Families Vs. DHR

Across Alabama, good mothers are being targeted before they ever leave the hospital. This powerful testimony exposes how the child welfare system is punishing families based on fear, not facts, and why so many are now too afraid to grow their families.

*** Watch the full clip here *** Seventeen years after Nancy Schaefer’s warning, families are still fighting to be heard. The system hasn’t changed. It has simply gotten better at hiding. In 2007, State Senator Nancy...

A Father’s Day Reflection on Power, Protection, and the Voice They Fear Most Oftentimes, a child’s first word is “Dada.” It’s simple. Soft. Full of meaning. It marks the beginning of attachment, safety, and identity....

By Families vs. Houston County DHR It started with a message from a grandmother. She didn’t write with rage. She wrote with heartbreak. With trembling hands and the kind of fear only a caregiver truly...

When Alabama Deputy Commissioner Karen Smith was asked if everyone on the state’s abuse registry deserved to be there, she answered without hesitation: “I do.” With no requirement for trial, no guarantee of notice, and no clear path for removal, Alabama’s registry functions as punishment by accusation. This investigation explores the real cost of that system and the chilling indifference of the official defending it.

By Staff Writer | Families vs DHR In a small Alabama town, a grandmother stood by her phone, waiting for a call that never came. Her daughter had just been taken into custody, and she...

By Families vs. DHR | Investigative Feature In Alabama, you can be labeled a child abuser without ever stepping foot in a courtroom. There is no requirement for an arrest. No need for a conviction. In...

What if I told you the removal of children from loving homes is being incentivized by federal dollars? This video expose how the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, passed under the Clinton administration,...