BAKERSFIELD, Calif.(KBAK/KBFX) — Questions about Kern County’s child welfare system are continuing as an out-of-state family with Choctaw heritage fights for custody of a 3-year-old relative who has spent months in foster care.
Alexandra’s family tells Eyewitness News they have been fighting for months to bring her home.
Photo Courtesy of: Deborah Moffett
Three-year-old Alexandra has been in the Kern County foster care system for months.
For the past seven months, members of her extended family have been seeking placement or custody, according to Deborah Moffett, a relative who lives in Nevada.
Moffett said the family is concerned Alexandra could be adopted rather than placed with biological family members.
“I never thought it would happen to us, but it could happen to anyone,” said Shuntalle Willford, one of Alexandra’s relatives.
Moffett said the family believes Alexandra’s Native heritage may not have been fully considered under the Indian Child Welfare Act, known as ICWA.
A 2024 Legislative Analyst’s Office report found Native American children in California enter foster care at higher rates than other children.
“With the Indian heritage that our family bloodline comes from, they checked the paperwork and said no, that she’s not a part of that lineage, which she is. But they did not do their research to find out,” Moffett said.
Coming from a long line of Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma ancestry, Deborah Moffett says she is fighting to keep her family’s heritage together as she seeks custody of her three-year-old relative in Kern County.
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Moffett said her great-grandfather was listed as half Choctaw in the 1910 federal Indian census, and the family believes that information warranted further ICWA review.
Christina Albrite, a senior paralegal with Kern County Child Protective Services, said ICWA was created to address the historic overrepresentation of Native American children in foster care.
Albrite said that in some cases, when a parent is already enrolled in a tribe, the county can help facilitate enrollment for a child.
Moffett also claimed family members were not informed before the mother’s parental rights were terminated.
With Alexandra’s father deceased, Moffett said the family was later told the child would remain with her current foster family.
“There’s not even a question if she has family. She has family,” Moffett said.
The Kern County Department of Human Services building is seen in Bakersfield, Calif. Investigators identified 1,685 local welfare cases with evidence of fraud in the first six months of 2016.(KBAK/KBFX photo)
In April, Kern County Department of Human Services declined to comment on the specific case, citing state and federal privacy laws.
The department said social workers are required to search for relatives when a child enters foster care.
DHS also said relatives seeking placement must complete the Resource Family Approval process, and out-of-state relatives may only begin that process after certain court hearings or orders.
Moffett said the family’s concerns also include Alexandra’s connection to her relatives and her identity.
“The only thing that she has left of her father to even know who he is, is her brother, her grandmother, her aunts and uncles, and her cousins. So if we remove that, what identity does she have?” Moffett said.
After a hearing earlier in May, Moffett said the court appeared to lean toward keeping the child with the current foster family.
She said the judge acknowledged the family’s concerns but stated the court must rely on the documentation and recommendations presented under state law.
“I could see if there was any kind of neglect in Nevada, or if Kern County found something, but they didn’t find that at all,” Moffett said.
The family’s concerns come as Kern County DHS continues to face public scrutiny, prompting an independent review that is expected to release findings this summer.
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“They’re looking at kids as a case number, but they’re not actually looking at these kids as if they need a future,” Moffett said.
Moffett said she has started a GoFundMe to help with legal representation and efforts to bring Alexandra back to her family.
Families who believe a county is not following ICWA properly can contact the hotline through the California Department of Social Services. For more information, click here.