Children and Youth Services, and to Premier Dalton McGuinty on behalf of the women who came to him for answers.
"They deserve to be heard," Gravelle said. "And beyond that, they deserve answers and solutions."
Questioning The Child Welfare System
As part of a prepared speech May 19 in Thunder Bay, Sherri-Lynne McQueen directed these questions to Liberal MP Joe Comuzzi and Liberal MPP Michael Gravelle:
Why can't we as parents visit our children in care?
Will the government assist in building a community-based program so that it can oversee our child welfare system and our child welfare agencies as a third party?
Will the government allow a third party such as a community-based program to advocate for children in care when the agencies are saying it is in the best interests of the child that all family ties be severed?
Will the government legislate under the Child Welfare Act a family preservation program?
Will the government implement funding for education of former foster children?
Will the government implement a reunification program so our children don't have to grow up without a sense of identity or without a sense of belonging?
Some of our children should have gone to family members or our agencies should have helped us when we needed it. Our agencies have taken our children and left us to fend for ourselves. We went through programs, and in the end, they said it is in the best interests of the children that they become permanent wards. Will the government open our cases on children who have been adopted in Manitoba because some of these adoptions shouldn't have happened?
Will the government see this as a healing of the children, healing of the parents, healing of the products that we have all become and a healing of the victims that we are?
Women claim abuses occurred while they were under Child and family services care
Wawatay News June 01, 2006
Joyce Hunter
joyceh@wawatay.on.ca
Three women who claim they were abused both sexually and physically while under child and family services care have come forward declaring the system failed them.
Sherri-Lynne McQueen, Diane Ogima Moir and Debi O'Kane are also claiming today's child-care system remains a failure.
On May 19 the trio walked approximately five kilometers from Children's Aid Society of the District of Thunder Bay to the offices of Liberal MP Joe Comuzzi and Liberal MPP Michael Gravelle to raise awareness about their concerns.
"I was raped and beaten while I was a Crown ward," McQueen told Comuzzi and Gravelle. Ogima Moir said she was raped by a foster parent while in care. O'Kane said her foster father prostituted her to his friends during drunken parties.
Rob Richardson, executive director of Thunder Bay Children's Aid Society, the agency that had care of the women when they were children, said the issue of abuse is something the agency takes very seriously. "It goes against everything we stand for," he said. "The cases (from the women) go back as far as 40 years." Richardson said children's aid programming has changed dramatically in the last 40 years.
"Forty years ago, the sexual abuse of children wasn't talked about," he said. "Today we take the issue of child abuse more seriously. We have better screening and better training. If someone came forward with allegations today, it would be thoroughly investigated."
Richardson met with the women prior to their walk to hear their stories. "How do we bring closure to these women?" he said afterward. "That is a big question. I've spoken with the organizers of the walk and we've agreed that we will talk." Richardson said the CAS welcomes the opportunity to sort out the women's issues.
Upon arriving at Gravelle and Comuzzi's offices, McQueen read a prepared statement to them. McQueen said she was so negatively affected by the system she never recovered from it. Her own children were taken by Children's Aid in 2003, she added. "This is a disease that affects one generation and is carried down to the next either indirectly or directly."
After years spent being abused sexually, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually, McQueen said she had no meaning left in her life. "I used alcohol and drugs so I wouldn't have to face the truth," she said. McQueen's drug and alcohol use led to her separation from her five children. Three of them were adopted out. The other two are
still in care but McQueen is not allowed to visit with them. "My children will grow up without a sense of identity," she said. "They will know they don't belong where they are today."
McQueen said she would like to see a "family preservation program" become part of the Child Welfare Act, noting that parents need to be able to spend enough time with their children in care to bond with them. McQueen also said she would like to see programs specially designed for foster children who are survivors of sexually, physical, mental, emotional and spiritual abuse.
"I would also like to see people who encountered this failure by the system to work in these programs," she said. "It is hard sitting in front of a counselor who has never experienced anything like this and hear them say 'I know what you mean' when they really have no clue how it feels to be left to struggle through life alone without an identity."
