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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (May 29, 2015)
Street Roots • May 29-June 4, 2015 News Page 5 FAMILIES, from page 4 the foster care system - there were 42 a relative, but realized there was nothing says they worked diligently to make the boys foster kids in Oregon last year who had lived she could do legally to stop it. with their foster parents for more than 12 feel they were loved and wanted. “You treat The child she represented in that Case, months prior to being adopted by a relative. Zachery, had been in the care of “Natalie,” a them like your own children,” says Stark. During that same period, DHS received four foster parent outside of Portland who asked That’s why, he says, after all the requests from caseworkers asking for we not use her real name, and her husband reassurances they gave the boys, to then exceptions allowing foster parents to be ever since they picked him up from the turn them over to a stranger would go considered for adoption. hospital when he was just 2 days old. against all their initial efforts. “I think it would be more,” says The couple had raised him for eight “There has to be a sense of betrayal McKechnie, “but the foster parents aren’t months when DHS asked if they would like there,” he says, leading the children to ask, ' to adopt him, says Natalie. “Why’d you give up on me? I already lost my allowed to ask.” In 2013, more than 12,000 children spent “We said of course, because we just loved mom or my dad, now why am I losing you at least one day in Oregon’s foster care him, and at that point, we gave the rest of too? Why don’t you want me? It instills a system. That same year there were 4,229 our hearts - all of our hearts - because you fear.” - certified foster homes statewide. According always kind of hold back a little bit knowing This reality has led to a phrase he often to DHS spokesperson Andrea Cantu- that they’re going to go,” she says. tells foster kids in his care. “‘You can be Schomus, the department is always in need Zachery’s pending adoption coincided certain that we love you,’ - and Ihate of additional foster homes. With a wide with DHS’s rule change» Natalie says six having to add this part,” he says, “and we variety of needs months later DHS are going to care for you as long as the state among the children told her the adoption lets us.” they serve, she says, was off because it had Stark emphasizes the bill would not give the best matches are found relatives who "We really? really need te step preference to foster parents, only allow for found when there a re up hew we see fester pareats« 1 were interested in them to be considered for adoption a lot of placement adopting the child. tblafe that a ll tee eltea? fester alongside relatives. Its passage would have choices. Zachery was nearly no effect on his case, as an agreeable parents are seea as k ia i e l aa Debbie Albright, 2 years old when it outcome has been reached, he says. after th e a f ht ia hew te really president of Oregon was time for him to There are exceptions, although rare, to Foster Parent help Bids h e a l/r go live with his new DHS’s current rule. The department’s Association, says parents - cousins permanency director Prouty says DHS does STATE SEN, CHIP SHIELDS from out of state. The foster parents often create “an exception for relatives and foster become frustrated whole process, from . parents to be considered together if it is in with what she says is the introduction to his the best interests of the child or children.” a lack of respect for new family, whom These exceptions must come at the their rights and their he’d never met, to his request of the child’s caseworker and cannot time from the state, making an already departure, took only three days. be made by the foster parents. In Prouty’s challenging role as a foster parent more “It was a horrific three days,” says four-year tenure, she says she’s received a difficult. In her circle, she says, the greatest Natalie. “In the end, they came to our house total of 17 such requests, two of which she challenge for foster parents c a m e w h e n “ and n e sa w d e n ie d . _ to u s gn d w ould n o t le t go. H e buried his Oregon began to shut them out of a d o p tio n Stark says there are branches of DHS face in us, and when it came time, they placement proceedings when a relative is that don’t allow for exceptions at all. “I’ve pried him off of us and shoved him in his car involved. been told many of the counties have seat. They couldn’t get him in because he “They stopped taking into account what somewhat of a blanket, ‘No we don’t do was flailing and screaming.” was in the best interest of kids and just th a t’” She came back into her home to find her always went toward that relative,” says DHS’s preference for placement with four biological children in distress. Her Albright. “It’s my own personal story. It’s relatives is backed by numerous reports oldest daughter, who was 12 at the time, the sfofy'of hundreds of families I know spanning the past 20 years. Studies find that across the state who have lost kiddos after a was sobbing so deeply she began to throw when a child is plated with or adopted by a up. year or two years of them being in their “We spent the next year trying to get our relative versus a non-relative foster parent, home to relatives that have no contact or kids through the grief process,” she says. the outcomes — at least statistically - are connection to these children other than “It’s like a death.” better. They are more likely to be placed biology.” Zachery’s Court Appointed Special with siblings, they have fewer behavioral In Albright’s case, she and her husband Advocate, who spoke on condition of problems, do better in school, and they are had fostered a boy since