Carson City foster home shortage at critical levels

The number of available foster homes in Carson City is so low right now that siblings cannot reside together in emergency foster care, a local panel of child welfare advocates said.

“It's a really critical situation right now in Carson City,” said Lori Nichols, LSW, Foster Care Recruiter for the Nevada Division of Child and Family Services (DCFS) District Office in Carson City.

As of March, there were just 13 total family foster homes in the Nevada state capital, she said, “which is way under what we need here based on our population.”

Ideally, DCFS officials said they’d like to see at least 25 family foster homes operating in Carson City for the more than 100 local area children currently in the system.

Nichols said of the 13 homes currently licensed to provide state foster care in Carson City, nine are either full or on hold, and three are respite only foster care; meaning they exist to give temporary breaks to full-time foster parents.

That leaves just one emergency foster care placement in Carson City as of March, and that home had just one bed available.

“That foster home would not be able to take a sibling group, so we have no where right now in Carson City that can take a sibling group,” Nichols said. “That's how critical it is.”

Neighboring rural counties have to take in Carson City children because there aren’t enough foster homes to place them in their own community.

“We're having to take kids and put them in outlying communities,” said Nichols, who recruits foster parents throughout all 15 of Nevada’s rural counties. “We're in a very dire situation right now for foster homes.”

There were 418 children in state custody in rural Nevada as of March, she said, and many of them are in sibling groups.

Foster home shortages are nothing new to rural Nevada, the panel agreed, but the present situation just makes the trauma of emergency foster care that much harder on the child. They are not only removed from their home, they are removed from their community.

“Putting kids who have already been removed from their home, so that they are already in crisis, into another jurisdiction makes that bigger picture all that more difficult to meet their needs,” said Carson City Assistant District Attorney Kristin Luis.

It’s better, the panel said, for the children to remain in their own communities where they are settled in school, with friends, fictive kin and extended family.

But that is no longer an option these days for most Carson City children who must be placed in emergency foster care.

“Children really need to be in a home environment with a family, getting used to that foundation of going to school every day just like every other kid,” said Nichols, who added that of all 15 rural counties that she recruits within, Carson City is the toughest nut to crack.

The reasons why are not clear. But the panel suggests that awareness, and a lack there of, may be the common denominator.

“Unless you work in the child welfare system, or you see it firsthand, people can be oblivious to that,” Nichols said. “If they are not seeing that constant message, they don't know there's a problem unless they hear about it.”

Public Information Officer Karla Delgado, Social Services Chief in the Systems Advocate Unit of the DCFS District Office in Carson City, said part of the challenge has been expressing that need to the public.

“We don’t have good information out there,” she said. “Information about becoming a foster parent hasn’t been on our web site, and we are working to fix that.”

Foster parent information panels, made up of child welfare professionals, was formed late last fall in an effort to improve the division’s communication and spread the word about the need for foster homes in Carson City.

“The panel discussions are bringing the human element to it,” Delgado said. “These are the people working behind the scenes and working through the situation.”

The first information panel was held in December 2017 and several others have followed since then, said Molly Blanchette, MSW, LSW, Social Services Manager of the DCFS District Office in Carson City.

As of March, Blanchette said eight Carson City families were in the process of getting licensed, “which shows that once Carson City is made aware of what's going on, they are totally willing to respond.”

She said the information panels appear to be having an impact as such, because they make the problem more tangible and give a face to the community of those working hard to address it.

“The idea of the panel is to make it real to people,” Blanchette said. “When something is real, you have to do something about it. When it's just this thing out there, it's easy to dismiss and live in a different world where it doesn't really happen.”

Jeremy Falconer, a licensed foster parent in Carson City and a fifth grade teacher at Mark Twain Elementary School, said he gets asked often by co-workers about becoming a foster parent.

“A lot of people come up to me and ask how I got started,” he said. “It's just really not knowing where to begin."

Falconer has been a foster parent since May 2017 and is approaching his one year anniversary, which also happens to land within National Foster Care Month, a nationwide awareness campaign designed to bring the need for foster homes to light in communities throughout the country.

He said one of the reasons many people may not pursue a foster care license is because they could feel trepidations about providing care to children in crisis.

“It's intimidating to think about being a foster parent, because I think there's a misconception that you are going to get really bad kids, that there's a reason they were removed from their home, that they have really bad behavior, these kids aren't normal and there's something wrong with them,” he said. “The reality is, they are like any typical kid, they just happen to be in a bad situation.”

There is also misinformation that leads people away from becoming foster parents.

“People have misconceptions on what is required to be a foster parent,” said DCFS Clinical Program Manager Kevin Quint. “There may be information they think they have that is not correct.”

Falconer agreed, noting that he, too, reconciled with misperceptions before making the decision to get his foster care license.

"I was always under the impression that I couldn't be a foster parent as a single person,” he said. “But I was quickly able to debunk that myth and decided to pursue it.”

Myths about age and marital status are being dispelled thanks to the information panels conducted around the community. But there is still more work to be done.

“It seems like when people in Carson City know that there's a need, they are willing to step up,” Luis said. “I don't think they realize the need, and I don't think they realize what kind of an impact not fulfilling that need has from a broader perspective.”

Helping bring that big picture into focus for people is what the information panels are designed to do.

“If we have foster homes in Carson City, our social workers are able to do the work that they are supposed to be doing, families can connect better to services, and case plans work out better,” Luis said. “It's that big picture that we're all able to see, and move forward in a positive direction.”

The next foster parent information panel is scheduled for Tuesday, May 15 at the Carson City Library, 900 North Roop Street, from 5:30 to 7 p.m.

Visit Nevada DCFS web site or on Facebook for more information about upcoming panels and becoming a foster parent.