Had the child-care welfare system been better organized and structured, McQueen said she, and others like her, would ot have had to go through what they did. "Since I came back (from Winnipeg) a lot of the people I grew up with in foster care have died as a result of drug and alcohol abuse and suicide," she said. "I'm here today on behalf of the people who cannot speak for themselves because they have not yet found the strength to do it and for the people who cannot because they have died."
McQueen wants an inquiry called to define how pervasive the issue of abused foster children is. Because child-care is provincially legislated and administered, Gravelle said he would take McQueen's recommendations to Mary-Anne Chambers, Minister of Children and Youth Services, and to Premier Dalton McGuinty on behalf of the women who came to him for answers.
"They deserve to be heard," Gravelle said. "And beyond that, they deserve answers and solutions."
Questioning The Child Welfare System
As part of a prepared speech May 19 in Thunder Bay, Sherri-Lynne McQueen directed these questions to Liberal MP Joe Comuzzi and Liberal MPP Michael Gravelle:
Why can't we as parents visit our children in care?
Will the government assist in building a community-based program so that it can oversee our child welfare system and our child welfare agencies as a third party?
Will the government allow a third party such as a community-based program to advocate for children in care when the agencies are saying it is in the best interests of the child that all family ties be severed?
Will the government legislate under the Child Welfare Act a family preservation program?
Will the government implement funding for education of former foster children?
Will the government implement a reunification program so our children don't have to grow up without a sense of identity or without a sense of belonging?
Some of our children should have gone to family members or our agencies should have helped us when we needed it. Our agencies have taken our children and left us to fend for ourselves. We went through programs, and in the end, they said it is in the best interests of the children that they become permanent wards. Will the government open our cases on children who have been adopted in Manitoba because some of these adoptions shouldn't have happened?
Will the government see this as a healing of the children, healing of the parents, healing of the products that we have all become and a healing of the victims that we are?
Brave Women Letter to the Editor
Brave Women - Letter to the Editor
Thunder Bay Source
June 02 2006
Brave Women
Letter to the Editor:
In regard to your article, Survivors in Solidarity, I was disappointed in Rob Richardson's response to the brave women who walked in memory of the victimization they and others endured while in the care of CAS.
So what if CAS didn't keep accurate records during the 60s and 70s. Does this change the fact that these women were violated?
If Rob Richardson really wants to show sympathy, why doesn't he initiate a thorough investigation into these women's cases? Who knows, maybe if the word gets out that CAS really does care, other past clients might also come forward with their concerns.
But to just say too much time has passed is ridiculous. There is no time limit on abuse and by doing nothing but offering some token words of understanding, Richardson is re-traumatizing these women and sending out the message to all the others who have been abused at CAS that what you've been through isn't important enough to look into and make right.
Kim Casey, Thunder Bay
Thunder Bay Source
June 02 2006
Brave Women
Letter to the Editor:
In regard to your article, Survivors in Solidarity, I was disappointed in Rob Richardson's response to the brave women who walked in memory of the victimization they and others endured while in the care of CAS.
So what if CAS didn't keep accurate records during the 60s and 70s. Does this change the fact that these women were violated?
If Rob Richardson really wants to show sympathy, why doesn't he initiate a thorough investigation into these women's cases? Who knows, maybe if the word gets out that CAS really does care, other past clients might also come forward with their concerns.
But to just say too much time has passed is ridiculous. There is no time limit on abuse and by doing nothing but offering some token words of understanding, Richardson is re-traumatizing these women and sending out the message to all the others who have been abused at CAS that what you've been through isn't important enough to look into and make right.
Kim Casey, Thunder Bay
Metis Post Secondary Education Conference in Winnipeg
Mino Kisikaw- “I said today is a good day.”
I will be speaking on the Barriers to Post Secondary Education on behalf Former Foster Children and Historical Abuse Survivors.
Before I start I will tell you a little bit about my personal life and why I am here today on behalf of Former and current Foster Children.
I became a Crown ward in Thunder Bay, Ontario when I was 12 years old. I was Sexually, Physically, Psychologically, Intellectually, Spiritually and Culturally assaulted by the hands of people who were suppose to protect me.
I was in 15 different Foster Homes in 2 years. I was severed from my Culture, My Language, My Family, My Sense of Belonging and My Sense of Self identity. This learnt behaviour that I was taught by people who were suppose to make me become a beautiful flourishing young woman taught me Violence, Anger, Hatred, Humility, Instability and many more deviant behaviours. I carried this unconstructive behaviour with me to other stages of my life including Relationships, Parenting, My Adolescents and My Activities of Daily Living. I grew up alone and not knowing the whereabouts of my family and I didn’t have a sense of belonging in society. I was just surviving from day to day. I entered many relationships that were very abusive and I became a Mother when I was 16 years old.
I am a Mother of 7 children with one whom is deceased. I became a grandmother at the age of 32. I fled this life of abuse and came to Manitoba in 1990. This negative ghost that followed me throughout my life was very traumatic. It followed me through all the stages in my life because this is what I was taught by my Foster Parents and the Agency. I became re victimized again by the Child Welfare that was supposed to protect me when I was a child, as they took my children from me when I was 30 years old due to my childhood issues and deviant behaviours as an Adult. Today I still don’t get visitations with my children. I haven’t seen them for 3 years. 3 out of 5 were adopted when they became Permanent Wards of the State.
The Agency that they should have went to was not mandated yet but still my children were adoptable material. This happened when the Devolution was happening here in Manitoba. Here goes another generation severed from their family, culture, language, a sense of belonging and their self identity.
Today, I am engaged to a wonderful man from Sudan, Africa. Deng, I don’t know how you could lived with and handled the baggage that I carried to our relationship. Thank you for all your genuine support and helping me reconnect to my Stolen Life. I am Transforming from my old destructive ways that I was taught by people who were supposed to protect me and make me into a young flourishing woman. I have to reprogram my thoughts, my behaviour, my attitude, and my actions. I have searched and found my identity at 34 years old. I was reconnected with my biological family after 34 years of not knowing them.( I come from the Blondeau and Gardipie from Estevan Saskatchewan) and I had a family that I could of and should have gone to. My children should of have also gone to them as well. This was negligence on part of the Child Welfare System. Why did they not send me home where I belonged?
Child Welfare is supposed to be the last resort. Why didn’t my children go to my biological family? These are questions that I will get answers too.
I have founded “SAIFC” which stands for Surviving Abuse in Foster Care. I have organized the 1st Annual Walk last May and am going to be organizing and pleased to announce that Manitoba Youth in Care will be apart of the 2nd Annual Walk for Survivors of the Child Welfare System. This walk will take place on May 18, 2007.
I am here today as a Post Secondary student from the University of Winnipeg who will get her double Major in Conflict Resolutions and Criminal Justice Studies. This is my short term goal. My long term goal is to become A Human Rights Lawyer, Métis Rights, Child Rights and also specialize in Aboriginal Law. I will succeed. I am on an Intensive Healing Journey and no one will get in the way of this process.
Many years have been lost and stolen from me due to negligence on part of a Mandated Agency and I have many years of hard work and dedication ahead of me to resolve the issues that were inflicted upon me from a Child Protection Agency.
The Barriers I face today as a Post Secondary Student are Great and Many. These are my Barriers.
Trying to gain a support system from my family.
Trying to build a bond to my biological family after 34 years of not knowing them.
Trying to visit my Mother after 24 years of not seeing her. I guess this makes me an immigrant in my own country.
Trying to find funding and scholarships but there is an age barrier on some scholarships. This in it self does not make sense when I still have 25years of working experience left. Some scholarships for Foster Children have an age barrier of 30 years old which I do not qualify for.
Many of us healing in different phases in our life. Some of the scholarships, we don’t even qualify for. This doesn’t make sense to me. We can educate our seniors but we can’t educate someone who has 25 years of working left.
I have a lot healing to do with my own childhood experiences that make’s it psychologically draining as an Adult and hard to recover what was lost and stolen from me.
Worrying and wondering if my own children that were taken from me are experiencing the same abuse that I was inflicted with. This is very traumatizing for me.
Wishing and praying that one day I will see my children before it is too late to build a bond with them. Each day that passes is harder to build that relationship that was severed. I know this from my own personal experience with my own mother.
