ERIE COUNTY — In Ohio, nearly 17,000 children are in foster care, but only 7 thousand families are licensed to care for them. The story is the same in Erie County, where the number of foster children in need of placement far exceeds the number of help.
Greg Hall has been a foster parent in Erie County for two years. He helps with emergency and respite care.
“At three o'clock in the morning, when law enforcement is out with children services with a removal, they'll contact us and they’ll go with me,” Hall said.
With a law enforcement background, he knows first-hand how traumatizing the removal process can be for families.
“These kids are the most vulnerable in our county, and they need a loving, [compassionate] home to be a part of. And some of them they may not get that at their home. So, yeah it’s been an amazing experience,” Hall said.
And although it’s been rewarding, he says it’s also a costly experience for his family.
“One of the biggest things is daycare,” Hall said.
Erie County foster parents used to spend a few hundred dollars of their own money each month to cover expenses.
“I have known foster families prior to this that have drained their entire savings account for daycare to provide that daycare for the foster child and they did it out of the own goodness of their heart,” said Hall.
Until Hall brought the financial roadblock to the attention of Erie County Commissioner Board President Patrick Shenigo and Jobs and Family Services Executive Director AJ Lill.
“We looked at it and what the costs were, and we thought this is something that we couldn't not do,” Shenigo said.
Now in Erie County, foster parents will be reimbursed for childcare expenses up to $200 a week if both foster parents are employed and use a certified childcare provider, but the county's efforts didn't stop there. They want to bring kids back home to Erie County.
“We were sending too many children out of county, which is not only expensive but it's not good for the children. And our goal was to keep these kids in the school system that they're in, the activities that they're in and not have to move them around,” Shenigo said.
There are currently 22 foster parents in Erie County, and 51 children are in the custody of Erie County Jobs and Family Services. Twenty of those kids have had to be sent to foster parents in Toledo, Cleveland and Columbus.
“Our goal was to attract more foster parents into our system,” Lill said.
Foster families will get a bump in daily pay depending on the age and needs of the child as well as $250 dollars twice a year that could be spent on clothes and shoes for the foster child.
“Before if a child was 11 and under, it was $30 a day and then with the commissioner's support, it’s now $35 a day. And then for children ages 12 and up, it was $38 a day and now it's $43 a day. And then lastly, there's kids with complex behavioral and mental health and other challenges that they have, those were $45 a day, and now they're $50,” Lill said.
Lill says the existing families are excited for the bump and daily pay and stipend.
“The parents are very conscious that that when they take a child into their home, they want that child to be treated just like their own kids,” said Lill.
Hall says he hopes this opens up the floodgates in the amount of people who decide to foster in Erie County.
