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Start the search for permanency on day one, LA County guests say
Summary
On a Talk to Me podcast episode hosted in Los Angeles County, child-welfare leaders and guests recommended beginning permanency planning immediately after a child enters care, emphasized family reunification and kinship placements, and highlighted shortages of transitional housing and supports for youth who age out.
Los Angeles County child-welfare leaders and guests said on a Talk to Me podcast episode that the search for permanency for young people in foster care must begin the day a child enters the system to reduce the number who “age out” without a family.
The search for permanency matters because too many young people leave foster care without a stable adult or home, speakers said. Michael Nash, executive director of the Office of Child Protection and a former Los Angeles County juvenile court judge, noted the county now has about 20,000 children in care compared with roughly 60,000 in 1990 and said “there are 2,500 kids plus between the ages of 18 and 21 in this in the system” with “a thousand to 1,500 kids aging out of the system every year.”
Nash framed permanency within child welfare’s stated goals: “When we talk about the child welfare system, the…
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