The number of foster care placements more than doubled in Brooklyn, increasing by 118.2 percent between 2019 and 2020. In Bushwick, placements nearly quadrupled, growing by 264.3 percent.
The Administration for Children’s Services releases data annually regarding the number of foster care placements by community district.
Data released in April for 2020 shows that there were a total of 1,922 children placed in foster care in Brooklyn last year, 102 of which were placed in Bushwick.
This is a sharp increase from 2019, when there were 881 placements in the borough, only 28 of which were in Bushwick.
Other boroughs saw similar rates of increase in foster care placements. The number of placements in the Bronx and Staten Island roughly doubled, growing by 109.6 percent and 112.3 percent respectively. Manhattan and Queens saw less drastic, but still substantial, growth: Manhattan saw an increase of 66 percent and Queens, 84.7 percent.
In Brooklyn, Bushwick had the second-largest increase in foster care placements percentage-wise, following Sheepshead Bay’s growth of 336.4 percent from 11 placements in 2019 to 48 in 2020.
Despite dramatic increases, these neighborhoods still have low numbers of placements relative to others in Brooklyn. In 2020, for instance, East New York had 356 placements, Brownsville had 224 and Bed Stuy had 214.
The only Brooklyn neighborhoods in which foster care placements decreased were Sunset Park and Borough Park.
Featured image via Creative Commons.
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