CAI’s Ed Howard, Senior Policy Advocate Quoted in Newsweek on AB 2906 a Bill to Protect Foster Youth’s Benefits in California

SAN DIEGO (April 29, 2024) – University of San Diego (USD) School of Law Children’s Advocacy Institute’s (CAI) Ed Howard, Senior Policy Advocate was quoted in an article entitled, “Social Security Benefits Could Be Changed for Thousands of Children.”

Last year, Governor Newsom vetoed a bill allowing foster youth to keep the money they are owed through Social Security benefits.  A new bill introduced by Assemblymember Isaac Bryan, AB 2906, is now making its way through the legislature.

According to the article, AB 2906, would require social service agencies to, among other things, ensure that a foster child's federal Social Security survivors' benefits "are not used to pay for, or to reimburse, the placing agency for any costs of the child's care and supervision." If passed, the bill would come into effect on January 1, 2025.

"Too many of these children, who are our children, end up homeless and terrified on their 18th birthday, too many of them end up trafficked, too few of them go to college," said Ed Howard, the senior counsel at the Children's Advocacy Institute. "A consequence of the veto, is that California still permits counties to steal from abused and neglected children and use it to their own benefit."

CAI, with support from funders, has been leading a multidimensional campaign to eradicate this practice nationwide. A well-established leader on this issue, CAI is leading reform efforts at the federal, state, and local levels to protect the rights and preserve the benefits of foster youth. CAI issued a 50 state report card entitled, “Foster Care or Foster Con? Preserving the Federal Benefits of America’s Most Vulnerable Children.” According to the report, California received an F for its effort to protect foster youth’s benefits.

To read the full article, visit Newsweek.

To learn more about CAI’s campaign to stop this practice, please visit our Preserving Federal Benefits of Foster Youth website.

About the Children’s Advocacy Institute

The Children's Advocacy Institute (CAI), founded at the nonprofit University of San Diego School of Law in 1989, is one of the nation's premiere academic, research, and advocacy organizations working to improve the lives of children and youth, with special emphasis on improving the child protection and foster care systems and enhancing resources that are available to youth aging out of foster care.

In its academic component, CAI trains law students and attorneys to be effective child advocates throughout their legal careers. Its Child Advocacy Clinic gives USD Law students three distinct clinical opportunities to advocate on behalf of children and youth, and its Dependency Counsel Training Program provides comprehensive training to licensed attorneys engaged in or contemplating Dependency Court practice.

CAI's research and advocacy component, conducted through its offices in San Diego, Sacramento, and Washington, D.C., seeks to leverage change for children and youth through impact litigation, regulatory and legislative advocacy, and public education. Active primarily at the federal and state levels, CAI's efforts are multi-faceted—comprehensively and successfully embracing all tools of public interest advocacy to improve the lives of children and youth. To support CAI’s work, please visit law.sandiego.edu/caigift.

About the University of San Diego School of Law

Each year, USD educates approximately 800 Juris Doctor and graduate law students from throughout the United States and around the world. The law school is best known for its offerings in the areas of business and corporate law, constitutional law, intellectual property, international and comparative law, public interest law and taxation.

USD School of Law is one of the 84 law schools elected to the Order of the Coif, a national honor society for law school graduates. The law school’s faculty is a strong group of outstanding scholars and teachers with national and international reputations and currently ranks 30th nationally among U.S. law faculties in scholarly impact and 41st nationally in past-year faculty downloads on the Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN). The school is accredited by the American Bar Association and is a member of the Association of American Law Schools. Founded in 1954, the law school is part of the University of San Diego, a private, independent, Roman Catholic university chartered in 1949.