Funding OK’d for kids leaving state foster care

Dan Kulin

Wednesday, April 28, 2004 | 9:15 a.m.

Nearly $1.3 million in additional money to help youth leaving foster care would pay for dental and eye care, subsidize rent and utility bills and be used to establish a mentoring program under a plan endorsed by a committee hoping to ease the transition for the roughly 100 Clark County youth who leave foster care every year.

The proposal backed by the Clark County Independent Living Committee also would set up a board to hear special requests from youth who need money on top of an annual stipend available to them until they turn 21, which is the cutoff age for those who can be helped by the programs.

Committee members hope the financial assistance will ease the transition to independence for the youngsters.

"How many kids leave their parents' home at 18 and don't need any help?" asked Donna Coleman, a committee member and president of the Children's Advocacy Alliance. "We looked at their basic needs, so they're not turning 18 and being cut loose."

Within the next few days the plan supported Tuesday will be sent to the state Division of Child and Family Services for official approval, said Susan Klein-Rothschild, director of the Clark County Department of Family Services and a committee member.

Rebecca Richard-Maley, statewide foster care/independent living specialist for the state, said the proposal is expected to be OK'd a few days later. Klein-Rothschild said the planned new and enhanced programs could be up and running within a month or two.

In early March the state announced it would release about $1.3 million to help young people when they leave foster care. The money is part of $2.1 million approved in 2001 that was about 90 percent unused at the end of 2003.

The Sun reported in January that the funds, which come from filing and copying fees levied by recorders throughout the state under a legislation passed in 2001, were not being used for foster children.

A study done in 2000 and 2001 by Clark County Manager Thom Reilly, when he was an associate professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, showed many foster children who left state custody wind up homeless and in trouble with the law.

A judge may allow some foster children to stay with their foster parents past their 18th birthday, depending on the circumstances, Klein-Rothschild said. A common example is when a high school senior turns 18 during the school year.

About $400,000 of the money has been spent since Feb. 1, 2003, on a program that provides a stipend to youth after they leave high school.

The program gives foster youths money when they leave high school -- $500 for those receiving a diploma or General Educational Development, and $250 for the others. That money is counted toward the annual stipend available to the youth through the program. The stipend is $2,000 in both the first and second year, and $1,500 in the third year. The money is available to the youth on an as-needed basis and is distributed in response to requests.

A proposed change to the stipend program supported Tuesday would make additional money available, but to receive the additional funds the youth would have to go before a special board to justify their need.

With the additional funds coming, the committee hopes to fund several additional programs, including:

Chris Brooks, a committee member and former foster care youth, said he was concerned the programs could end up prolonging a youth's dependence on others. But Brooks said he was optimistic that with life skills classes for those youth and the extra money, those youth will be better prepared to set off on their own at 21 than they would be at 18.

Klein-Rothschild said more changes to the assistance programs could come after these programs are in place.

"The kids who leave foster care who have nothing are not doing well so we need to get this started. And we're starting with out best guess. ... But this is the beginning not the end," she said.