Governor Patrick Morrisey (right) joins Alex Adams (left), assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children and Families, to announce that West Virginia will participate in the national A Home for Every Child initiative. (Photo courtesy of West Virginia Governor’s Office Patrick Morrisey)
West Virginia will join the Trump administration’s “A Home for Every Child” initiative, which aims to address the state’s nursing home shortage.
There are 5,580 children in the state foster care system that have been screened for sleeping children in hotels or short-term rented houses. There are at the moment 549 foster children in out-of-state homes and facilities because there are not enough in-state options.
The up-to-date federal initiative aims to increase the ratio of foster homes to children in foster care while giving states more flexibility to modernize child welfare systems and cut unnecessary bureaucracy. It followed that of President Donald Trump Implementing regulation The focus is on improving child welfare nationwide.
“West Virginia is committed to strengthening families, supporting foster parents, improving permanency outcomes and ensuring our child welfare system focuses on what matters most – protecting children and helping them thrive,” Morrisey said Thursday at the state Capitol.
West Virginia will redesign its screening process for foster parents to reduce barriers, he said.
Assistant Secretary Alex Adams of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children and Families joined Morrisey in the announcement.
“The Trump Administration is pleased to welcome West Virginia as the 19th state to join our national initiative aimed at increasing the ratio of foster care to children in foster care,” Adams said. “Under Governor Morrisey’s leadership, the state will be able to increase efforts to keep families safely together and support foster care recruitment and retention to ensure no child has to wait for a safe, loving and stable home.”
The federal government will renegotiate its program improvement plan with West Virginia and provide “record bureaucracy relief” to reduce time-consuming paperwork for caseworkers, Adams said.
Morrisey stressed that his government is making improvements to the troubled foster care system, citing a up-to-date tool for checking children’s welfare and improving national consistency in the handling of child cases.
“We inherited a really brutal system,” he said. “We’re working hard at it. What we’re doing isn’t perfect, but we’re making progress… This administration is committed to putting in more time than people have ever seen before.”
Morrisey recently vetoed several foster care bills, including a Republican-sponsored measure is intended to expand support for youth leaving the foster care system.
The governor also vetoed it a measure To do this, the state would have had to develop and implement a plan to prevent children from being placed in foster care.
At Thursday’s news conference, Morrisey said the state is focused on improving prevention efforts.
“Too often the children entered foster care because the support systems failed earlier in the process,” he said. “We are working to change that.”
Morrisey said his administration remains focused on working with churches and faith-based organizations to address the care crisis, including nursing home recruitment.
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