Trying to learn and speak my Cree language as an adult is very difficult.
I am a strong and proud Métis woman whose only part of my life that wasn’t stolen from me is my Spirit and Voice. The Child Welfare System will never get this. I say No More will this continue. This genocide has been continuing for generations and I say today that it will stop. I have dedicated my life to this journey and advocate for our youth who need us to stand strong and proud for them. You are hurting our children and creating criminals who lash out in forms of violence because this is the only way they know how. We have jumped to another form of slavery with our young sisters who are spiriting their souls on the streets of Canada to buy Drugs or feed their children. Sexual Exploitation is a crime.
You never gave us our voice. It was always the Social Workers or the Agency that spoke for us. This is a violation of our Human Rights. What happened to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms? Isn’t this the Law of the Land?
What happened to the United Nations Rights of the Child 1989?
We are Over Represented in the CJS, the child welfare and many other areas. We have had many social injustices done to us. We were severed from our land, our children, our families, our culture, our language. We live in Poverty and are lashing out on society. Our gangs are speaking to us by means of graffiti on the walls and we are not recognizing this. (Society says look at these kids they have know respect.) Look at our young generation committing suicide, being incarcerated, sexually exploited, joining gangs. Are we going to have a future generation if this continues?
My recommendations to the Government of Manitoba and the Government of Canada are these:
Family Preservation Program- Reflecting new knowledge and recognition of the intergenerational impacts of the Residential Schools, apartheid of the reserve system, systemic oppression and re- trauamatization of First Nations and Métis mother and fathers whose children have been removed from their care. We have Parents whose children are apprehended by the child welfare agencies and denied family reconciliation.
Healing Center- in Winnipeg specifically designed and operated for survivors of rape and abuse in foster care and adoptive homes to address the traumatic impacts of assaults by strangers acting as or familiar to foster and adoptive parents and or foster care workers.
Safe house- for survivors of foster care and or adoption who are escaping sex slavery in its various forms.
Child/ Family Advocate - working to assist and intervene where requested on behalf of children in care and /or with mothers or other family members. When these children are reporting assaults or neglect.
Reunification Program-including an investigation unit to trace and remedy illegal adoptions, historic and recent.
Scholarship Program- guaranteed education (secondary and post secondary) for survivors of abuse in foster care and or adoptive homes and their children. This should apply to current foster children who have not been abused and Residential School Survivors and their children. I would like to see RESP’s set up for all children currently in the child welfare system.
Restorative Justice Program- for children who are from the child welfare system and who are deviant and committing acts of violence. We need to get to the roots of this issue and start healing as a Nation!
An Accountability Act that makes the Agencies and Authorities Civilly Liable for the Criminal Acts of various forms that happen to the children in foster care or adoptive homes and Family members of those whose lives were lost or disabled because of the effects of such abuse while in the province’s care or adopted through arrangements made by it’s agencies.
A Community In Home Support System- to help and teach parenting skills, provide early intervention, life skills, and to offer respite and pay for Psychotherapy that is requested by Professionals when assessments are requested by the Agencies and recommendations are made to follow these assessments.
This is to help mothers and fathers who are former foster children and who have been victimized by the system to help them keep their children with them in their homes.
This needs to be operated by a private organization formed by Immigrant Officials, Métis and First Nations Elders and leaders but funded by the government.
Children who are made Wards of the state are sometimes abused then this is covered up by removing the child from the home and placing them in a different home. We need to know that are Future Generation are safe and not manipulated by the Agency’s staff and support workers.
This Genocide has been going on for generations and it is time for the government to start paying for the damages that have been inflicted on our children, parents and grandparents. These are programs that we need to remedy the impacts and affects that this has had on our generations.
Martin Luther King Jr. once said “I have a Dream that one day Blacks and Whites would come together walking hand in hand and this became a reality.” and this is my Dream and VISION that one day we would start to gather our families, our children, our land, our culture, our language and live in peace and harmony.
Meegwhich. Akoski, Thank you
I will be speaking on the Barriers to Post Secondary Education on behalf Former Foster Children and Historical Abuse Survivors.
