You age out of a system, but you don't age out of a family

Editorial: It takes a family
San Francisco Chronicle, Feb. 25, 2007, pg. E4.

FOR ALL of the rhetoric about "family values" in American politics, the federal government certainly puts up a lot of obstacles to allowing foster youth to live with their family members.

There are many reasons why the government should be helping relatives -- most typically grandparents -- who are willing to open their homes to a child whose parents are either unwilling or unable to provide a stable home.

Various studies have shown that young people in a relative's care fare far better in life -- as measured by education, employment and incarceration rates -- than those who are bounced from placement to placement in the foster-care system. Also, those relatives are far more likely than a stranger or a group-home "parent" to continue emotional and financial support when a youth becomes 18.

"You 'age out' of a system, but you don't age out of a family," observed Donna Butts, director of Generations United, a national family-advocacy group that has been pushing for reform of the federal foster-care rules.

The underlying flaw in federal law is a financing structure that encourages the placement of children in foster care instead of with relative guardians. More than 500,000 U.S. children are in a foster-care system that is severely underfunded in most states.

The upshot is that the money (in terms of monthly support payments and services such as drug treatment or mental-health counseling) does not follow the child when he or she moves from foster care into the home of a grandparent or other relative.

U.S. Sens. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, have just re-introduced legislation to rectify that problem by giving states the option to provide monthly support payments to grandparents and other relatives.

Their "Kinship Caregiver Support Act" also requires the state to notify grandparents and other adult relatives within 60 days of a child's removal from parental custody -- and to lay out the options for the relative who might be willing to care for the child.

U.S. Rep. Danny Davis, a Chicago Democrat, plans to introduce soon a similar measure in the House. Davis has seen the heartache and stress on relatives struggling to keep siblings together.

"In some neighborhoods in my district, half of the children are living with grandparents," Davis said.

The reality is that many of those grandparents can barely afford their own living expenses -- but they take in the children anyway, out of love and obligation. He believes the federal government should "ease the burden" and "provide additional rights" to these relatives.

In California, the state and counties have tried to navigate around the federal restrictions with programs such as "Kin-GAP," which uses a blend of state, county and other federal resources to help out relative caregivers. Still, it's not nearly enough money to make up for the federal restrictions.

San Francisco has been able to place more than half of its 2,000 foster youth with relative caregivers -- but at a cost to the city of "several million dollars a year" because of the federal funding restrictions, said Trent Rhorer, the city's human services director.

Passage of the Clinton-Snowe bill would "send a very important message to the system as a whole across the country that the federal government recognizes that permanency is important for kids," Rhorer said.

Another problem with the federal rules is that they impose the same standards on relative caregivers that they apply to strangers who take foster care kids into their homes. Again, this is a policy that might sound sensible at first blush, but becomes impractical in the world of a low-income grandparent, who has taken another child into the house. For example, the federal rules would not allow three children -- even siblings -- to share a room. A relative with a criminal record -- even a 20-year-old DUI offense -- would be disqualified from federal caregiver support.

State and county officials and advocates for foster youth have long been frustrated at what they see as "perverse incentives" in federal rules that keep children in the transitional system when they might otherwise find a permanent home.

"If we can't get them home, we should at least get them to someone who shares a blood relation when we can," said Miriam Krinsky, a policy director for the Children's Law Center of Los Angeles.

Passage of the Clinton-Snowe bill would be a good start toward instilling "family values" in this nation's child-welfare policies.

Unintended consequence of Adam Walsh law

State custody foster care delayed for needy tots
Short-term resource homes for kids taken from their parents are in short supply
Rosetta, Lisa. Salt Lake Tribune, Feb. 21, 2007.

Severely neglected for the first five months of her life, the infant girl didn't cry anymore. She stopped signaling when her diaper was wet, or when she needed to be fed or held. She just lay in her crib.

Melissa Schwitters, a short-term foster care mother in California at the time, was told by state case workers to cuddle the baby and feed her every four hours since she had stopped asking for food herself. Within a few short weeks, Schwitters said, the baby girl began smiling and snuggling.

That reward is just one of the reasons Schwitters, who now lives in Herriman, serves as a resource home, a kind of short-term foster care, for Salt Lake County, taking in children who are in limbo in the state system.

People like Schwitters, however, are in short supply, said Roger Gisseman, associate director of the county's Division of Youth Services. And because of a new federal law, resource homes are more needed than ever.

Children who are removed from their homes by the Utah Division of Children and Family Services (DCFS) are first taken to the Christmas Box House, which performs emergency intake and assessment services around the clock, he said.

Before the passage of the Adam Walsh Child Protection And Safety Act Of 2006, many of those children could then be placed with another family member, like a grandparent, or a friend of the family, until the child's shelter hearing took place and a longer term plan was in place.

The new law, however, requires that adoptive or foster care parents, including a child's kin, undergo a thorough background check conducted by the FBI, which typically takes between six and eight weeks - sometimes longer, Gisseman said.

In the meantime, children are placed in resource homes like Schwitters.' As more children trickle in, however, the number of available resource homes dwindles, which means some children often have to stay at the Christmas Box House for months at a time.

The Christmas Box House can accommodate up to 34 children, up to age 11, at once, Gisseman said. But already this year, the facility has had as many as 30 children in its dormitory-style rooms. - WHAT A STRANGE NAME FOR A SHELTER

"Obviously the care of the child is extremely important," Gisseman said, but "it [the new law] has made it more difficult to release the kids, and it's creating a bit of a backlog for kids looking for shelter resource homes outside of our residential facilities."

In January, for example, 47 children were taken in and assessed at the Christmas Box House, compared to 76 in the same month last year, said Heidi Roggenbuck, a resource home and recruitment specialist.

But of the 47 children taken in this year, 40 remained at the Christmas Box House or in a resource home, versus just 24 of the 76 children taken in a year earlier. Roggenbuck only expects that number to grow.

"It's creating a huge impact on the system," she said.

The problem is especially acute for those children who are toddlers or older, since some of the county's 20 resource homes will only care for infants.

Roggenbuck said she is hoping to recruit and license 10 new resource homes this year. Potential candidates must take a 32-hour service class, pass a background check, become CPR and First Aid certified and participate in about a month's worth of interviews and home visits. And, one of the resource parents must be available for a child, or children, around the clock.

