UCLA School of Law’s Criminal Justice Program has published a report that sheds light on the federal, state and local laws and regulations that encourage collaboration between local law enforcement agencies and Los Angeles County’s child protective services agency, the Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS).

The report, “The Ties That Bind: Relationships Between Law Enforcement and the Department of Children and Family Services in Los Angeles County,” focuses on the operation of DCFS, the largest local child protective services agency in the nation. The report details how federal, state and local laws create information-sharing schemes that enable law enforcement and child protective services agencies to collect and share vast amounts of data, which can lead to separation of families or criminalization.

The report finds that law enforcement and DCFS collaborations could lead to harmful outcomes for families. For example, local policies allow law enforcement to share gang-affiliation data with DCFS, which could negatively influence the outcome of a dependency case. Additionally, DCFS policies authorize child abuse or neglect allegations to be co-investigated with law enforcement, which can encourage law enforcement contact with families and possible criminalization.

In reaching these and other findings, the report relies on narratives from individuals who are impacted by the child welfare system, data regarding cases referred to both DCFS and law enforcement, and analysis of federal, state and local laws.

Leah Zeidler-Ordaz, an expert in youth justice policy at UCLA Law, wrote the report. She found that federal funds earmarked for child welfare are often conditioned on a state’s development of programs and partnerships that strengthen collaborations between law enforcement agencies and child protective services.

“It is troubling that laws at all levels of governance incentivize law enforcement and child protective services partnerships,” Zeidler-Ordaz says. “One of the more significant concerns stemming from our analysis is that these partnerships may subject Black and Indigenous families to higher rates of contact with DCFS and the criminal legal system. Families involved with both agencies may have more harmful and longer-term system involvement than families that are only involved with DCFS.”

Alicia Virani, the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation Director of the Criminal Justice Program, says, “This report is breaking new ground by showing how local law enforcement agencies partner with Los Angeles County’s DCFS to criminalize families. Future research is sorely needed to continue to determine whether and how families of color are impacted by these partnerships.”

Jess Johnson ’23 participated in researching the report as a UCLA Law student. “We are grateful to the two women who shared their stories with us,” Johnson says. “Their firsthand accounts help us understand the real impact of this system on children and families who have lived through it.”

The report was funded by a generous faculty research seed grant from the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy.