All foster children and youth need safe, permanent families. Foster and kinship families are the most important resource for permanent homes for children and youth who cannot return to their parents.  Foster, kinship, and adoptive families make a child’s dream of a loving home a reality. Making a commitment to permanence for every child and youth in foster care is the responsibility of the entire child welfare community, but is especially important for the families that provide loving homes for abused and neglected children.

Making a commitment to permanence means different things in different situations – but every child deserves a permanent, lifelong connection with a caring adult. Caregiver families “step up to the plate” to make sure the children in their homes have a permanent, loving adult connection for a lifetime. Many caregiver families adopt, become permanent legal guardians, or make a permanent commitment to a foster child or youth in some other way.

In some cases, a child’s caregivers cannot keep the child permanently, but can work with their child welfare partners to ensure that each foster youth maintains a secure, nurturing connection with a supportive adult.  Regardless of how long a child stays with a foster or kinship family, a child’s caregivers have unique insights into the child’s need for permanency.  Older foster youth are especially vulnerable to exiting the foster care system without a permanent family. Many foster and kinship parents solve this dilemma by maintaining contact with the children in their homes long after they age out of foster care.

LAPP encourages caregiver organizations and families to make a commitment to permanence for foster children and youth – by becoming a permanent parent or by urging their child welfare partners to find a permanent connection for each child and youth.  Make a decision to sign the Declaration of Commitment to Permanence for Older Foster Youth today!

For more information on the California Permanency for Youth Project, see: http://www.cpyp.org/