"That's because so many of our children that come in do have higher needs once they've been stabilized," she said.

Some of the children who arrive at the Christmas Box House are in diapers and have been snatched from their parent's homes by police in the middle of the night during a drug bust, she said. Others come in filthy clothes, and have lice and other medical problems.

But caring for these children, and fulfilling the many requirements for licensure, are well worth the effort, Schwitters said.

Since November, she and her husband, Randy, and their four children have taken in four babies.
"You do it because as long as they keep calling us and giving us babies, that means there is a baby that needs somewhere to go," she said.

And like the infant girl they cared for in California, they all have their own stories.

Wonder what David Sanders thinks of all this?

Foster care system setback
Anderson, Troy. Pasadena Star, Feb. 13, 2007.

After heralding an innovative federal funding waiver as the capstone of efforts to reform Los Angeles County's long-troubled child protective system, officials said Monday the amount of annual money that can be spent on services to help keep families together has dwindled from the $369 million originally proposed to $15million now.

"This is the ultimate betrayal of vulnerable children and their families," said Richard Wexler, executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform in Alexandra, Va. "Whenever you try to change the status quo in child welfare to help families, you will offend an enormously powerful group of vested interests.

"Any county as large as Los Angeles County has a foster care industrial complex, the network of agencies whose survival depends on a steady stream of foster children," Wexler said. "Anything that threatens that will prompt them to pull out all the stops to oppose it."

The dramatic change in funding comes two years after the Board of Supervisors voted to apply to the federal government for what was described as a "revolutionary" waiver that would allow the Department of Children and Family Services to use nearly $400 million of its' $1.5 billion budget on services to keep children safely with their families.

Even without the waiver, DCFS has since made marked improvements in terms of child safety, quicker adoptions and has returned thousands of children home from foster care. The number of children in foster homes has dropped from about 50,000 in the mid-1990s to 20,454 as of Dec. 31, DCFS Director Trish Ploehn said.

But child advocates worry that without the larger sum of money, those reforms could be in jeopardy.

"The victory was that there was going to be this large pot of money that could be used to offer preventative services to keep kids out of foster care," said Janis Spire, executive director of the Alliance for Children's Rights. "I'm anxious to understand why that pot of money has dwindled significantly and where it's going to be spent instead in order to accomplish the goal of reducing the number of kids in care safely."

Susan Kerr, chief deputy director of DCFS, said the change in the figures is the result of a "misunderstanding."

Former DCFS Director David Sanders, who took a job at Casey Family Programs last year, wrote in a memo to the supervisors before he left that the waiver would allow DCFS to use $369 million of its budget on preventive services.

But Kerr said that figure was misinterpretted and several factors have further reduced the amount available. This includes an increase in the average amount the county pays agencies to take care of foster children from $1,748 a month in 2004-05 to $1,951 this fiscal year.

Also, DCFS' administrative costs have increased, Kerr said. A DCFS memo noted increased administrative costs are a result of 7.9 percent increases in salaries and benefits for employees this fiscal year and 9.3 percent increases each following year.

"I'm calling it a misunderstanding," Kerr said. "But we are extremely hopeful that the amount of available funding will increase as we begin to see successes from the waiver implementation. To the extent we are successful in getting more children out of placement, we'll have more dollars to reinvest."

Last week, Supervisor Michael Antonovich raised concerns about the ongoing negotiations between the county and state over the waiver, noting the state's proposed funding guidelines are more restrictive than the federal funding guidelines.

"Submission of the county plan without knowing the state's financial commitment to the project may result in the county's over-estimating service programs as part of the waiver, potentially placing the county at great financial risk," Antonovich said.

California Department of Finance spokesman H.D. Palmer said Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger remains committed to the federal waivers for Los Angeles and Alameda counties, even though it's going to cost the state an extra $34 million.

"To the extent we are able to keep a family together by providing counseling and substance abuse services ... that's certainly a preferrable alternative to removing a child and putting them in foster care," Palmer said. "And that's why the governor committed to this waiver and why we are continuing to provide additional resources to Los Angeles and Alameda counties to get this project up and running."

Chief Administrative Officer David Janssen said the $15 million figure could be reduced even further depending on whether the federal government imposes fines on the state for not meeting guidelines for improving the child protective system.

"We are hopeful the state has contacted the federal government to get them to agree should not be taken away from the waiver funding," Kerr said.

Even with the reduced amount of money, Janssen said the waiver is still beneficial. After negotiations between the county and state are completed, the waiver is expected to go back before the supervisors for their approval. The plan to expand services under the waiver is expected to start July1.

"Currently, we receive money from the federal government based on the number of cases we have," Janssen said. "There is no relationship to results at all. And in fact, you get rewarded for keeping more kids in foster care. The waiver would allow the department to spend money much more flexibly than they currently are."

Wexler said he's perplexed why the county's waiver isn't working out as planned when similar ones the federal government approved last year for Florida and Michigan are working well.

"They found a way to make it work," Wexler said. "Why can't L.A.? If this waiver had gone through as originally planned, fewer children would enter foster care. That would be a great threat to foster family agencies, the private agencies that handle a lot of foster kids and get paid to hold kids in foster care. So I'm sure they have been very upset about this waiver from day one."

Reforms in jeopardy without sufficient funding

Children, families lose again
Only a sliver of anticipated funds available to cut foster-kid numbers
Anderson, Troy. LA Daily News, Feb. 13, 2007, pg. N1.

After heralding an innovative plan to reform Los Angeles County's troubled child-protective system, officials said Monday that they will have just $15 million a year to help keep families together instead of the $369 million they had expected.

The dramatic change in funding comes two years after the Board of Supervisors successfully applied for a waiver of federal rules so the county Department of Children and Family Services could use nearly $400 million of its $1.5 billion budget on counseling and similar services to keep children safely with their own families.

While former DCFS Director David Sanders wrote a memo before he left the county last year, estimating that $369 million would be available, some officials now say several factors have cut into the program's funding, including an increase in fees paid to foster- care agencies and a spike in administrative costs.

"I'm calling it a misunderstanding," said Susan Kerr, chief deputy director of DCFS. "But we are extremely hopeful that the amount of available funding will increase as we begin to see successes from the waiver implementation.

"To the extent we are successful in getting more children out of placement, we'll have more dollars to reinvest."

