Teens not getting all state funds after leaving foster care

By Timothy Pratt (contact)

Thursday, Jan. 15, 2004 | 11:14 a.m.

More than 90 percent of funds available for teens to get on their feet after they turn 18 and can no longer be under the state's care are not being spent, causing concern among legislators and nonprofit groups who work with the youths.

The funds were authorized in the 2001 Legislature to help teens who become too old for the foster care system takes care of the needs such as housing, health care and education.

But only $209,000 of about $1.8 million was spent in fiscal year 2003 and $153,000 of $2.1 million in fiscal year 2004, as of Dec. 16. The fiscal year began on July 1.

Legislators said that for two years they've heard a variety of excuses including that it is a new program and developing the mechanism for disbursing the funds took longer than expected and that locating the youths who need the funds has been difficult.

"We created the funding ... and are extremely frustrated," said Assemblywoman Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, one of the original sponsors of Assembly Bill 94, which authorized the funding.

"The bottom line is these children are desperate ... and need to pay for rent, clothing, prescriptions, utilities and college.

"What needs to happen is this money needs to get spent," she said.

Buckley serves on the Legislative Committee on Children, Youth and Families, which expects a report from the Nevada Division of Children, Youth and Families on the funds at a Feb. 12 meeting. The division is charged with overseeing the funds for the state and disburses them to different counties that in turn disburse them to nonprofit groups working with teens.

Before AB94, a teen who wasn't adopted would be on his or her own as soon as he or she turned 18. Some of the children under foster care for long periods of time then wound up homeless or in trouble with the law because they were ill-equipped to quickly adapt to living on their own.

In 2000 and 2001, when he was associate professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Clark County Manager Thom Reilly conducted a study on youths that leave the foster care system

"We interviewed kids locally and the number that end up homeless is astounding. The fact that kids aren't doing well once they leave the system is documented and the need is there," Reilly said.

That need drove the Legislature's creation of the Foster Care Transition Account. The funding for the account comes from filing and copying fees levied by recorders throughout the state.

Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, who also serves on the Legislative Committee on Children, Youth and Families, said she was "extremely disturbed that we are not able to implement this program in a meaningful manner.

"I don't think it's malicious intent so much as bureaucratic ineffectiveness, but it's the foster kids who are losing out," Leslie said.

Jone Bosworth, administrator for the division, said, "There's nobody more distressed than I that we haven't reached out to better understand this law and make the funds available."

Bosworth referred further questions to Rebecca Richard Maley, statewide foster care specialist for the division.

Maley, who was hired in July, attributed the unspent funds to what she called "a paradigm shift" in state government.

"We've been taught to be good stewards of financial resources and save money," she said.

"Now we need to learn to spend and spend wisely," she said.

The official said that her agency was given only $500,000 of the millions of dollars in the fund for a 17-month period from February 2003 to June 30, 2004. In Clark County, however, a nonprofit agency was contracted to spend the money only nine months ago.

Reilly said he didn't understand why it took so long to get an agency on board locally to administer the funds.

"It took 1 1/2 years for them to get a contract out locally and that's troublesome," he said.

Maley said she hopes to work with county governments, nonprofits and former foster children on planning committees throughout the state to come up with new proposals for spending more of the money.

A meeting is scheduled for the Southern Nevada committee on Jan. 27 to assess proposals such as offering health care and transitional housing to youths ages 18 to 21.

According to the most recent figures Maley had, 217 children turned 17 statewide during FY 2002, meaning they would have left the foster care system during FY 2003.

In Southern Nevada, the Nevada Partnership for Homeless Youth was contracted by the Clark County Department of Family Services to spend the money in March 2003.

Kathleen Boutin, executive director of the agency, said her agency had helped 101 youths with $192,000 up to December 31. About 90 percent of those funds were spent on rent and utility assistance, she said.

"There are a lot of kids who could use the money, but the state isn't making it available," Boutin said.

"If they have $2 million, we could do so many things with it," she said.

"I don't know what they're thinking."

Leslie said the issue must get resolved because the state "is not complying with the intent of the legislation.

"We're talking about people's lives here," she said.