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CPA employs efforts to return children to biological families – Shows decline in numbers due to new deinstitutionalization programme.
CPA Director Ann Greene
Child care specialists have often opined that children are best served in healthy family settings. An ideal echoed by Director of the Childcare and Protection Agency, (CPA) Ann Greene, even as efforts and mechanisms towards removing children from the various institutions within the system are being adopted.
According to Greene, such efforts have resulted in a notable decline in the number of children currently in State Care.
In a recently publicized letter, Greene had outlined the reduction in the number of children in the three institutions namely the Drop-in-Center, Mahaica Children’s Home and the Sophia Care Center. The population is now at approximately 165 children compared to last year when the facilities housed over 200 children.
The CPA head noted that the reduction is directly linked to the fact that the Agency has been adopting the mechanisms aimed at returning children to their home environment.
Ms. Greene explained that the CPA has been working with both parents and the children to have them (the children) deinstitutionalised by providing counseling and follow up support after a child or children spends some time in State Care.
“Children are better served in families. Therefore the Childcare and Protection Agency has been looking at methods of making children‘s time in State agencies as short as possible through the deinstitutionalization programme.”
Greene said that in addition to the reduction of the children in the state care centers, due to the renewed effort of reunification of children to biological families, the CPA has been working towards advancing its foster care programme.
“The policy of the agency is the promotion of family based care and institutional care as a last resort. If there is an alternative other than admission to an institution, that option will be taken since children are better served in a family.”
She said that the agency has been appealing to persons to come and register to be foster parents. There is a screening process and initial training followed by ongoing training and support to ensure the children’s continued wellbeing.
At present the CPA has 199 registered foster parents and 200 children in the foster care programme.
Ms. Greene explained that the programme is supported by the CPA; each foster parent is paid $18,000 per month for each child in addition to receiving follow -up assistance from the agency.
At the beginning of 2016, the CPA had reported that the total number of children in residential care was approximately 700.
The number of child residential care institutions in the country stands at 23. Twenty of these are privately owned and managed.
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