But children's advocates decried the situation, saying services such as counseling, mental-health treatment and drug or alcohol rehabilitation can go a long way toward keeping families together.

"Those are some of the kinds of things at the top of the list that the advocacy community was in support of being able to put funding into to create healthier families so that children did not have to be removed from those families and put into foster care," said Janis Spire, executive director of the Alliance for Children's Rights.

Even without the waiver, DCFS has made strides in returning thousands of foster children to their natural families. The number of children in foster homes has dropped from about 50,000 in the mid- 1990s to about 20,500 as of Dec. 31, DCFS Director Trish Ploehn said.

But children's advocates worry that reforms could be in jeopardy without sufficient funding.

"The victory was that there was going to be this large pot of money that could be used to offer preventative services to keep kids out of foster care," Spire said. "I'm anxious to understand why that pot of money has dwindled significantly and where it's going to be spent instead."

Kerr said some of the money will be used to pay increased administrative costs for DCFS workers -- a 7.9 percent jump in salaries and benefits this fiscal year and a 9.3 percent hike next year. - THIS IS GOOD

In addition, the amount county government pays agencies to care for foster children rose from an average of $1,748 a month per child in 2004-05 to $1,951 this fiscal year.

Last week, Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich raised concerns about ongoing negotiations with the state on funding of social services, noting that state regulations are more restrictive than federal guidelines.

California Department of Finance spokesman H.D. Palmer said Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger remains committed to the federal waivers for Los Angeles and Alameda counties.

"To the extent we are able to keep a family together by providing counseling and substance-abuse services, ... that's certainly preferable to removing a child and putting them in foster care," Palmer said. "And that's why the governor committed to this waiver and why we are continuing to provide additional resources to Los Angeles and Alameda counties to get this project up and running."

David Janssen, the county's chief administrative officer, said officials expect to have $15 million available for programs in problem prevention, but that figure could drop if the federal government penalizes the state for missing guidelines for improving the child-protective system.

"We are hopeful the state has contacted the federal government to get them to agree (the penalties) should not be taken away from the waiver funding," Kerr said.

Even with the reduced amount of money, Janssen said the waiver is still beneficial. After negotiations between the county and state are completed, the waiver is expected to go back before the supervisors for their approval. The plan to expand services under the waiver is expected to start July 1.

"Currently, we receive money from the federal government based on the number of cases we have," Janssen said. "There is no relationship to results at all. And, in fact, you get rewarded for keeping more kids in foster care. The waiver would allow the department to spend money much more flexibly than they currently are."

Thinking about what could have been ($385 million worth)

Follow through on foster care
San Gabriel Valley Tribune, Feb 19, 2007.

SURELY there are many reasons that Los Angeles County couldn't follow up with its ambitious plan to use nearly $400 million to reform child-protective services with the goal of
keeping families together. Pay raises and higher costs than expected are among them.

But in the end, that matters little to the children and families who haven't been helped with the counseling and support the money would have provided.

Two years ago, the Board of Supervisors was able to get the federal government to issue a waiver so that the county could use about $400 million of $1.5 billion in federal funds toward this goal. Now, it turns out the county was only able to dedicate $15 million a year to this cause.

It's true that the county's efforts have increased the number of foster kids returned to natural families. But just imagine how many more families might have benefitted if it could have followed through with its promise.

Laney Kermani speaks about the value of foster care alumni

A transition into adulthood
San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 28, 2007, pg. E4.

THE AVERAGE parent in California doesn't expect his or her child to achieve full adulthood -- in the form of complete self- sufficiency -- at the age of 18. In fact, it's not until the age of 26 that this average child is able to get by without leaning on mom and dad at least a little bit -- whether it's a place to live, given California's astronomical housing prices, help with college tuition or maybe the used car that gets her back and forth to her first job. The average cost for mom and dad, for this launch into adulthood? Approximately $44,000.

If only the state of California cared so much about the realities facing its children. Foster children are turned out of their parents' house at the age of 18, to survive, and rarely thrive, on their own. The statistics are daunting for their futures and expensive for taxpayers: Less than 3 percent graduate from college. They are disproportionately represented in the prison system, and female foster youth are four times more likely to receive public assistance than the general population.

Now we have a chance at reversing these outcomes. State Sen. Carole Migden, D-San Francisco, and Assemblyman Dave Jones, D- Sacramento, are introducing a bill to create a "transitional guardian program" for foster youth aging out of the system. The program will offer former foster youth tuition money, housing vouchers, and -- crucially -- a mentor of their choice to dispense the money and report their progress to the state, until the youth reaches the age of 24 or is prepared to launch themselves.

This Supportive Transitional Emancipation Program (STEP) has similar precedents at both the state and national levels, so there's little danger of California forming a new program that won't work. In 2002, Congress authorized the Chafee Educational Training Vouchers, which offer former foster youth $5,000 a year for tuition or vocational training. Despite spotty distribution -- the funds dribble out at a notoriously slow pace -- the program is constantly oversubscribed.

Within California, the best examples are in the nonprofit sector. The Guardian Scholars program, sponsored by the Orangewood Children's Foundation, offers emancipated foster youth financial aid, housing and mentoring so that they can attend participating colleges -- and it boasts a retention rate of nearly 70 percent, better than the community at large. It was wise of Migden and Jones to work with a nonprofit -- the San Diego-based Children's Advocacy Institute, in this instance -- to target best practices.

One of the best elements of the STEP program is its insistence on the active participation of emancipating foster youth. They'll have the chance to "opt-out" in case they feel fed up with the idea of another program, and also "opt-in" later on, if they decide that life on their own isn't so rosy. They'll also help choose their own mentors.

The only thing that would improve on this system would be the inclusion of former foster youth as advocates and role models - - an idea that 22-year-old Laney Kermani, a participant in First Place Fund for Youth, an Oakland-based emancipation services nonprofit, enthusiastically endorses.

"Former transitional foster youth have to be part of this," she said. "I can't emphasize that enough."

STEP won't be cheap. In its cost-benefit analysis of such a program, the Children's Advocacy Institute showed that it will cost about $123 million annually after the first five years. But it's certainly possible that the state can obtain at least some federal funds for the program, particularly in the form of housing vouchers, and a little creativity in the form of public-private partnerships would go a long way as well. Even if the state has to come up with the bulk of the money, however, it will still receive the bulk of the benefit.

