WASHINGTON – Senator Chuck Grassley participated in a roundtable discussion at the Casey Family Foundation foster care event with Iowa foster youth in Des Moines today.
“This was a great opportunity to hear from the foster kids,” Grassley said. “The main theme I heard was once again that they want permanence. They want to have a mom and a dad. Hopefully we can continue bringing good ideas to the forefront to make that dream a reality for more foster kids.”
Grassley has long been a champion for foster care and adoption issues.
Grassley is the founder and co-chairman of the Senate Caucus on Foster Youth. This caucus is a way for current and former foster youth to have their voices heard. It's a way to make senators more aware of these issues, to generate ideas for preventing negative outcomes, and to create opportunities for success for the 500,000 children in the foster care system in America and the more than 200,000 young people nationwide who have aged out of foster care. The caucus provides briefings for senators by think-tank experts, foster-care coalitions and other groups close to these kids and familiar with the issues they face. The caucus is a clearing house for up-to-date research and policy initiatives in this area of child welfare.
In November 2009, Grassley received a “Legislator of the Year” award from Voice for Adoption, a national organization dedicated to “speaking out for our nation’s waiting children.”
In the 110th Congress, Grassley helped enact legislation he initiated to help states move more children from foster care to permanent, loving homes. The bipartisan Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoption Act of 2008 is the most significant child welfare bill to be enacted in over a decade. It provided additional federal incentives for states to move children from foster care to adoptive homes. It made it easier for foster children to be adopted by their own relatives, including grandparents, aunts and uncles, and to stay in their own home communities. It made all children with special needs eligible for federal adoption assistance. Previously, that assistance had been limited to children who are removed from very low-income families. The new law also established new opportunities to help kids who age out of the foster care system at 18 by helping them pursue education or vocational training.
Grassley introduced the bill that became the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008 in May 2008. Families and foster kids from Des Moines, Waverly, Iowa City, Ankeny and Cedar Rapids came to Washington to help build support for his bill. “Their personal stories were inspiring and helped to make the case that more adoptions benefit everyone, not just the children,” Grassley said.
Grassley won support for this initiative from more than 500 organizations across the country, including Iowa organizations like the Iowa Foster and Adoptive Parents Association, Boys and Girls Home and Family Services of Sioux City, Family Resources of Davenport, the Iowa Citizen Action Network and Orchard Place of Des Moines. Other organizations supporting the legislation include the Children’s Defense Fund, the Kids Are Waiting: Fix Foster Care Now campaign sponsored by The Pew Charitable Trusts, the North American Council on Adoptable Children, the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, and the National Foster Care Coalition.
In 2006, the Finance Committee held the first hearings on child welfare in over a decade. The hearings were part of an effort that led to passage of the Child and Family Services Improvement Act of 2006, which Grassley developed as Finance Committee Chairman and shepherded through Congress. The legislation improved programs aimed at helping troubled families, provided grants for states and community organizations to combat methamphetamine addiction and other substance abuse, and increased case worker visits for children in foster care.
The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 included funding championed by Grassley for grants to train judges, attorneys and legal personnel in child welfare cases, as well as grants to strengthen and improve collaboration between the courts and child welfare agencies. Grassley also has worked to protect federal funding for Social Services Block Grants that help fund child welfare services.
Grassley also worked to advance the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997. Since its enactment, adoptions increased to 54,000 per year, and many states have doubled their adoptions from foster care.
Details from the Casey Family Foundation event follow below.
For immediate release | Oct. 20, 2010
Contact: Marty McOmber
206.335.9263
mmcomber@casey.org
Foster care youth to share stories at special event with Iowa leaders
DES MOINES - Each year, some 30,000 youth in the U.S. exit foster care without a connection to a permanent family. As a result, they face greater risks of homelessness, unemployment, incarceration and mental illness. About 450 of those youth each year are from the state of Iowa.
What has to change to better help these vulnerable young people?
Several Iowa youth who spent time in foster care will have a chance to tell their personal stories and offer their personal perspectives Friday morning at a special event in Des Moines. Federal and local leaders will join the youth in what promises to be a powerful and poignant discussion about the challenges that exist in the current child welfare system, promising efforts taking place in Iowa and across the nation to improve outcomes for children, and how changes in the system could improve the lives of vulnerable children and families.
Casey Family Programs – the nation’s largest operating foundation focused entirely on foster care and improving the child welfare system – invites you to join Iowa youth currently and formerly in foster care, U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley, and child welfare leaders for this important discussion about improving the lives of Iowa’s most vulnerable citizens.
DATE AND TIME
Friday, Oct. 22
10 to 11:30 a.m.
Registration opens at 9:30.
LOCATION
The Temple For Performing Arts
Recital Hall, Fourth Floor
1011 Locust Street
Des Moines, Iowa 50309
This discussion will examine the impacts of the recent Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act and the Senate Caucus on Foster Youth, co-chaired by Sen. Grassley, as well as the ongoing efforts to reform the federal financing of child welfare in order to create opportunities to improve the lives of Iowa's vulnerable children and families.
The youth currently and formerly in foster care who will share their powerful stories come from across the state. They include:
• Franceska entered foster care at age 12, leaving her adoptive family and an unsafe living situation. She has lived in six foster homes, shelter care and the Iowa State Training school in Toledo. She is now a student at Des Moines Area Community College.
• Janessa entered foster care at age 14. Separated from her sisters, she spent time at a youth shelter but was determined not to become another statistic. She is now a college student at the University of Iowa in Iowa City and works to improve foster care in Cedar Rapids and Boone.
• Travis spent time in multiple group homes in Central Iowa before finding a permanent home with an aunt and uncle that he first met after moving to Iowa.
• Keith spent time in four shelter placements before he landed in a supportive foster home. He is now enrolled at Iowa Central Community College in Fort Dodge.
• Julie entered foster care at age 8. She lived in foster homes and with relatives, but didn’t secure a permanent family until she was 16, at which point her life improved. She graduated from Iowa State University with a degree in child, adult and family services, which she plans to use by giving back and helping youth reach their fullest potential.
The national perspective
About 424,000 children live in foster care in the United States, including 6,500 in Iowa. Over the past few years, we've seen those numbers decline thanks to promising approaches that are helping ensure more vulnerable children are living in safe, nurturing and permanent families. But more work needs to be done.
About Casey Family Programs
Casey Family Programs is the nation’s largest operating foundation focused entirely on foster care and improving the child welfare system. Founded in 1966, we work to provide and improve—and ultimately prevent the need for—foster care in the United States. As champions for change, we are committed to our 2020 Strategy — a goal to safely reduce the number of children in foster care and improve the lives of those who remain in care.