Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Fostering Connections Act of 2008

A new law, The Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008 is designed to better connect foster children with their relatives, promote permanent families through relative guardianship, and improve education and health care for foster children.

The law provides:
* Subsidized guardianship to enable children in the care of grandparents and other relatives to exit foster care into permanency
* Kinship navigator programs to help link relative caregivers to a broad range of services and supports that will help meet their needs and the needs of the children in their care
* Notices to adult relatives of a child placed into foster care
* Options for states to waive non safety related licensing standards for relative foster parents

It also offers federal reimbursement to states for support provided to foster youth up to age 21, and requires increased efforts to keep siblings together when placed in foster care.

Full Article and Source:
Fostering Connections Act of 2008

More information:
Summary of the law

Short summary of the law

Actual text of the law

Kinship provisions

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I like the spirit here --- it seems supportive of grandparents.

Anonymous said...

Applause! Family first, the old American way!