Before I start I will tell you a little bit about my personal life and why I am here today on behalf of Former and current Foster Children.
I became a Crown ward in Thunder Bay, Ontario when I was 12 years old. I was Sexually, Physically, Psychologically, Intellectually, Spiritually and Culturally assaulted by the hands of people who were suppose to protect me.
I was in 15 different Foster Homes in 2 years. I was severed from my Culture, My Language, My Family, My Sense of Belonging and My Sense of Self identity. This learnt behaviour that I was taught by people who were suppose to make me become a beautiful flourishing young woman taught me Violence, Anger, Hatred, Humility, Instability and many more deviant behaviours. I carried this unconstructive behaviour with me to other stages of my life including Relationships, Parenting, My Adolescents and My Activities of Daily Living. I grew up alone and not knowing the whereabouts of my family and I didn’t have a sense of belonging in society. I was just surviving from day to day. I entered many relationships that were very abusive and I became a Mother when I was 16 years old.
I am a Mother of 7 children with one whom is deceased. I became a grandmother at the age of 32. I fled this life of abuse and came to Manitoba in 1990. This negative ghost that followed me throughout my life was very traumatic. It followed me through all the stages in my life because this is what I was taught by my Foster Parents and the Agency. I became re victimized again by the Child Welfare that was supposed to protect me when I was a child, as they took my children from me when I was 30 years old due to my childhood issues and deviant behaviours as an Adult. Today I still don’t get visitations with my children. I haven’t seen them for 3 years. 3 out of 5 were adopted when they became Permanent Wards of the State.
The Agency that they should have went to was not mandated yet but still my children were adoptable material. This happened when the Devolution was happening here in Manitoba. Here goes another generation severed from their family, culture, language, a sense of belonging and their self identity.
Today, I am engaged to a wonderful man from Sudan, Africa. Deng, I don’t know how you could lived with and handled the baggage that I carried to our relationship. Thank you for all your genuine support and helping me reconnect to my Stolen Life. I am Transforming from my old destructive ways that I was taught by people who were supposed to protect me and make me into a young flourishing woman. I have to reprogram my thoughts, my behaviour, my attitude, and my actions. I have searched and found my identity at 34 years old. I was reconnected with my biological family after 34 years of not knowing them.( I come from the Blondeau and Gardipie from Estevan Saskatchewan) and I had a family that I could of and should have gone to. My children should of have also gone to them as well. This was negligence on part of the Child Welfare System. Why did they not send me home where I belonged?
Child Welfare is supposed to be the last resort. Why didn’t my children go to my biological family? These are questions that I will get answers too.
I have founded “SAIFC” which stands for Surviving Abuse in Foster Care. I have organized the 1st Annual Walk last May and am going to be organizing and pleased to announce that Manitoba Youth in Care will be apart of the 2nd Annual Walk for Survivors of the Child Welfare System. This walk will take place on May 18, 2007.
I am here today as a Post Secondary student from the University of Winnipeg who will get her double Major in Conflict Resolutions and Criminal Justice Studies. This is my short term goal. My long term goal is to become A Human Rights Lawyer, Métis Rights, Child Rights and also specialize in Aboriginal Law. I will succeed. I am on an Intensive Healing Journey and no one will get in the way of this process.
Many years have been lost and stolen from me due to negligence on part of a Mandated Agency and I have many years of hard work and dedication ahead of me to resolve the issues that were inflicted upon me from a Child Protection Agency.
The Barriers I face today as a Post Secondary Student are Great and Many. These are my Barriers.
Trying to gain a support system from my family.
Trying to build a bond to my biological family after 34 years of not knowing them.
Trying to visit my Mother after 24 years of not seeing her. I guess this makes me an immigrant in my own country.
Trying to find funding and scholarships but there is an age barrier on some scholarships. This in it self does not make sense when I still have 25years of working experience left. Some scholarships for Foster Children have an age barrier of 30 years old which I do not qualify for.
Many of us healing in different phases in our life. Some of the scholarships, we don’t even qualify for. This doesn’t make sense to me. We can educate our seniors but we can’t educate someone who has 25 years of working left.
