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Support that foster children receive from community and faith groups highlighted at summit
May 18, 2018
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 18, 2018
CONTACT: Bob Wheaton, 517-241-2112
ACME, Mich. – Community and faith-based groups in local communities play a key role in helping children and families involved in Michigan’s foster care system, state officials said at a summit held today to highlight and expand the partnerships.
Community and faith leaders, Michigan Department of Health and Human Services child welfare staff and others attended the Community and Faith Leader Summit on foster care and adoption at the Grand Traverse Resort near Traverse City. This is the seventh year of the MDHHS summits.
“MDHHS recognizes how important it is to have relationships with community and faith-based groups who can provide support to children and families,” said Dr. Herman McCall, executive director of the MDHHS Children’s Services agency. “They know their local communities and are well-positioned to help us find loving foster and adoptive homes. These community and faith leaders also assist foster and adoptive parents by hosting family events and collecting donations to meet the needs of children in foster care.”
MDHHS’s Community and Faith-Based Initiative on Foster Care and Adoption plans the summit. The Rev. Darrell Armstrong, who was in foster care as a child and is now pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church in Trenton, N.J., was the keynote speaker at today’s event. Other highlights included a panel discussion including a Michigan youth who was previously in foster care, a foster/adoptive parent and a representative from a local MDHHS office.
There are about 13,000 children in foster care in Michigan due to abuse and neglect. While the goal is for most of those children to return to their parents after MDHHS has provided services to make reunification safe, more than 300 children who have been identified as needing an adoptive home are awaiting a match.
For information on becoming a foster parent, call 855-MICHKIDS or learn more at www.michigan.gov/hopeforahome. For information on adopting from foster care, call 800-589-6273 or go to www.mare.org.
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