IMAGE: CNS photo/David Maung
By Mark Pattison
WASHINGTON
(CNS) — Maybe it was the request by the Pentagon for 20,000 mattresses as
military bases become, at least partly, shelters for detained border crossers.
Maybe
it was the federal government report that 2,342 children had been separated from
2,206 parents at the U.S.-Mexico border between May 5 and June 9.
Maybe
it was the now-famous audio recording of children crying after being separated
from their parents.
Or
maybe it was the pictures of kids in cages.
Whatever
the reason, hundreds of American adults have called the Washington headquarters
of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops seeking to provide foster care for
the separated children.
At first
report June 20, 300 calls had come in. And the calls keep coming. “We’re
triaging the calls,” said Katie Kuennen, associate director for children’s
services for the USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services office.
“We’re
getting flooded,” Kuennen added. “It’s not just Catholic Charities, but
MRS-wide.”
The one
hitch: Most of those who have called are not licensed or certified to be foster
parents. That’s a process that varies from state to state, according to
Kuennen. While most states can train and certify parents for foster care in two
or three months, some states can take a lot longer.
Further,
while many Catholic Charities USA affiliate agencies are set up to match foster
families with children, not all are. MRS, Kuennen said, also partners with
Bethany Christian Services in some areas of the country. Agencies wishing to
add foster care to their portfolio of services can typically gain state
licensing in a month or two, she added.
So what
happens when the calls come in? “We’re able to direct them to the nearest ORR
foster care program that we have available,” Kuennen told Catholic News Service
June 22. ORR is the acronym for the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement.
“The
programs aren’t new, the process of bringing foster families on board isn’t
new,” she said. “What’s new is the public awareness of the program and the
seeing of these images on television to get engaged and to open their homes to
these families.”
Even
though President Donald Trump signed an executive order June 20 that
essentially reversed that part of the administration’s “zero tolerance” policy
that separated kids from their parents, it was silent on the fate of those
2,352 kids already torn from their folks, plus whatever additional children
were separated from their parents after June 9.
Moreover,
a policy enacted in 1997 sets a 20-day limit for detained children to be
detained alongside their parents. A Trump administration request to exceed that
limit is before a federal judge in California.
“For
years there has not been sufficient capacity in the ORR residential network for
foster care placement,” Kuennen told CNS. “Historically they (children) have
been going into shelter settings.”
However,
“our department is currently responding to a funding opportunity announcement
from ORR. I’m sure others (agencies) are as well. We are actively seeking to
increase our transitional foster care and our long-term foster care,” she
added.
It
could be coincidence that the ORR money is being freed up at this time, or it
could be consequence.
“My
sense is that it was initiated in May, released in May, so the timing does
match up,” Kuennen said, “before the family separation issue got a lot of
attention after the zero tolerance (policy) was put into effect.”
Although
the money won’t be officially freed up until the start of the new federal
fiscal year Oct. 1, Kuennen said there is precedent for ORR to retroactively
reimburse groups it has funded for expenses incurred if the group can show the
money was spent on the specific grant plan.
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