Foster care increases?

[Julia Littell <jlittell@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Des, 

Is it possible that the recent increase in foster care placements is due to
greater reliance on kinship care? Some states continue to "formalize"--and
pay for --kin care arrangements that used to occur outside of the child
welfare system. The time frame you examined seems to me to be out of sync
with the implementation of welfare reform (i.e., too early), but it is
possible that we will see increased use of foster care as a result of TANF. 

Several years ago Rob Green examined a sample of foster care placements in
Illinois and found that 15% of these placements did not involve any change
of address on the part of the child. These were three-generational
households in which children were "placed" with the grandmother so that the
household could collect per diem foster care payments, which were
substantially greater than the AFDC rate. It appeared that some caseworkers
were simply using the foster care system to help intact families make ends
meet. Perhaps we will see more of that.

Julia Littell


At 08:41 AM 4/13/1999 -0500, you wrote:
>David,
>
>The National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being will be fielded
>beginning this summer.  We will be following 7200 children from 100
>counties selected in a stratified random manner from across the US.  this
>survey will explicitly examine, at 6 month intervals, services received by
>the children.  Mental health measures and reports of re-victimization will
>be obtained at yearly interviews for 2 years after recruitment.  Sexually
>abused children and foster care children will be oversampled.  The survey
>will produce state estimates for the 5 largest states and national
>estimates by type of state organization of the social service agency and by
>types of maltreatment reported.  we will also have a sample of children who
>entered the child welfare system through other doors besides a report of
>child maltreatment.
>
>By the way, my review of federal statistics form AFCARS suggests that
>foster care numbers have increased 34% from July 1996 to July 1997!!!  Are
>we seeing fall-out from welfare reform?
>
>Des
>
>Des Runyan
>University of North Carolina
>Chapel Hill, NC  27599
><drunyan@med.unc.edu>
><dkrunyan@mindspring.com>
>
>
>
Julia H. Littell, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research
Bryn Mawr College
300 Airdale Rd.
Bryn Mawr, PA 19010
610/520-2619
FAX 610/520-2655
jlittell@brynmawr.edu