You can get involved and learn how to help strengthen our foster care system and give a helping hand to caseworkers in your county and throughout the state. The Georgia Care Partnership, formerly called the North Georgia Coalition, is a partnership between Georgia's Division of Family and Children Services (DFCS) and community organizations to provide resources to assist and/or care for Georgia's foster children. Community organizations include all faith-based, business, civic, school, service and neighborhood organizations.

Why

There are usually an average of 15,000 foster children in Georgia who need a good, safe and loving home. Thousands of families are needed to help abused and neglected children. More are needed to volunteer to provide respite care, transportation, mentoring, and other services.

Benefits:

• Partnership with your community and friends

• Help from your community base for support and retention of the foster homes

• Less cost to our tax base since outsourcing to house children in private agencies cost more from our tax dollars and for our state

• Teamwork between DFCS caseworkers, foster parents and biological families so that successful reunification of healing families or adoptions can take place

• No cost to our community partners that help, just good ol' mission work and community volunteerism/team building corporate partnerships, etc.

How

Each participating faith-based, school, neighborhood, business or service organization has the goal to provide one or more of the following:

• 3 to 5 foster families

• 3 to 5 respite families

• A classroom for training (1 for each geographic area)

Support resources are already in place at FCSF for clothing, basic care essentials and training. Items can be shipped to county DFCS offices when driving distance is to long, or impractical.

Foster Families

Foster families provide care for foster children while DFCS caseworkers work to help biological parents repair their lives. Foster families receive children at their discretion from the county DFCS. Approval and licensing is free.

Requirements

• Training provided by DFCS

• Background checks provided by DFCS

• Home inspection provided by DFCS

A non-taxable stipend of approximately $15 to $19 per day is provided to reimburse some of the costs. Additional assistance is provided by Foster Care Support in the form of free clothing, toys, books, infant care items, school supplies, bicycles, etc.

Respite Families

Respite families provide short-term care (babysitting) when a foster family needs help during emergencies, vacations, or a just a night out. Respite parents are required to have the same training, background checks and home approval as foster parents. The daily stipend is paid to respite parents when the child is kept overnight. Respite parents can become foster parents with a simple paperwork conversion.

Volunteers

Volunteers are always needed to help with the following (background checks and DFCS approvals are required):

• Transportation - drive children to medical, DFCS office visits, court, outings, etc.

• Visitations - provide trained supervision during child visits with their biological family

• Specialized services - dental checkups or eyecare can be provided by local professionals

FCSF also has many opportunities for volunteers to help at our Distribution Center and our Fostering Hope Resale Store.

Coordinators

A coordinator from each partner, faith-based organization, neighborhood, or company works with a facilitator from Foster Care Support or the county DFCS office.
Coordinator's responsibilities:

• Organize and distribute information for their group and coordinate with other groups, FCSF, and DFCS

• Coordinate foster parent needs with the partnering facility and DFCS

• Arrange transportation for children

• Arrange respite for foster families

• Orchestrate special events for foster children and families

• Recruit and refer foster families, respite families and volunteers

Expected Results

This program can make a huge improvement in the quality of Georgia's foster care system:

• Increase the number of high-quality foster families

• Provide excellent support for foster families

• Greatly reduce fees currently paid to child placement agencies

• Provide direct communication between foster families and DFCS caseworkers

• Create new families through adoption when reunification is not possible

Please download our Georgia Care Partnership presentation.