STEP will save the state money after 12 years -- even assuming that it only results in most former foster youth achieving the same levels of education, welfare usage and imprisonment as the rest of the population.

In 23 years, once it works it way through an entire generation of foster youth, STEP will pay for all of its costs -- even the start-up ones. When our legislators see that price tag, we urge them to keep in mind not only their unrivaled opportunity to help foster youth live happier, more productive lives, but also those benchmark years, 12 and 23. Though they will be termed out of office, they could, by approving the STEP program, leave a tremendous legacy for California.

One-stop shopping for at-risk families

Children's Bureau Family and Community Center breaks ground
With Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's support
Press release, Children's Bureau, Feb. 16, 2007.

LOS ANGELES -- Children's Bureau, a 103-year-old nonprofit leader in child abuse prevention and treatment, recently held a groundbreaking ceremony for its Family and Community Center set to open in early 2008.

The ceremony officially marked the start of renovations on a46,000 sq. ft. facility that will serve mostly low-income, ethnically diverse immigrant communities near downtown Los Angeles. The Family and CommunityCenter is made possible through a $20 million capital campaign undertaken by the organization.

Close to 200 supporters of Children's Bureau participated in the ceremony including: Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Los Angels County Board of Supervisor Yvonne Braithwaite-Burke, Los Angeles City Council President Eric Garcetti, Court TV personality and child advocate Rikki Klieman-Bratton, local families and children and donors to the campaign.

The ambitious project aims to help low-income families with young children by offering four interlocking services: 1) child abuse prevention; 2) kindergarten readiness; 3) health and wellness promotion and 4) economic stability.

These efforts have been deemed necessary to foster productive and successful family dynamics by organizations such as the Los Angeles Children's Planning Council, the Department of Children and Family Services and First 5 LA.

"This Center represents an extraordinary evolution in how society will ultimately spare children from the social ills of abuse, poor health, school failure and delinquency," said Alex Morales, Children's Bureau president and chief executive officer. "By co-locating services in one place, we have created a comprehensive approach that engages families and empowers communities."

The Center is expected to serve more than 6,000 at-risk children and parents annually and will strive to be a model for other child-advocate organizations throughout the nation.

David Fleming, Children's Bureau board member and vice chair of the Los Angeles Children's Planning Council said, "The new Center is a wonderful illustration of a private organization taking the recommendations of government and bringing them together in an exciting and innovative way that has not been done before."

Children's Bureau worked with architects House & Robertson and design specialists Rios Clementi Hale Studios to create an attractive, lively and safe place for the entire community.

About Children's Bureau
For over 100 years, Children's Bureau has been a nonprofit leader in the prevention and treatment of child abuse and neglect. More than 14,000 children and families are helped each year throughout Southern California with services that include foster care, adoption, school-readiness, parenting education, family resource centers, support groups, mental health counseling and more.

For more information about Children's Bureau, please visit www.all4kids.org

Foster care alumna provides foster care for special needs children

Three and thriving
A couple with guts adopt child with heart-stopping problems
Carlsonbee, Ken. Modesto Bee, Feb. 18, 2007.


Hevanne Brown of Manteca started crawling — make that, scooting — months after his first birthday, and didn't walk until he was 2½ years old.

That's not bad for a child born with half his heart underdeveloped. Now, his adoptive parents have a hard time keeping up with him.

"He likes jumping off things; he is a daredevil," said Henrietta Brown, his mother. "He's like a normal 3-year-old. It's easy to forget he has a heart condition."

Henrietta Brown, who was abandoned by her parents and raised by a grandparent in Oakland, has provided foster care for several "special needs" children over the years.

Some children with severe illnesses or mental disabilities are turned over to social services agencies by parents who have drug addictions or are unable to care for them.

Brown considers it a challenge to care for these children and knew she wanted to adopt Hevanne as soon as she saw him.

"We know everyone can't do it," she said. "It is a calling. I don't want them to go to any home where they will be abused. There are a lot of sick, sick babies and they just need some love."

Hevanne was born with a severe deformity called hypoplastic left heart syndrome. The main pumping chamber of his heart failed to develop in the womb and, after his birth, was unable to send blood through his 8-pound body.

His home for the first year of life was Children's Hospital & Research Center Oakland, where he underwent four open-heart surgeries.

His homeless birth mother gave him up for adoption when he was four months old.

Babies with this deformity soon die if not for surgeries that offer a 70-percent chance of surviving at least five years, according to medical literature.

The trick to saving Hevanne's life was adapting his vascular system to work without the left pumping chamber, said Dr. Ziad Saba, the hospital's cardiology director.

First, surgeons made a connection between his aorta and pulmonary artery, so the smaller right ventricle, which pumps blood to the lungs, took over the work of sending blood to his body and lungs.

In a second surgery, the veins that drain blood from the head and neck were connected to his lungs. That way, the right chamber of Hevanne's heart could work solely on pumping blood through his body.

In another surgery, veins coming from the lower body can be connected to his lungs, but doctors will wait two years before deciding if Hevanne is right for that.

Like other patients, Hevanne may need a transplant.

His prognosis is worse than some, because he also required surgery to replace a leaky heart valve, Saba said. He is given blood thinners to prevent clots.

Hevanne was a favorite of the hospital staff, often spending time at the nursing station on his floor, and Saba obviously enjoys seeing the boy on follow-up visits.

"Every time I see him in the clinic, it is very uplifting," he said last week. "He is intelligent and runs up and gives me a hug. People find he is pretty good at getting his way."

Henrietta Brown and her husband, John, heard about Hevanne from a friend of Henrietta's who is a Solano County social worker.

The first time they saw him in the hospital in 2005, they hit it off, and the Browns were impressed with his clever streak.

"They wouldn't let him drink water, because they wanted him to leave room for food," John Brown recalled. Hevanne was given water through a tube but was determined to drink.

"He knew if his pacifier was dirty they would wash it off," John said. "He would throw the pacifier on the floor, and when the nurses washed it, would suck water off the pacifier."

She lets him just be a kid
The parents brought him home in August 2005, and within four days he had a crisis due to fluid in his lungs. He was returned to the hospital for a month.