infancy. After both anonymity, says she advocated for Zachery more likely to report they always feel loved his parents died from drug overdoses, the to stay with the foster parents. She said, “I Albrights were on track to adopt him, she. - 9 4 percent versus 82 percent of children was incredibly upset with the solution that says. But when DHS found a second cousin in non-relative foster care. DHS came up with. Placing Zachery with living on the East Coast who was willing to Data pulled from an expansive, federally; take him, the decision to allow the Albrights people he did not know, only because of the funded study of 5,501 foster children, The current law, was very unfair, to both to adopt was overturned. At age 18 months, National Survey of Child and Adolescent Zachery and the foster family.; The final the child was sent across the country to live Well-Being, published in 2010, was used to decision was almost as hard on me as it was with a second cousin he had never met. compare parenting by relative and non- on the foster family.” “We’d had him his entire life,” says relative foster parents. While both groups of Albright, “and so that was definitely trauma parents scored well across the board, for everyone involved. That was five years relatives were more likely to encourage ago and we’ve never seen or heard from him hobbies and education, according to the en. Chip Shields (D-Portland) introduced again.” study sample. a package of bills to reform foster care Meghan Bishop is a juvenile law attorney Relative - or kinship - foster parents this session. He says it’s a system that in Washington County who’s represented have their own challenges, as well. They “desperately needs to be improved,” And foster parents in disagreement with DHS were statistcally found to be older than one area his bills target is foster parents’ adoption placement decisions. “The only other foster care givers - 61 percent were rights. Shields and his wife are foster mechanism to get them a seat at the table the child’s grandmother g to have fewer parents. - has been to file for intervention,” she says, years of education, were less likely to be “We really, really need to step up how we “and that’s a very difficult hurdle to married and were more likely to be living see foster parents,” he says. “I think that all overcome.” below the federal poverty level. too often, foster parents are seen as kind of She figured out this approach to an after thought in how to really help kids intervening after the outcome of a child heal.” welfare case early in her career had a He believes giving foster parents more profound effect oh her. ccording to Mark McKechnie, executive rights, training and support will help Oregon She had strongly disagreed with a DHS director of Youth, Rights and Justice - a to attract and retain a greater number of nonprofit law firm representing children in decision to place her foster child client with S S active foster homes - an objective shared with DHS. Shields took a lead role in championing the bill that will give equal consideration to foster parents in DHS adoption hearings. DHS has taken a neutral position on the bill, says Prouty. “I think we’ve gone a little bit too far in trying to reunify families at all costs with a relative no matter how distant,” Shields says, “and I think this brings us a little bit back toward center where we really put the best interest of the child first.” In the meantime, filing a court motion to intervene in an adoption is one of few options foster parents have. That’s what the Sisks did when they were faced with losing Caleb. ccording to Emily Sisk, an evaluation of Caleb by clinicians at the Children’s Program determined his transition into his aunt’s care needed to be very slow, with many visits in between. A transition plan that seemed impossible with 2,000 miles between thé Sisks’ and Caleb’s aunt’s home. Emily Sisk says she and Caleb’s DHS caseworker attempted to initiate in-person and Skype visits between the child and his aunt in order to make the transition less damaging, but his aunt was unresponsive to requests for contact. Worried the abrupt uprooting from their home and move to an out-of-state house full of s tra n g e rs w ou ld c a u se irre v e rs ib le A d a m a g e tc r C aleb^ t h e Sïslés p a id . $> S’, Q 0 0 to retain a lawyer so they could fight to keep him under their care - hot an option every foster parent has at their disposal. Court documents show a Washington County judge ultimately removed Caleb from DHS’s custody so the Sisks could adopt him, citing that “it is the only home (the) child has known for the past three years. Removal will cause irreversible harm.” Neither Caleb’s aunt nor DHS appealed the decision. Youth, Rights and Justice director McKechnie says removing a child from DHS custody is not unprecedented, “but it’s kind of a drastic move” and one of only a few tactics available. “The trade-off is that you’re losing all the resources that DHS has at its disposal, and it’s really only foster parents who have the financial means to care for their child without any support from DHS — who have that option,” he says. As an operations coordinator at ÔHSU, Greg Sisk is able to support his patchwork family comfortably, giving Emily Sisk the ability to dedicate her time to caring for the children. Without a subsidy from the state, they are still able to give Caleb everything he needs. When Street Roots visited the couple’s new, five-bedroom home in Woodburn, Caleb was happily playing Legos with his brother in the family’s fully-stocked playroom at the front of the house. As he ran around, through the kitchen and living room, smiling and laughing, it was easy to see - he was home. The names o f a ll the foster children in this story have been changed to protect their privacy.