I have a lot healing to do with my own childhood experiences that make’s it psychologically draining as an Adult and hard to recover what was lost and stolen from me.
Worrying and wondering if my own children that were taken from me are experiencing the same abuse that I was inflicted with. This is very traumatizing for me.
Wishing and praying that one day I will see my children before it is too late to build a bond with them. Each day that passes is harder to build that relationship that was severed. I know this from my own personal experience with my own mother.
Trying to learn and speak my Cree language as an adult is very difficult.
I am a strong and proud Métis woman whose only part of my life that wasn’t stolen from me is my Spirit and Voice. The Child Welfare System will never get this. I say No More will this continue. This genocide has been continuing for generations and I say today that it will stop. I have dedicated my life to this journey and advocate for our youth who need us to stand strong and proud for them. You are hurting our children and creating criminals who lash out in forms of violence because this is the only way they know how. We have jumped to another form of slavery with our young sisters who are spiriting their souls on the streets of Canada to buy Drugs or feed their children. Sexual Exploitation is a crime.
You never gave us our voice. It was always the Social Workers or the Agency that spoke for us. This is a violation of our Human Rights. What happened to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms? Isn’t this the Law of the Land?
What happened to the United Nations Rights of the Child 1989?
We are Over Represented in the CJS, the child welfare and many other areas. We have had many social injustices done to us. We were severed from our land, our children, our families, our culture, our language. We live in Poverty and are lashing out on society. Our gangs are speaking to us by means of graffiti on the walls and we are not recognizing this. (Society says look at these kids they have know respect.) Look at our young generation committing suicide, being incarcerated, sexually exploited, joining gangs. Are we going to have a future generation if this continues?
My recommendations to the Government of Manitoba and the Government of Canada are these:
Family Preservation Program- Reflecting new knowledge and recognition of the intergenerational impacts of the Residential Schools, apartheid of the reserve system, systemic oppression and re- trauamatization of First Nations and Métis mother and fathers whose children have been removed from their care. We have Parents whose children are apprehended by the child welfare agencies and denied family reconciliation.
Healing Center- in Winnipeg specifically designed and operated for survivors of rape and abuse in foster care and adoptive homes to address the traumatic impacts of assaults by strangers acting as or familiar to foster and adoptive parents and or foster care workers.
Safe house- for survivors of foster care and or adoption who are escaping sex slavery in its various forms.
Child/ Family Advocate - working to assist and intervene where requested on behalf of children in care and /or with mothers or other family members. When these children are reporting assaults or neglect.
Reunification Program-including an investigation unit to trace and remedy illegal adoptions, historic and recent.
Scholarship Program- guaranteed education (secondary and post secondary) for survivors of abuse in foster care and or adoptive homes and their children. This should apply to current foster children who have not been abused and Residential School Survivors and their children. I would like to see RESP’s set up for all children currently in the child welfare system.
Restorative Justice Program- for children who are from the child welfare system and who are deviant and committing acts of violence. We need to get to the roots of this issue and start healing as a Nation!
An Accountability Act that makes the Agencies and Authorities Civilly Liable for the Criminal Acts of various forms that happen to the children in foster care or adoptive homes and Family members of those whose lives were lost or disabled because of the effects of such abuse while in the province’s care or adopted through arrangements made by it’s agencies.
A Community In Home Support System- to help and teach parenting skills, provide early intervention, life skills, and to offer respite and pay for Psychotherapy that is requested by Professionals when assessments are requested by the Agencies and recommendations are made to follow these assessments.
This is to help mothers and fathers who are former foster children and who have been victimized by the system to help them keep their children with them in their homes.
This needs to be operated by a private organization formed by Immigrant Officials, Métis and First Nations Elders and leaders but funded by the government.
Children who are made Wards of the state are sometimes abused then this is covered up by removing the child from the home and placing them in a different home. We need to know that are Future Generation are safe and not manipulated by the Agency’s staff and support workers.
This Genocide has been going on for generations and it is time for the government to start paying for the damages that have been inflicted on our children, parents and grandparents. These are programs that we need to remedy the impacts and affects that this has had on our generations.