Although some parents might be overly protective of a child who's had four open-heart surgeries, Henrietta gives Hevanne the run of their Manteca home while keeping a watchful eye.
Because he is on blood thinners, a bruise can quickly develop into an emergency. She once rushed him to a hospital after he bumped his head in the tub, causing rapid swelling over his left eye.

Still, the parents let him climb on furniture and ride his rocking horse whenever he wants.

Because of his heart condition, he can tire easily but is OK with everyday activities.

The doctors have stressed that the little boy needs to put on weight, so he's free to eat high-carb foods such as french fries, potato chips and bread sticks. Hevanne weighs 21 pounds, while other boys his age are close to 30 pounds.

He was taken off a feeding tube six months ago, after he kept pulling it out.

Hevanne is behind his age group in learning to speak, though he is very sociable. He repeats any word spoken to him and runs to greet visitors.

His favorite toys are Elmo chicken and the rocking horse.

"I just let him be a kid," his mother said. "I am just an instrument in the little puzzle."

As a young adult, Henrietta Brown worked as a medical assistant and behavioral health technician in Solano County, though her real calling was as a foster parent.

"I took the troubled ones," she said, referring to children suffering from physical disabilities or the effects of fetal alcohol syndrome.

Her toughest case was Amontay, who was placed in her Fairfield home at age 2.

Born more than three months premature, he had spent 18 months in a hospital intensive care unit. He had cerebral palsy, a lung disorder and mental disabilities, was on oxygen 24 hours a day, and wasn't expected to live to age 3, she said.

She quit her job to care for him, getting help from 25 health workers who came to her home.

To everyone's surprise, his condition improved, she said, and before long she believed she could teach him to eat on his own.

Amontay had spent days in front of a television at a previous home, so she decided to use TV as a motivator, she said.

"He loved "Sesame Street." If he took a bite of food, I would turn the TV on," she said.

After he learned to eat, it was time to get on his feet.

She stood him in the middle of the floor, facing the television, and turned off the TV if he went down to his knees. "He was almost five when he started walking," she said.

Brown adopted Amontay in 2001. Now 12, he attends a day school and reads at a third-grade level, she said.

Hevanne never crawled but scooted across the floor on his rump. He also needed coaxing to walk. Henrietta has two grown daughters and a grandson, Josiah. When the grandson came to visit, they stood Hevanne in the living room and he would try to follow Josiah.

These days, a speech therapist comes to the home to teach Hevanne colors, read to him and have him work on puzzles.

Another therapist works on strengthening his arms and developing his coordination. Because his body was not getting enough oxygen early on, his fingertips are clubbed, interfering with his motor skills.

His ongoing medical care consists of monthly blood tests and a visit to the doctor every three months.

The Browns rely on California Children's Services and other social programs to pay for the care. They also are trying to find a preschool for Hevanne.

Henrietta, 45, said she has to deal with the prospect that Hevanne could develop serious health problems and may need more surgery.

On the brighter side, some patients, who have the third surgery to the vascular system can stop taking medication and live with reasonable physical limitations. There are plenty of survivors in their teens and early 20s, and Henrietta met a woman who is in her 30s after a transplant.

"They told me Hevanne could die, but I don't look at it," she said. "I let him live. Tomorrow is not a promise for any of us."

Virginia Wilson, foster care manager for Stanislaus County, said there is always a need for dedicated foster parents to care for special-needs children.

"We may not have a high-need placement for months, and then we may have two or three at a time," she said.

'A lot of hours, lot of heartache'
The parents must be licensed for foster care and receive medical training in feeding tubes and administering medication. The government provides extra assistance, ranging from $79 to $915 above the monthly foster care rate, depending on the child's medical needs.

"It takes a very special person," Wilson said. "There are a lot of hours, a lot of heartache. It requires a lot of care and empathy on behalf of the foster parents."

John Brown, an inventory analyst for the Ford Motor Co. parts distribution center in Manteca, said he was well aware of Henrietta's work with foster children before they married.

Caring for special-needs children requires a commitment and teamwork from both parents, he said. "Your life is a little different," he said. "Your vacations have to be family-oriented."

The family went to the snow during the Christmas holiday, and their road trips are planned so a hospital is never too far away. They plan on a cruise in the Caribbean in August.

Dr. Saba said he has a great deal of respect for the Browns.

"For a foster parent to decide to adopt him is amazing to me," he said. "He is not a healthy kid, but a child who may need a heart transplant. It takes a special person to do that."

Stanislaus County residents can inquire about caring for special-needs children by calling the county foster care program, 558-3983. Information also is available from foster care and adoption agencies.

Henrietta Brown, holds her adoptive son Hevanne, 3, who was born with heart damage. 'There are a lot of sick, sick babies and they just need some love,' she says. The Browns also are raising Amontay, seen reading in the background. Henrietta has had the 12-year-old since he was 2. He was not expected to live to age 3. Hevanne Brown, 3, is eating on his own and playing like a regular tyke, according to his adoptive mother, Henrietta Brown.

Sebastian overcoming his night terrors in his new adoptive home

Smiles all around as new world has opened for boys, the parents
Sauer, Mark. San Diego Union Tribune, Feb. 18, 2007.

The two young brothers batted a balloon back and forth, laughing each time one of them took it on the nose. Then they hustled to the kitchen for a snack and cartoons.

Photo taken by San Diego Tribune staff, signonsandiego.com: Sebastian (left) and Billy Ferreira played on the electric piano the brothers got for Christmas, the first they'd spent together.

“Either they are all over each other wrestling and giggling like this, or they are bickering – which is completely normal,” their mother said.

For the younger one, 6-year-old Sebastian, life once held very little to laugh about.

He had been taken away from his mother and father after spending most of his early life living on the streets, often hungry, neglected and inevitably traumatized. Sebastian's birth parents had been homeless and addicted to drugs, unable to cope with the needs of their young child as they grappled with their own demons and abusive pasts.

After several unsuccessful interventions by San Diego Child Protective Service investigators, the boy's parents lost him for good when Sebastian was found in the care of drug dealers during a police raid on a rundown hotel in January 2004.

Sebastian's journey from the streets, through the foster-care system and into the stable, loving, East County home of the Ferreira family – Bill, Barbara, Billy (now 8) and Grandma Gerry and Grandpa Joe – was chronicled in Currents last summer.

It was a rare inside look at the difficult process of finding homes for children who have been through the heart-rending process of being taken from their parents and placed in foster care.

