It is a payment that is long overdue to those willing to act as foster parents across this state.Yet when the matter of raising foster parent allocations surfaced in 2006, state lawmakers rejected it.
But Alabama Department of Human Resources officials say they will raise the issue again when the Legislature reconvenes in March. And rightly so.
The state’s foster parents have not had a raise in payments per child since 2002 and even if the Legislature approves it now, it won’t take effect until October. That’s more than four years of service to thousands of foster children without an increase while costs have certainly risen to care for children during that same time period.
DHR officials are asking for a 25 percent boost – raising the allocation from $420 per child per month to $525 per child per month.
They maintain that constant recruitment of foster parents is needed to keep the pool at adequate levels, and it could be increasingly hard to be successful in doing so if the foster care payments remain too low.
While most foster parents aren’t in it for the money, common sense tells us that it is not right to expect a foster parent to serve the needs of these children with no raise in a four-year time span.
With 6,555 children in foster care across this state, the need for adequately compensated foster parents is evident.
Lawmakers ought to be urged to see that need and promptly fill it.