Martin Luther King Jr. once said “I have a Dream that one day Blacks and Whites would come together walking hand in hand and this became a reality.” and this is my Dream and VISION that one day we would start to gather our families, our children, our land, our culture, our language and live in peace and harmony.
Meegwhich. Akoski, Thank you
Monday, February 26, 2007
Goals for "SAIFC"
Family Preservation Program -reflecting new knowledge and recognition of the intergenerational impact of residential schools, apartheid of the reserve system, systemic oppression and re-traumatization of First Nations and Metis mothers and fathers whose children have been removed from their care. Program will offer mobile crisis response and in-home support workers to work directly with survivors and their children with individualized service contracts created with survivors and their children, to radically reduce the number of children apprehended by the foster and adoption system.
Healing Centre in Winnipeg Manitoba and Thunder Bay Ontario -- specifically designed and operated for survivors of rape and abuse in foster care and adoptive homes to address the traumatic impact of assaults by strangers acting as or familiar to foster and adoptive parents and/or foster care workers. A wing of the Healing Centre will serve as an information, advocacy and resource centre for those survivors and family members needing informed assistance to access services to which they are entitled including on-site lawyer.
Safe House for survivors of foster care and/or adoption who are escaping sex slavery in its various forms.
Child/Family Advocates working from the Healing Centre and reporting to on-site lawyer, to assist and intervene where requested on behalf of children in care and/or with mothers or other family members.
Reunification Program including an investigation unit to trace & remedy illegal adoptions, historic & recent.
Scholarship Program - guaranteed education (secondary & post secondary) for survivors of abuse in foster care or adoptive homes, and their children currently in the child welfare system.
Restorative Justice Program- for children who are from the child welfare system and who are deviant and committing acts of violence. We need to get to the roots of this issue and start healing as a Nation!
An Accountability Act that makes the Agencies and Authorities Civilly Liable for the Criminal Acts --of various forms that happen to the children in foster care or adoptive homes and Family members of those whose lives were lost or disabled because of the effects of such abuse while in the province’s care or adopted through arrangements made by it’s agencies.
A Community In Home Support System- to help and teach parenting skills, provide early intervention, life skills, and to offer respite and pay for Psychotherapy that is requested by Professionals when assessments are requested by the Agencies and Recommendations are made to follow these assessments.
Family Preservation Program -reflecting new knowledge and recognition of the intergenerational impact of residential schools, apartheid of the reserve system, systemic oppression and re-traumatization of First Nations and Metis mothers and fathers whose children have been removed from their care. Program will offer mobile crisis response and in-home support workers to work directly with survivors and their children with individualized service contracts created with survivors and their children, to radically reduce the number of children apprehended by the foster and adoption system.
Healing Centre in Winnipeg Manitoba and Thunder Bay Ontario -- specifically designed and operated for survivors of rape and abuse in foster care and adoptive homes to address the traumatic impact of assaults by strangers acting as or familiar to foster and adoptive parents and/or foster care workers. A wing of the Healing Centre will serve as an information, advocacy and resource centre for those survivors and family members needing informed assistance to access services to which they are entitled including on-site lawyer.
Safe House for survivors of foster care and/or adoption who are escaping sex slavery in its various forms.
Child/Family Advocates working from the Healing Centre and reporting to on-site lawyer, to assist and intervene where requested on behalf of children in care and/or with mothers or other family members.
Reunification Program including an investigation unit to trace & remedy illegal adoptions, historic & recent.
Scholarship Program - guaranteed education (secondary & post secondary) for survivors of abuse in foster care or adoptive homes, and their children currently in the child welfare system.
Restorative Justice Program- for children who are from the child welfare system and who are deviant and committing acts of violence. We need to get to the roots of this issue and start healing as a Nation!
An Accountability Act that makes the Agencies and Authorities Civilly Liable for the Criminal Acts --of various forms that happen to the children in foster care or adoptive homes and Family members of those whose lives were lost or disabled because of the effects of such abuse while in the province’s care or adopted through arrangements made by it’s agencies.
