Every child deserves to have his or her basic needs met in a safe, loving, and nurturing environment. Unfortunately, far too often that is not the case, even in our own community.
Earlier this month we learned that the remains of an eight-month-old baby girl were found in the house she shared with her parents. As we learn more and more about this case, it becomes clear that her short life was a tragic one. Her parents are charged in the case and the investigation continues, but it is obvious that Miya Rudd was not afforded safety in life, nor respect in death.
As Chairwoman for the House Families and Children Committee, I will ensure that my fellow lawmakers monitor the case and work with local and state law enforcement, community officials, and child advocates, to see what we can do to honor Miya’s memory by preventing more children from enduring what Miya did.
While there are limits to what we can do to make people do the right thing, we will continue to build on the work we have accomplished over the past decade, bills that have provided children in foster, kinship, and adoptive care with more support, basic rights, and a voice in their own lives.
While there is still much work to be done in these areas, we enacted meaningful pieces of legislation earlier this year. These include SB 151, legislation that would improve the state’s foster and adoptive care systems, yet the state has failed to implement.
SB 151 and the foster care and adoption systems in Kentucky were important topics of discussion during the June meeting of the IJC on Families and Children. Members discussed the foster care and adoptive systems with representatives from the Department of Community Based Services, Kentucky Youth Advocates, and a Family Court Judge. They made clear that the goal of foster care and adoptive services is to ensure the safety and well being of the children within the system, and to reunify the children with their biological family in every case that it is possible to safely do so. In many cases reunification with the child’s birth parents is not possible due to the continued actions and priorities of the parent. In these cases, it is important for the state to find a permanent family for the child to live with to give the child security and stability in their lives.
Biological families are crucial in this process. After all, aunts, uncles, and grandparents have a special connection with the child that nonfamilial individuals simply do not. Additionally, overwhelming research indicates that children who are placed in the custody of their extended family have better psychological, academic, and behavioral outcomes than those who are placed in nonfamilial homes.
Before SB 151, relative and fictive kin caregivers could receive limited support from the state, unless they filed for a “fictive kin foster care parent” when they initially agreed to take custody of a child. As we all know, these decisions are extremely important and time sensitive, and relatives make often these dramatic decisions under extensive duress. However, SB 151 was designed to allow a relative or fictive kin caregiver to apply to become a relative or fictive kin foster parent within a certain timeframe from the time of placement or upon a qualifying event, which would be defined by the cabinet through administrative regulation.
SB 151 was passed by the General Assembly and signed by the Governor in a bipartisan effort to support Kentucky’s most vulnerable children and families. Before the bill’s signing into law, the cabinet made it clear to the General Assembly that they could carry out the implementation of this law without additional allocations in the state budget, but now these children and these families will remain neglected by the cabinet despite the passage of SB 151 by the General Assembly.
Unfortunately, the Cabinet for Health and Family Services testified this week that it cannot carry out the law. This decision will directly harm the nearly 1,500 children in the care of relative caregivers and continue to keep the 6,739 children in nonfamilial homes from the opportunity to be placed with a relative.
Relative and fictive kinship caregivers often have families of their own, are retired, or are otherwise living on a fixed income. Many are unable to bear the financial burden of bringing another person into their home, and without financial support, they cannot provide the quality of life the child deserves. These families should be given the same opportunities as traditional foster care placements, and their commitment to these children must be acknowledged by the cabinet through the implementation of the law.
The Department of Community Based Services, the agency in the cabinet responsible for the implementation of SB 151, has been called before next month’s meeting of the IJC on Families and Children to further discuss its implementation of SB 151. I will continue to work on this issue to ensure we see this law in place so it can help our most vulnerable Kentucky children.
As always, I can be reached anytime through the toll-free message line in Frankfort at 1-800-372-7181. You can also contact me via e-mail at Samara.Heavrin@lrc.ky.gov and keep track through the Kentucky legislature’s website at legislature.ky.gov.
Samara Heavrin, R-Leitchfield
