Abigail Kramer

Center for New York City Affairs • 31st January 2021

In Covid-Era New York, Suicidal Kids Spend Days Waiting for Hospital Beds

As the Covid-19 pandemic grinds on, hospitals around New York State report a growing crisis for children who need mental health care: Suicide attempts and other psychiatric emergencies are up, inpatient units are full, and very sick kids spend days in loud and crowded emergency rooms, waiting for beds to open up.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th August 2020

Kids and Covid-19: A Mental Health Crisis Looms

Hospitals are seeing an influx of young people in dangerous psychiatric crisis. Doctors warn that many won't get the help they need.

Center for New York City Affairs • 20th April 2020

After Deaths of Juvenile Detention Staff Members, Parents Fear for Their Children's Safety

Covid-19 has torn through the City's juvenile detention centers. Frantic parents say their kids should be sent home.

Center for New York City Affairs • 20th April 2020

Child Welfare Limbo: Covid-19 Puts Family Reunifications On ‘Indefinite’ Hold

Amid the chaos caused by Covid-19, New York City parents with kids in the child welfare system have lost access to the Family Court judges normally entrusted with protecting their rights. In at least one case, the City's child welfare agency held custody of a child for more than a week without seeking permission from a judge, according to family members who were desperate to bring the child home.

Center for New York City Affairs • 20th April 2020

Backfire: When Reporting Domestic Violence Means You Get Investigated for Child Abuse

Child welfare investigators are often among the first responders to domestic violence cases. Officials say their goal is to help not just kids but adult victims, protecting them from abusers and steering them into services like therapy or shelter. But critics say that child welfare interventions often go terribly wrong, turning domestic violence victims into suspects and creating chaos for vulnerable families.

Center for New York City Affairs • 1st April 2020

Even as Youth Suicides Rise, New York State Cuts Funds For Kids’ Mental Health

Across New York State, children and adolescents regularly wait weeks—or even months—to get treatment for serious mental health problems. In the coming year, mental health providers and advocates warn that the situation may get worse.

Center for New York City Affairs • 28th February 2019

Banned for 28 Years: How Child Welfare Accusations Keep Women out of the Workforce

Nearly every state keeps a database of people investigated for child abuse or neglect. On its face, the goal is unassailable: to keep abusers away from potential victims. But critics say the registries are much too long and easy to land on—especially for low-income women of color, who are subject to far more than their share of child welfare investigations.

Center for New York City Affairs • 31st January 2019

Long Hours, High Caseloads: An Ongoing Surge of Cases Weighs on Child Welfare Workers

In the poorest neighborhoods of New York City, frontline child welfare workers carry dangerously high caseloads — a fact that is obscured by the city's reporting.

Center for New York City Affairs • 9th February 2019

Family Court Reform: Is there hope for 'the saddest place in New York?'

New York's family courts are notorious for delay and dysfunction. But court administrators say that if there has ever been a time for positive change, it’s now.

ProPublica • 30th January 2019

The Trials of New York’s Family Court

When you spend time in Family Court, it’s painfully clear that we apply a level of scrutiny to poor families that the rest of us would never tolerate.

Center for New York City Affairs • 31st January 2019

Is Cuomo Ditching Kids in his Medicaid Reform Plan?

EVEN AS GOVERNOR Andrew Cuomo promises to defend New Yorkers’ health care from federal funding cuts, his proposed budget threatens to kill a long-planned fix to the state’s underfunded, overburdened system of mental health services for children.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

Building Health Homes: Medicaid redesign finally reaches children

New York has begun its ambitious project to re-engineer health care for low-income children.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

Reform Or Relapse? Kids’ Medicaid Mental Health Services Hang In The Balance

New York’s hard-won mental health reform for kids is now in danger of being crushed by the Trump administration.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

Can a New ‘Strong Starts’ Initiative Make a Difference for Babies in the Bronx?

Chaos and upheaval can derail a baby's development. A new Family Court project in the Bronx aims to get kids back on track.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

Child Welfare Surge Continues: Family Court Cases, Emergency Child Removals Remain Up

A year and a half after two high-profile child deaths, New York City is taking thousands more parents to Family Court. So-called "emergency removals," in which children are taken from their homes without approval by a judge, are up nearly 30 percent.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

ACS in Overdrive: After the death of a Harlem 6-year-old, are fewer families getting the help they need?

After a series of widely publicized child deaths in 2016, New York City's child welfare system continues to struggle under a glut of new cases.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

Keeping Teenagers out of Foster Care

New York City pours $22 million a year into "teen-specialized" services designed to prevent adolescents from going into foster care. But the city offers little evidence that the programs work.

Child Welfare Watch • 11th March 2019

The Science of Trauma

Together, behavioral psychology and neuroscience are reshaping our understanding of the damage caused by trauma in early childhood.

Child Welfare Watch • 11th March 2019

Learning how Babies' Brains Grow

A new program teaches biological and foster parents about the science of development.

Center for New York City Affairs • 7th February 2019

Baby Steps: Poverty, chronic stress, and New York’s youngest children

Chronic stress can stunt young children's brain development, changing the trajectories of their lives.