Los Angeles Public Interest Law Journal

LOS ANGELES PUBLIC INTEREST LAW JOURNAL

1 L.A. PUB. INT. L.J. 240

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ENDING THE EMANCIPATION NIGHTMARE: REFORMING THE PARADIGM OF EMANCIPATION PREPARATION FOR FOSTER YOUTH IN CALIFORNIA*
Nicole Gon Ochi

          As you arrive at Pantages Theater to watch a show or shop at Hollywood and Highland or have dinner at one of the restaurants along Hollywood Boulevard, you may cross paths with Brian or Chato or JJ. These are Los Angeles’ “throwaway kids”–youth who ran away or emancipated from the foster care system and are now living on the streets of Hollywood. Some, like Brian, have adopted their parents’ destructive addictions. Others, like Chato, have kicked the habit, but have difficulty finding employment and getting off the street. All of them share the pain of a fractured childhood. Some, like Brian, were sexually abused by their foster care parents; while others, like JJ, moved constantly from group home to group home. All of them face a bleak future because of the state’s failure to properly care for them and prepare them for independence.

          Each year, more than 24,000 young people are discharged from foster care because they are too old to remain under the jurisdiction of the dependency court. At least one out of six of these “emancipated foster youth” live in California. These youth face enormous challenges as they transition to adulthood. Unlike their peers who grew up in a stable family, emancipated foster youth lack a safety net: there is no home to return to on college break, or a mom to help pay for gas, or a dad to help fill out financial aid forms. Moreover, former foster youth carry the emotional baggage of parental abuse, neglect, or abandonment as well as the harm they suffered from the transience, isolation, and neglect of state care.


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