Generations United
applauds the bicameral, bipartisan agreement on the Preventing Sex Traffickingand Strengthening Families Act (H.R. 4980) for recognizing and
supporting the needs of grandfamilies, families where children are being raised
by grandparents or other relatives either inside or outside of the formal
foster care system.
Specifically, children
being raised in grandfamilies will benefit from the provisions which:
- extend kinship navigators and family finding through
Family Connection Grants,
- expand the adoption incentives program to include
permanent guardianships and increase incentives for older youth,
- promote “normalcy” for children in foster care
including kinship foster care,
- more fully engage youth in planning for their
permanency,
- require adoption assistance de-link savings to be reinvested
in post-permanency services, and
- preserve eligibility for kinship guardianship
assistance payments with a successor guardian.
While we affirm these
important steps to supporting grandfamilies, we elevate the need for further
reforms and ladders to stability and permanency for children. In
particular we are committed to working with both parties to ensure the Family
Connection Grants are extended beyond the current year. These grants
support kinship navigator programs, one of the few sources of information and
support for grandfamilies who are both keeping children with extended family
and saving taxpayers more than $6.5 billion each year by keeping children out
of foster care.
Generations United looks
forward to supporting future efforts related to child welfare finance reform
and ensuring the availability of additional prevention, post-permanency
services and other supports for grandfamilies who step up to raise
children when they cannot remain with their birth parents.
Thank you for your commitment
to ensuring safe, stable and permanent homes for children and preserving their
family and cultural ties whenever possible.
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