When the kids go live with Grandma
CCS works to support relative caregivers of foster children
By RUTH LILJENQUIST
Special to The New Vision
Caring for children in extended family networks has always been a feature of human society. In good times and bad, and in mostly informal ways, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins have contributed to the care of the extended family’s children.
In recent years, however, the United States has seen kinship caregiving increase dramatically, with relative caregivers increasingly called upon formally by state child welfare agencies to care for children whose parents are unfit or unable to care for their children because of abuse and neglect, substance abuse, mental illness, incarceration, abandonment, family violence, and other factors.
This trend is seen commonly by foster care workers for Catholic Community Services, which is a member of the Arizona Partnership for Children (AZPC), a multi-agency coalition that recruits, trains, licenses, and supports foster families throughout the state. As a partner, CCS is responsible for providing foster care services throughout Southern Arizona, including Pinal County.
Lily Nestorovich directs CCS’ foster care program in Pinal County, one of the fastest growing counties in the United States. With the influx of people into the county, Lily has seen the number of foster care placements increase, with many kinship placements from both in and out of state.
“Kinship placements are usually the best option for children in foster care,” said Lily. “The children already know and love the relative caregiver—such as a grandparent or aunt—and the family connection is maintained.”
Ironically, however, relative caregivers often receive less support than non-relative foster families. In most cases, relative caregivers are providing care in response to the family crisis that led to the children’s separation from their parents. They are not licensed by the state to provide foster care, and, therefore have no access to ongoing financial support, medical care, educational assistance, therapy, and other services for the children.
In Arizona, kinship families can get licensed and then get support, but most don’t know that they can or don’t know how. CPS workers, struggling with heavy caseloads and dealing constantly with emergency situations, may not follow up with the relative caregiver until months after the placement.
Lily once received a call from a grandmother who had taken in her four grandchildren several months before. She was living on a fixed income and was struggling to provide for them. Frustrated and desperate, she called Lily for help.
“We got her into the foster care training classes immediately and started the licensing process,” said Lily. “By the time she got licensed, she had been caring for her grandkids for a full year. She finally got the support she needed, but she lost the opportunity to get funding for those kids during that first year. It wasn’t fair to her or other family caregivers in the same situation.”
This grandmother’s experience is not uncommon. In fact, nationwide, relative caregivers are not well supported, which has prompted children’s advocates to push for legislation that provides more immediate and ongoing support to kinship caregivers.
In the meantime, Lily and other AZPC foster care workers throughout the state are helping kinship caregivers get licensed so that they can receive the support they need to care for the children in their homes.
“Just because they are family doesn’t mean that relative caregivers shouldn’t be given the resources to care for the children,” said Lily. “On the contrary, it makes so much sense to support these caregivers because children benefit so much from remaining with their families.”
For more information
If you are relative caregiver providing care through a formal arrangement with the state of Arizona and have not become a licensed foster care provider, call the Arizona Partnership for Children at (866) 800-9468.