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Committee holds bill to expand emergency shelter and adjust foster-care education rules for further amendment
Summary
Senate Bill 498, which would lengthen emergency shelter stays for children and simplify education requirements for foster-care supervisors, received supportive testimony from providers but was held for amendment; committee plans to reconvene to consider agreed amendment language.
Senate Bill 498, a measure that would lengthen allowable stays at emergency shelters and simplify education requirements for foster-care agency supervisors, was heard by the committee but held so members and counsel could reconcile amendment language.
Hannah Joy, executive director of IARCA, said the bill does two primary things: lengthen the time a child can remain at an Emergency Shelter for Evaluation (ESE) and simplify education requirements for foster-care supervisors. Joy told the committee that DCS and IARCA had recently agreed on language for handling 20-day waivers and maximum stays and that the remaining issue involved the statutory definition of a child-welfare agency inserted in two places in the bill.
Multiple service providers voiced support. Kathy Felton, executive director of Debra Korn Foster Care, said the bill would ‘‘help our workforce’’ and allow agencies to retain supervisors. Tina Clower, CEO of Firefly Children and Family Alliance, described circumstances in which shelters serve children under age 6 — including domestic-violence exits, hospitalization of a single parent and family homelessness — and urged the committee to fix the law so shelters can ‘‘accept younger children under the age of 6 who might be in need of shelter services.’’
Chairman Walker said he would not adopt the amendment on the floor that day and instead would hold the bill to allow counsel and stakeholders to finalize language. The committee did not take a final vote on SB 498; the chair said he will reconvene the committee on a short timeline to consider the amended draft so other bills can proceed to Appropriations.
