Foster care focuses on reunification

WORLAND — The ultimate goal for the majority of foster care cases is reunification.

In a case reported in the Northern Wyoming News about a teen that has spent the past eight months in the Wyoming Department of Family Services and was recently reunited with her family through art and equine-assisted counseling.

The teen’s story is not unique with statistics showing more than 1,000 youth in the foster care system in Wyoming.

According to the Wyoming Department of Family Services handbook, the philosophy for Wyoming foster care is as follows, “We believe foster care, in most cases, is not a permanent solution for a child. Instead, foster care provides for the physical and emotional needs of a child until a more permanent plan can be achieved. “A child deserves permanency” is the philosophy of the Department of Family Services (DFS), whether with his own family or through an alternate plan.”

Big Horn Basin Foster Care Coordinator Kristie Collins, who serves Big Horn, Hot Springs, Washakie and Park counties said that in nearly every case the parents love their children. “They just maybe were raised differently than we are, they don’t know how to actually parent or having their own mental health struggles, substance abuse … I can’t think of a more cool thing than helping a family raise up from addiction or [other struggles].”

She said the hardest thing is when the children cannot return home or when they know there are issues at home and they cannot prove it in court.

“What we’re trying to do is trying to help. We don’t always get there but we’re not adding to the bad thing that already exists. It might be hard for us but at the same time it should be harder to not do anything,” Collins said.

According to statistics from the Case Family Programs, who works with all 50 states to try and safely reduce the need for foster care, the No. 1 reason in 2017 that children were in foster care in Wyoming was neglect, with 60%, with 38% due to parental substance abuse. Other reasons, according to the report were inability to cope, physical abuse, child behavior problem, inadequate housing, parental incarceration, abandonment and sexual abuse.

Also in 2017, the most recent year data was available, there were 1,087 children under the age of 18 living in foster care in Wyoming. The majority of the children, 56% are ages 1 to 10 years old.

Collins said if they are called to a home they first try to keep the children in the home as long as they can, assuring the child is safe. If a child is removed from the home, the ultimate goal is reunification with the family, but the immediate need is a temporary home. Collins said they look to a relative first. However, a relative may not be willing or may not be eligible.

They then look for foster parents where the child can remain in the same school and keep the same connections to try and keep everything as familiar as possible.

She said there can be emergency placements, where a child may be placed in a temporary foster home for 48 hours. A shelter care hearing is held within 48 hours after a child is removed from the home.

Foster parents are required to pass a background check, provide references, complete pre-service training and pass a home safety inspection. The certification process can take up to 90 days, Collins said.

Foster parents have a right to specify ages they are willing to welcome to their home and specify behavior issues.

“It’s nice for people to realize they are still in control [as foster parents],” Collins said.

She said the minimum stay for a foster child is usually three months but short-term placement can be up to six months.

Long-term placement can be several months or even years, Collins said. She said there are quarterly reviews with the judge, DFS workers, family and foster parents — the multidisciplinary team. The team also includes the guardian ad litem attorney assigned to protect the interests of the child in the foster care system.

Foster parents, Collins said, should also know that medical care for foster children are covered by Medicare, and families receive reimbursement for costs associated with housing a foster child.

She said there is a myth that foster parents are “only in it for the money.” However, in Wyoming, she said, “People really have super big hearts and are not in it for the money.”

If a child is in the foster care system for 15 months, the judge will ask DFS to seek a different permanent plan for the child rather than reunification, this can include adoption.

One thing Collins said the public should be aware of when it comes to the foster care system is that the people involved are “your neighbors who are just struggling.”

For anyone interested in learning more about being a foster parent, they can go to the DFS website at https://dfs.wyo.gov/services/child-youth-services/, contact Collins at her office in Lovell, 307-548-6503, or email her at [email protected]. Or, better yet, Collins said, talk to a foster parent if you know one.

FOSTER PARENTS

There’s a variety of reasons why someone may want to become a foster parent to a child in need. For Chris McGee of Worland it was seeing the need on a daily basis as a contract employee for the Wyoming Department of Family Services.

Over the past five years, she and her husband have welcomed five different foster care children into their home.

“It’s a sacrifice. It turns your world upside down to allow kiddoes to come into your home. You have to be ready to put your heart out there. It’s like parenting. It’s going to be hard. There will be ups and downs. You have to look to the end goal; and hope to do your little part and be a light along the way for these kiddoes who are stuck in these hard places,” McGee said.

To try and make the foster children feel welcome, McGee said, they provide them their own space and give them some privacy. He said all of their children have been over the age of 8.

“No matter how hard you try, they are getting moved to an unfamiliar place. Everyone wants their mom and dad,” she said.

She said she tries to communicate to the children that “The goal is to go home and that’s what we’re all working toward.”

She also provides structure, daily consistency so the children know what’s coming.

She said if you can try and eliminate as many questions and unknowns as possible also helps, but it is important to realize that there will be unknowns for the child as well as the foster parents, including how long the child may be in the home.

For McGee she said the experience the past three years has been rewarding and positive. “The kids we have had have been awesome and we’ll have lifelong relationships for sure,” she said. “We’ve been blessed by it and loved, loved our kiddoes.”

For anyone who might be considering being a foster parent, McGee said, “Give it a try.” She said people do not have to be a foster parent forever. “Even if you help one kid along the way that’s one kid,” she For Pam Greek it was one time a few years ago. She said it was a “pretty special case,” but like the McGees the experience provided a lifelong relationship.

“She’s part of the family,” Greek said.

Greek had another opportunity to help a foster child in the system recently, helping a young teen by mentoring the teen’s artistic passion, which led to a mural being painted in the DFS office and featured in a Healing With Art exhibit in Casper.

Greek said, “I found myself as [the teen’s] instrument.” Greek said the teen provided the vision and she helped the teen sketch it.

She said she roughly sketched it out on the wall and then they divided the painting work.

“Any time I can help a kid with their passion in art, I’m going to do it,” Greek said. “I’m really grateful for the DFS workers who made this [teen’s] vision happen, art is such a powerful and therapeutic thing and I’m so glad people understand that.