CARE families would receive education funds for home-schooling foster children
by Megan Hart, Andy Marso, KHI News Service
The Kansas Senate on Tuesday passed a bill 24-15 that could create a new type of foster family within rigid terms and require school aid to follow children within those homes.
Senate Bill 410 was amended to allow but not require the Kansas Department for Children and Families to authorize a pilot program for the CARE foster homes and to make continuing education for CARE families optional. The families wouldn’t receive payment for providing foster care but would be eligible for thousands of dollars a year in education aid if they home-school their foster children.
Kansas has seen record numbers of children in its foster care system for more than a year.
Sen. Forrest Knox, an Altoona Republican who sponsored the bill, said it was about DCF placing children in “highly-trained families” and “giving them additional tools to nurture children in need of care.”
Democrats opposed the bill, saying it set up a de facto school voucher system unfair to public schools and favored families based on questionable criteria.
“Kansas desperately needs more foster care families,” said Sen. Pat Pettey, D-6th Dist. “This is not the way to address that need.”
Pettey pointed to Kansas Division of the Budget concerns that federal authorities could refuse to send $20 million in foster care funds to Kansas if the bill passes because federal rules require that foster homes providing the same level of care receive the same payment.
Knox said changing the bill’s language from “shall” to “may” would allow DCF to pull back from creating a program if it found it violated federal law.
Not meant to be exclusive
Under the bill, a CARE family would have to include a couple who had been married for seven years and didn’t allow the use of alcohol or tobacco in their home. One spouse couldn’t work outside the home, and the family would have to be “actively, regularly socially involved in their local community.”
Knox said the goal was of the bill wasn’t meant to be exclusive.
“This is not a condemnation of single people,” he said.
Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley said bill supporters exhibited the “height of hypocrisy” by rejecting an amendment requiring CARE families to lock up guns if they have them in the house.
“I find it ironic that a vast majority of senators are willing to restrict alcohol, tobacco and drug use in CARE foster homes because they’re dangerous but were not willing to require that firearms be kept out of the reach of children,” Hensley said.
Sen. Oletha Faust-Goudeau, a Wichita Democrat and single mother, said the bill implies that single people are inferior parents.
“I’m a little bit offended by this legislation,” she said. “I care, even though I’m a single mother.”
Faust-Goudeau said the Legislature’s foster care efforts should focus on reuniting families.
The amended bill removed language stating CARE families wouldn’t have to be licensed in the way child care facilities or other foster homes are. It also limited the amount that CARE families can receive for home-schooling to the actual expenses of providing educational services, and clarified those funds also could go to another school district if the child transfers in the middle of the year.
Hensley, a Topeka Democrat, said the amendment would reimburse families on a per-pupil basis after the Legislature scuttled that payment model for public schools last year when it passed a block grant bill.
“It’s a carve-out,” he said.
Knox said schools already have to keep track of when students enter or leave. Funds don’t normally follow students if they change schools after the official count day.
“These are children in need of care, and I think we want to do what’s best for them,” he said.
Other action
The Senate on Tuesday also gave final approval to several other health-related bills that next will be considered by the House:
• Senate Bill 408, which would authorize the Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation Unit under the Kansas Attorney General’s Office to focus on vulnerable adults, such as people with disabilities and senior citizens. Attorney General Derek Schmidt had told the Senate that the unit’s mission had broadened over time, limiting its ability to thoroughly investigate cases. The bill passed 40-0.
• Substitute for Senate Bill 103, which would enact new pricing disclosure requirements for pharmacy benefits managers. Stakeholders in the insurance industry and pharmacies have said the compromise bill could become a national model. It passed 40-0.
• Senate Bill 365, which would allow Kansans who buy contaminated property to petition the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to be released from environmental liability for the pre-existing contamination. It passed 36-4.
• Senate Bill 402, which allows for continuing education credits for medical workers who provide charity care. It passed 40-0.
• Senate Bill 449, which creates a new type of addiction counselor licensed to counsel people struggling with substance abuse. The bill also includes an amendment preventing the privatization of Osawatomie State Hospital without legislative consent. It passed 33-7.
The nonprofit KHI News Service is an editorially independent initiative of the Kansas Health Institute and a partner in the Heartland Health Monitor reporting collaboration. All stories and photos may be republished at no cost with proper attribution and a link back to KHI.org when a story is reposted online.
– See more at http://www.khi.org/news/article/senate-oks-new-foster-family-category#sthash.TMwEhBiB.dpuf