Separated by Silence: Enhancing Public Notice Accessibility in a Changing Demographic Landscape — A Case Study of Barriers to Legal Notice of Termination of Parental Rights Among Foreign-Born Communities in Lewiston, Maine

Abstract

Public notice has long stood as a cornerstone of American public communication policy---designed to meet the governed where they are. This tradition reflects the government's founding commitment to transparency about government actions relating to the rights and livelihood of advanced notice of government actions impacting the lives of residents. This paper examines the effectiveness of government legal notices concerning the termination of parental rights (TPR), which are notices of the government removing a parent's right to raise their child. Using a subset of Lewiston, Maine's Foreign-Born population, the Somali Maay, as a case study, the research evaluates the effectiveness of legal notice policy for providing advanced notice and a reasonable time to respond by affected parties and their families of children who entered state custody. The broader policy issue commented on through the case study is whether current legal notice public communication approaches adequately fulfill the constitutional requirement of being on a relevant medium accessible to the families affected and the public in a meaningful way. This study draws on policy review, contextual legal analysis, constructed TPR legal notice datasets, and interviews with key stakeholders. It also argues for a renewed commitment to the foundational public notice principle of the government meeting the people where they are. Policy recommendations align with existing federal and state family preservation policies and offer a replicable model for improving legal notice access in other communities with a high prevalence of foreign-born citizens and permanent residents.