Such cases are usually kept confidential within the juvenile court system; a court order granting permission to follow this case was secured in order to produce the stories.

The two-part series, called “A Forever Family,” can be viewed on the Union-Tribune Web site at www.sebastian.uniontrib.com

One year after arriving in his adoptive home, Sebastian is thriving in ways beyond the fondest hopes of the adults involved in his placement.

“This boy was a poster child for failure,” Barbara Ferreira said, ticking off Sebastian's at-risk factors as her two sons played together in their spacious family room. “Poverty, homelessness, abuse, neglect, dysfunctional parents with substance-abuse problems. But all of those elements are now gone.”

As the adoption loomed last February, Sebastian was suffering frequent night terrors, horrific nightmares in which he bolted upright screaming, sweating and panting, like a shell-shocked soldier home from the war.

Those episodes have all but ceased.

“When he has a nightmare now, I generally hear it first,” Bill said. “I go in, hug him, rub his back and he usually goes right back to sleep.”

Myriad medications the child had been prescribed to quell his emotional extremes and behavioral problems have been almost eliminated, Barbara said.

“He still does not want to be left alone,” she said. “That's really the only issue he still has.”

But he's “still a little conniver,” Bill added. Telling the truth, about things like whether he took his scheduled bath, remains a challenge.

“Maybe that's a survival instinct left over from his days on the streets,” Bill said. “We remind him over and over: You have to tell the truth.”

Sebastian and Billy, who share a bedroom, attend the same neighborhood school (first and second grade, respectively). They played on the same soccer team last fall; Bill was an assistant coach.

“Sebastian is an aggressive player,” Bill said. “In one game he took two balls in the face; I took him out for a rest, but he wanted to get right back in there.”

Both boys have expressed an interest in music, and their parents got them an electronic keyboard. “They can play in silence using headphones – a godsend,” Barbara noted.

And despite mild misgivings early on, Barbara's parents, who share their home, have adapted well to their adopted grandson.

“I'll go back and look in on my folks' room after dinner and one boy will be playing on the stationary bike and the other will be cuddled in with grandma and grandpa watching 'Wheel of Fortune,' ” Barbara said.

Children in waiting
Bill and Barbara strongly felt that their son Billy, born in September 1998, needed a brother. But Bill was 50 and Barbara 40 when Billy was born.

They decided in 2005 to adopt a boy from the county's foster-care system and took extensive classes and read several books in order to learn what they were getting into.

“That preparation,” Barbara said, “made all the difference.”

Social workers, under court authorization, remove kids from troubled homes in order to ensure their safety, often after a call is made to the child-abuse hotline.

Neglect is usually the cause, often the result of substance abuse, domestic violence, or an arrest.

Of the 6,000 to 7,000 children who are in foster care at any given time in San Diego, the vast majority are returned home after their parents complete rehabilitation and coping classes.

But some parents fail, and some children, like Sebastian, are permanently removed.

Infants and toddlers are quickly claimed by couples wishing to adopt. But older children – who tend to have myriad problems caused by their abusive pasts – are more difficult to place.

San Diego County typically has about 150 such children of all ages in foster care. Some suffer from physical impairments or mental illness; some were born with drugs or alcohol in their systems; all have emotional issues to overcome.

The Ferreiras learned about all of this, and the specific problems Sebastian was struggling with, as they worked their way through the adoption process.

They were introduced to Sebastian and his desperate need for a “forever family” from a Web site that profiles foster-care children awaiting adoption.

Introducing these children on Web sites, in “heart galleries” and at picnics and other occasions known as “matching events,” are ways San Diego social workers have increased efforts in recent years to find homes for children in long-term foster care.

Such children are often described as “languishing.”

But the Ferreiras feel that Sebastian's luck changed dramatically when he was placed in the home of Gilberto and Yaira Dixon.

A Panamanian couple living in University Heights, the Dixons (who have since moved to Texas) relished their role as foster parents – a trait that, unfortunately, is not universal.

“It's clear that the time he spent with the Dixon family, and in therapy and special-education classes during the year before we got him, made a huge difference in Sebastian,” Bill said.

“That year turned out to be a great bridge to adoption for this child.”

Though they vowed to stay in touch with the Dixons, the Ferreiras said they have yet to find the time to write or call. Having two children, Barbara said, “is way more than twice the work of having just one.”

A model adoption
The Ferreiras said that for them, the adoption system “worked perfectly.”

“Yet we have heard our share of horror stories,” Bill said. “We found it really helps to take the classes and to take the time to understand the system going in and adjust your expectations. Otherwise, you can easily end up at odds with it.”

Having caring and experienced social workers was also very important, Barbara added.

After the adoption was finalized in a brief September court ceremony, the two brothers delighted in a series of firsts together: first Halloween; first Thanksgiving; first Christmas.

“We were a bit concerned because we wouldn't be able to give Billy as much at Christmas this year,” Barbara said. “But when I asked him about it, Billy replied: 'Mom, this was my best Christmas ever because I had my little brother with me.' ”

For information about the San Diego County foster-care and adoption system and profiles of individual children waiting to be placed, visit the Web site www.iadoptu.org or call (877) 423-6788.

Tony Thurmond would make a wonderful member of FCAA

Commentary: Young People Need Help When Foster Care Ends
Tony Thurmond. Berkeley Daily Planet, Feb. 16, 2007.

Meeting my father for the first time in 38 years forced me to think about the experience of many young adults who transition out of the foster care system and proceed through life without forging connections to caring adults.

I lost my mother in my youth and grew up without a father, but I was adopted by an older cousin and always had plenty of relatives and mentors who provided me with a stable, caring home and support that ultimately helped me persevere and prosper.

The experience is much different however, for the more than 4,000 young adults who emancipate (age out) of the California foster care system at the age of 18 and are forced to live on their own without the benefits of family, support, or resources.

Many of these youth become homeless and in turn face other problems such as prostitution, drug addiction and incarceration. There are some programs to provide these youth with transitional housing and training to help them develop the life skills they need to live independently, but ultimately, need far outweighs the supply.

In spite of these challenges, there are ways to support emancipated youth that are not exclusively tied to funding. Specifically, host housing programs and mentoring programs can help.

