Grant to Fuel Child Welfare Journalist's Investigations in California

LOS ANGELES - Dec. 1, 2016 - PRLog -- Jeremy Loudenback, a journalist focused on child welfare, has been awarded a grant from The Fund for Investigative Journalism that will propel his efforts to investigate child welfare reform in California.

Loudenback is a senior editor and reporter for The Chronicle of Social Change, an online news publication that covers issues affecting vulnerable children and youth – particularly those involved with the child welfare system.

Loudenback will use the grant to investigate child welfare reform in California. He will delve into the de-institutionalization of foster care throughout the state as legislators implement so-called Continuum of Care Reform – legislation that will limit the use of group homes for youth in foster care.

"The Chronicle of Social Change is dedicated to shining a light on how decisions at the top levels of our government affect the lives of our most vulnerable children," said Daniel Heimpel, publisher of The Chronicle. "A key component of that work is Jeremy Loudenback. That the Fund for Investigative Journalism, which has spawned so many important investigative projects, would bet on him and on us, is an honor. It speaks to our place at the intersection of child welfare and journalism."

The Fund for Investigative Journalism is an independent, non-profit organization that has supported hundreds of public service reporting projects since 1969, when it provided funding for Seymour Hersh to investigate and expose the massacre of Vietnamese civilians by American soldiers in My Lai. Hersh's stories won the Pulitzer Prize.

More recently, the Fund for Investigative Journalism helped Vyette Cabrera produce an eight-part series on undocumented children in California who were in custody of the probation department. The stories ran in The Voice of OC before Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill clarifying that juveniles' court documents should not be shared with federal immigration officials.

The Chronicle of Social Change (http://chronicleofsocialchange.org) is a national online news site published by Fostering Media Connections, a nonprofit based in Los Angeles, CA. The Chronicle produces daily news about child welfare, juvenile justice and children's mental health issues, and aims to be the hub of mainstream news coverage on issues affecting vulnerable children and youth.