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CASA director urges state support as caseworker turnover, lack of legal and mental-health access deepen foster-care trauma
Summary
Amber Steinberger of CASA of South Central Missouri and a former foster youth described high caseworker turnover, long caseworker caseloads and large gaps in mental-health and legal services for children in foster care across the 20th/25th judicial circuit.
Amber Steinberger, executive director of CASA of South Central Missouri, told the Mental Health Committee that high turnover among children’s-division caseworkers and shortages in mental-health and legal services are worsening trauma for children in foster care.
Steinberger described CASA volunteers — Court Appointed Special Advocates who are sworn to represent children in court — as a stabilizing presence for youths who otherwise face frequent caseworker changes and delayed services. She told lawmakers her program’s 9 staff supervise 50 volunteers who in the last quarter reached 218 children, leaving 254…
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