While there are currently no children temporarily living in the the Richmond County DSS building, anywhere from 1-5 children were living in the building at the peak of COVID, said DSS director Robby Hall. “They had no other option,” Hall said.
Daily Journal file photo
Supply of foster families not meeting the increased post-COVID demand
“Most of the kids that come into care come with a garbage bag and maybe a couple pieces of clothes, if at all,” said Robby Hall at the unveiling of the Childrens Hope Center in Hamlet earlier this year. “Here, you give them a place that looks like a store, that looks like something everybody would want to come to. It gives them a chance to be a little more normal when they come to school.”
Matthew Sasser | Daily Journal
ROCKINGHAM — In Richmond County, there was about 30 children in the foster care system in 2019. Close to five years later, that number has risen t0 109 as of November 2023.
The month of November has been proclaimed as Adoption Awareness Month in Richmond County, with a day of recognition on Nov. 17.
Division of Social Services Director Robby Hall said there is a need for permanent families for youth in the foster care system, and that since January of this year, there has only been one finalized adoption. Currently, there are 109 children in the local foster care system and adoption is the permanent plan for 24 of those children.
“Richmond County will continue to recruit adoptive families with the hope of placing current child[ren] in foster care who are awaiting adoption.” Hall said to the Board of Commissioners earlier this month.
There are many challenges facing the foster care system, and those obstacles have increased exponentially during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.
“One of the things in COVID that people didn’t realize — Social isolation also meant no volunteerism,” Hall said. “Our system primarily in North Carolina was based on volunteer foster parents. For the first 18 months, I could not bring on a foster parent because the MAPP [Model Approach to Partnerships in Parenting] training was not certified to be done electronically, which is the certification you need to to to be a licensed foster parents. There’s a court process — You can’t leave foster care without court process. If your courts were reduced, restricted or closed, that child had to stay there. It’s the same thing for access to treatment services.”
The increase in the overall number of children admitted into the system has many multiplying affects. Hall said they had to use foster homes outside the community to accommodate the increased need. At the DSS building, they built a bedroom to house some of the highest-acuity kids at the peak of the pandemic, where anywhere from 3-5 children lived temporarily.
“We’re not supposed to do that, but they had no other option,” Hall said. “In a rural community, access is already a issue. We have some providers, and some darn good providers, but it’s few.” With COVID restrictions, some 25-bed temporary housing facilities would only offer 10 beds, Hall said.
In his 30 years in this field, Hall is nonplussed at the number of infants embroiled in the system. On May of 2023, 19 of the then 111 children under the purview of the Richmond County DSS were under the age of 2.
“That’s unheard of,” Hall, who is the legal guardian of all children under the care of DSS, said. “Normally family would come forward and take a baby. That’s not happening as much, mainly we believe, because of the discord with severe substance abuse in some of our families. We’re carrying Narcan [at DSS] because we’ve had an incident of a child OD’ing in our building.”
Hall said that the lack of available place and treatment services started in 2018, and the social service directors around North Carolina brought that fact to the attention of the state. Placements were not available for high-acuity kids, and assessment for severe mental health needs skyrocketed during COVID.
“We couldn’t bring on volunteers on top of that,” Hall said. “It’s like a rock rolling down the hill and gathering more and more.”
There are about 22 foster families in Richmond County right now, but Hall says they need about 25-50 more. The course to become a foster parent typically takes about 10 weeks, but Hall says they’ve been able to complete the process in about six weeks with smaller groups. Still, Hall says that the interest has routinely not met the demand, especially for high-acuity kids. The length of stay for a foster child has also increased — the goal is about 12 months or less, but it’s been more recently trending closer to 12 months.
“The vast majority of kids adopted in North Carolina are adopted by their foster parents,” Hall said. “Not because of lack of reunification efforts or anything else, but they have the kids, they see the kids, they know the kids. They have a right after a certain period of time to be heard for that.”
Hall said it’s not all “doom and gloom”, and that these local trends are reflected in neighboring counties and across the United States. Children in the foster care system can stay under the purview of DSS or a foster home until they are 21. Hall said there are resources available that can help these young adults transition into being a productive citizen.
This year, a child advocacy center, which will evaluate and treat victims of sexual and physical abuse, has opened in downtown Rockingham. In January of 2022, King’s Gate Church unveiled their Childrens Hope Center that will serve any foster child who needs clothing.
For any interesting in learning or becoming a foster parent, information is available on the county DSS website. To learn more, visit https://www.richmondnc.com/518/Foster-Care
To support the Richmond County Daily Journal, subscribe at https://www.yourdailyjournal.com/subscribe or 910-817-3111.
Reach Matthew Sasser at 910-817-2671 or msasser@www.yourdailyjournal.com to suggest a correction.