Host housing programs allow caring adults in the community to house an emancipated youth in an extra room in their home and to provide some basic mentoring and life coaching support. In many California counties, these hosts qualify for small subsidies to help with food and incidentals. The hosts get help from social workers who provide training and support. These efforts make dramatically positive changes in the lives of both host and youth.

Opportunities exist in programs for everyday citizens to get involved in hosting emancipated youth or in helping them as mentors. These programs are part of a menu of services being used by child welfare advocates to help emancipated youth move from transition to permanency.

More and more child welfare systems are investing in programs to promote permanency—like “family finding,” where professionals trained in advance search techniques help youth locate extended family members who can be part of their extended network of caring adult supporters.

It is the goal of all child welfare systems to reduce the number of youth in foster care, to reduce the length of time youth remain in care and to help youth make permanent lifelong connections with caring adults.

Serving as a host or a mentor is an excellent way to pitch in while the child welfare system continues to make progress towards those goals.

Please consider becoming a host or mentor today. Your efforts will add tremendous value to the experience of a young person. Those interested in hosting or mentoring a young person or making donations to support housing programs should contact Beyond Emancipation at (510) 261-4102.

Beyond Emancipation is a nonprofit program that helps emancipated youth in Alameda County find housing, employment, health services, scholarships and other resources to support their independence.

-Tony Thurmond is the Executive Director of Beyond Emancipation and a member of the Richmond City Council

Family preservation services in LA County are cut by $354 million

L.A. foster care program funding plan falls short
Anderson, Troy Anderson. San Gabriel Valley Tribune, Feb. 13, 2007.

After heralding an innovative federal funding waiver as the capstone of efforts to reform Los Angeles County's long-troubled child protective system, officials said Monday the amount of annual money that can be spent on services to help keep families together has dwindled from the $369 million originally proposed to $15 million now.

"This is the ultimate betrayal of vulnerable children and their families," said Richard Wexler, executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform in Alexandra, Va. "Whenever you try to change the status quo in child welfare to help families, you will offend an enormously powerful group of vested interests.

"Any county as large as Los Angeles County has a foster care industrial complex, the network of agencies whose survival depends on a steady stream of foster children," Wexler said. "Anything that threatens that will prompt them to pull out all the stops to oppose it."

The dramatic change in funding comes two years after the Board of Supervisors voted to apply to the federal government for what was described as a "revolutionary" waiver that would allow the Department of Children and Family Services to use nearly $400 million of its' $1.5 billion budget on services to keep children safely with their families.

Even without the waiver, DCFS has since made marked improvements in terms of child safety, quicker adoptions and has returned thousands of children home from foster care. The number of children in foster homes has dropped from about 50,000 in the mid-1990s to 20,454 as of Dec. 31, DCFS Director Trish Ploehn said.

But child advocates worry that without the larger sum of money, those reforms could be in jeopardy.

"The victory was that there was going to be this large pot of money that could be used to offer preventative services to keep kids out of foster care," said Janis Spire, executive director of the Alliance for Children's Rights. "I'm anxious to understand why that pot of money has dwindled significantly and where it's going to be spent instead in order to accomplish the goal of reducing the number of kids in care safely."

Susan Kerr, chief deputy director of DCFS, said the change in the figures is the result of a "misunderstanding."

Former DCFS Director David Sanders, who took a job at Casey Familiy Programs last year, wrote in a memo to the supervisors before he left that the waiver would allow DCFS to use $369 million of its budget on preventive services.

But Kerr said that figure was misinterpretted and several factors have further reduced the amount available. This includes an increase in the average amount the county pays agencies to take care of foster children from $1,748 a month in 2004-05 to $1,951 this fiscal year.

Also, DCFS' administrative costs have increased, Kerr said. A DCFS memo noted increased administrative costs are a result of 7.9 percent increases in salaries and benefits for employees this fiscal year and 9.3 percent increases each following year.

"I'm calling it a misunderstanding," Kerr said. "But we are extremely hopeful that the amount of available funding will increase as we begin to see successes from the waiver implementation. To the extent we are successful in getting more children out of placement, we'll have more dollars to reinvest."

Last week, Supervisor Michael Antonovich raised concerns about the ongoing negotiations between the county and state over the waiver, noting the state's proposed funding guidelines are more restrictive than the federal funding guidelines.

"Submission of the county plan without knowing the state's financial commitment to the project may result in the county's over-estimating service programs as part of the waiver, potentially placing the county at great financial risk," Antonovich said.

California Department of Finance spokesman H.D. Palmer said Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger remains committed to the federal waivers for Los Angeles and Alameda counties, even though it's going to cost the state an extra $34 million.

"To the extent we are able to keep a family together by providing counseling and substance abuse services ... that's certainly a preferrable alternative to removing a child and putting them in foster care," Palmer said. "And that's why the governor committed to this waiver and why we are continuing to provide additional resources to Los Angeles and Alameda counties to get this project up and running."

Chief Administrative Officer David Janssen said the $15 million figure could be reduced even further depending on whether the federal government imposes fines on the state for not meeting guidelines for improving the child protective system.

"We are hopeful the state has contacted the federal government to get them to agree \ should not be taken away from the waiver funding," Kerr said.

Even with the reduced amount of money, Janssen said the waiver is still beneficial. After negotiations between the county and state are completed, the waiver is expected to go back before the supervisors for their approval. The plan to expand services under the waiver is expected to start July1.

"Currently, we receive money from the federal government based on the number of cases we have," Janssen said. "There is no relationship to results at all. And in fact, you get rewarded for keeping more kids in foster care. The waiver would allow the department to spend money much more flexibly than they currently are."

Wexler said he's perplexed why the county's waiver isn't working out as planned when similar ones the federal government approved last year for Florida and Michigan are working well.

"They found a way to make it work," Wexler said. "Why can't L.A.? If this waiver had gone through as originally planned, fewer children would enter foster care. That would be a great threat to foster family agencies, the private agencies that handle a lot of foster kids and get paid to hold kids in foster care. So I'm sure they have been very upset about this waiver from day one."

Foster mother attends law school, while nurturing the children in her care

On duty for kids, 24 hours a day
Vo, Kim. Mercury News, Feb. 12,2007.

With her 22-month old foster child never far from her, longtime child advocate Lois Rapp works in the office of Legal Advocates for Permanent Parenting (LAPP), where she serves as a senior lawyer for the non-profit organization.