A Community In Home Support System- to help and teach parenting skills, provide early intervention, life skills, and to offer respite and pay for Psychotherapy that is requested by Professionals when assessments are requested by the Agencies and Recommendations are made to follow these assessments.
Changes to Education for Foster Children in Manitoba
Keep Manitoba foster kids in care until 21:
reportDate : Wednesday, January 10, 2007
The Manitoba government should retain responsibility of foster youth past age 18, at least until 21, says a report by the province's children's advocate.
It's among 45 recommendations in the 97-page report, on the struggles foster youth face when they leave Manitoba's child welfare system, that was released Wednesday by Billie Schibler.
Schibler noted that many youth still need support when they become young adults.
"Once they reach age of majority, they are let go out onto their own, without adequate supports in place," she told a news conference Wednesday at her downtown Winnipeg office.
"Many of them have been severed from their families, from their communities of origin, and are really struggling with other issues that they've faced through trauma in their life."
In response to Schibler's report, Family Services Minister Gord Mackintosh established several education and transition programs, at a cost of about $240,000.
He also asked a committee already reviewing ways to overhaul the child welfare system to examine the report.
However, Mackintosh said he would not commit to Schibler's primary recommendation of extending care to foster youth over 18.
1,600 youth 'aging out' in 3 years
Nearly 1,600 Manitoba youth will be "aging out" of foster care over the next three years, Schibler said. Of those, 70 per cent are aboriginals and nearly 30 per cent have diagnosed disabilities.
She added that many youth who are released from the child-welfare system do not complete high school, and end up vulnerable to drugs, gang violence and the sex trade.
"Society owes them. And we all know that it will put some significant drains on the other systems in the end anyway, so why not be proactive?" she said.
Schibler's report recommends the province extend foster-care services to at least age 21. It says the province should extend the maximum age eligibility for certain programs to 25.
The report also recommends offering more child welfare services - such as life-skills training, transitional housing and counselling - to foster youth over 18, so they can be more independent as adults.
Schibler suggested a tracking system to monitor how kids do once they become adults.
"We know that young people are staying well into their 20s and beyond in the comforts of their family home, and through those supports," Schibler said. "And then once they do exit, they still have the supports of their family."
Please see Children's Advocate Website in Manitoba for more information.
reportDate : Wednesday, January 10, 2007
The Manitoba government should retain responsibility of foster youth past age 18, at least until 21, says a report by the province's children's advocate.
It's among 45 recommendations in the 97-page report, on the struggles foster youth face when they leave Manitoba's child welfare system, that was released Wednesday by Billie Schibler.
Schibler noted that many youth still need support when they become young adults.
"Once they reach age of majority, they are let go out onto their own, without adequate supports in place," she told a news conference Wednesday at her downtown Winnipeg office.
"Many of them have been severed from their families, from their communities of origin, and are really struggling with other issues that they've faced through trauma in their life."
In response to Schibler's report, Family Services Minister Gord Mackintosh established several education and transition programs, at a cost of about $240,000.
He also asked a committee already reviewing ways to overhaul the child welfare system to examine the report.
However, Mackintosh said he would not commit to Schibler's primary recommendation of extending care to foster youth over 18.
1,600 youth 'aging out' in 3 years
Nearly 1,600 Manitoba youth will be "aging out" of foster care over the next three years, Schibler said. Of those, 70 per cent are aboriginals and nearly 30 per cent have diagnosed disabilities.
She added that many youth who are released from the child-welfare system do not complete high school, and end up vulnerable to drugs, gang violence and the sex trade.
"Society owes them. And we all know that it will put some significant drains on the other systems in the end anyway, so why not be proactive?" she said.
Schibler's report recommends the province extend foster-care services to at least age 21. It says the province should extend the maximum age eligibility for certain programs to 25.
The report also recommends offering more child welfare services - such as life-skills training, transitional housing and counselling - to foster youth over 18, so they can be more independent as adults.
Schibler suggested a tracking system to monitor how kids do once they become adults.
"We know that young people are staying well into their 20s and beyond in the comforts of their family home, and through those supports," Schibler said. "And then once they do exit, they still have the supports of their family."
Please see Children's Advocate Website in Manitoba for more information.
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