After decades of caring for AIDS babies, shaken babies and traumatized teens, Lois Raap's husband encouraged the longtime foster mom to do something for herself. She wanted nights off -- to attend law school.

It almost didn't happen. The Los Gatos woman thought she could continue caring for only one foster child while studying. Then, the phone rang. Another child needed special care. Authorities suspected abuse. Could she help?

Raap reconsidered the dream. After all, at 49 it wasn't like she would launch a hot-shot legal career or ascend to the Supreme Court.

"What's really important here?'' she asked herself.

She thought hard -- and, in her take-charge way, decided to do both.

She laughs about it now, sitting in her dinky San Mateo office with its stacks of legal papers and a laundry basket of toys. Though it's a work day, Raap has brought in her latest charge, a toddler with spina bifida and an enormous grin.

"I'm an eternal optimist,'' she said.

Raap knew that going to law school would work out. She watched the kids in the daytime, made dinner, then left for class while her husband, Peter, took over. She read case law at Great America, sitting on amusement park benches while kids whooshed on roller coasters overhead. She wrote papers in various waiting rooms while she took her foster children to innumerable appointments.

By 2000, the year she was supposed to graduate from Northwestern California University School of Law, she had five foster children and a daughter getting married. So she extended her studies another year.

To Raap, it was nothing extraordinary. The daughter of a Calvinist pastor carries a sense of righteousness and duty. Many people have it bad in this world, she says, and those who don't should do what they can.

It's that attitude that helped Raap win a Ruth Massinga Award, administrated by the national advocacy group Casey Family Program. Raap recently won the award, which honors those who work with foster children, advocate to improve the child welfare system and "who can always be counted on to contribute.''

"She's an extraordinary person,'' said Regina Deihl, who works with Raap at Legal Advocates for Permanent Parenting. "She has for many, many years taken the children no one else would take, the children other people had given up on.''

According to Deihl, Raap sees the unique potential of each child and then declares, "We've got work to do here. Let's hop to it.''

Raap, now 60, wields her law degree like a sword. She helps write new legislation for foster parents, who she feels are not granted enough respect or rights. She takes on private clients, helping parents get services for special-education kids.

"I go ballistic. I know no one's speaking for those kids. I know I'm more expressive, more forthright than any of these kids.''

Her fierce advocacy has won her fans and probably detractors.

"Lois Raap is the high, high end of all the foster parents I've ever encountered,'' said former judge Len Edwards, who presided over Santa Clara County's Juvenile Dependency Court for 21 years before retiring last year.

Unlike many foster parents, he said, Raap regularly attended court hearings, even wrote her own detailed reports.

"She's an inspiration to all of us. When she'd come to court we'd all be on our toes because she'd ask -- demand -- extra care for the children,'' Edwards said. He acknowledged that some could interpret her demanding style as an ``irritant.''

That might explain why the Santa Clara County Social Services Agency initially declined comment when told that a county resident had won a national award. After nearly a week, the director of the Department of Family and Children's Services issued this wispy praise:

"The Raaps have been foster parents in the county for a number of years. The Department appreciates the efforts of all our resource families, and we are grateful for how much they give of themselves to care for our dependent children.''

Kids first

Raap shrugs it off. What matters, she says, is the kids, especially the ones who need extra care. The key for such children, she said, is to crawl into their mind, see how the world looks and jimmy the system accordingly.

And Raap, a former special education teacher, finds ingenious routes into a child's thinking. She remembered one brain-damaged child with a wry sense of humor. At sixth grade, he still couldn't read and eventually refused to pick up a book.

No books, she promised, and then copied "Amelia Bedelia'' onto flashcards. They read the cards, day after day. Eventually, she slipped him the actual book. To his astonishment, he could read it.

"I love challenges,'' she said. "I love the game.''

Law offers the same rush. So can Monopoly, but she tends to avoid it. "I don't play board games,'' she said, giggling, "because I'm way too mean.''

In it for long haul

Mean is not what comes to mind sitting in Raap's office, where the conversation stops every five minutes. The toddler in her care, a sprite with a big red bow, keeps tugging on Raap's arm. The girl wants food. Eggs. Now pears! In the chair. Out of the chair. Peek-a-boo!

Each time, Raap stops talking, answers and plays with the girl, then resumes the conversation. She never forgets where she left off.

This is her "bonus baby,'' a child she's delighted with and initially was surprised is still with her, months after birth. It seems no one wanted to adopt a sick baby. (The child's name is being withheld because she's in foster care.)

Raap knows this happens. She cared for HIV-positive babies when fear of the disease was so high that they were shunned at day care and churches. She's gotten calls on Thanksgiving, a house already full of kids, with the county needing to bring another by because no one would take her.

Then there was the Mercury News profile of her in 1996. She had hoped it would recruit sorely needed foster parents, but the first 10 calls were from animal lovers. Beagles were in one of the photos and people wanted to know where they could get the pups.

Once a child comes into her home, Raap's in for the long haul, until the child is adopted or reunited with biological parents.

Sometimes, the kids stay. Raap, who has two biological children and one adopted daughter, has had three children simply decide to live with her until they turned 18, and sometimes beyond.

"If you provide a home for a child and the kid decides your home is the forever home, you have no choice,'' she said. "You care for that child.''

Formula for success

Nathaniel Gray was such a child. His mother was suspected of having Munchausen by Proxy, a disorder in which people fabricate illnesses in their children to get attention. Gray showed up at age 13, and eventually said he wasn't leaving.

The Raaps "were encouraging independence, while being dependent on Jesus, which is cool,'' said Gray, now 22. Despite a seizure disorder, he's at college now; he won't say where so his biological mother can't find him. He still calls the Raaps regularly, and it's their home he returns to on Thanksgiving and Christmas.

The Raaps, he said, taught him to stand up for himself while helping others. That prompted him to intervene at his new school, where some disabled students were teasing the more severely disabled ones.

"So I tell them they don't have to like each other,'' he said, ``but they have to show respect.''

Raap doesn't know how many children she's cared for over the years. She measures her success on people like Gray, who arrived depressed, recovering from a surgery to help him walk and now cooks his own dinner, navigates buses and trains, and attends college.

And it's what she may do for this latest child. For Raap, it comes back to that essential question she asked herself when debating law school.

"What's really important here?''