LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) – Right now, Clark County needs about 300 more foster parents to support the number of children waiting for families, according to county officials.
To help tackle that statistic, the county is now partnering with church leaders across the valley. County officials say they’re not only hoping the churches will help recruit foster parents into their network, but support foster parents in their congregation and throughout the community.
“I think when you embark on foster care, it is challenging, there are a lot of unknowns,” HOPE Church’s Director of Fostering Hope, Carly Souza, says.
Souza knows this firsthand after being a foster parent herself.
“When we first became foster parents, we had never been parents at all. So there were a few things that feel like common sense now, having been parents for so long, that wasn’t common sense then,” she says.
Souza started HOPE Church’s Foster Care Ministry, called Fostering Hope. It’s a way the church supports foster parents within their congregation, and in the community as a whole.
“Foster parent retention is rough, and so we would have to do significantly less recruiting and training if we were supporting our existing foster parents,” she says.
The ministry helps with meal delivery and child care, and even allows foster parents to shop for their children for free in their resource center called Hannah’s Closet.
“Don’t get overwhelmed by how much there is that you can do, start with one small thing, and then it’ll be a ripple effect. If every church in our community did one small thing,” Souza says.
The impact of each church doing one small thing is also the message the Clark County Family Services Department hopes to spread.
Last week they met with faith leaders from 30 different congregations to explain how they can start a foster care ministry of their own, and how to recruit more foster parents from within their church.
“I mean, we need people from every aspect of our community to come in and help out, but this is a group that, community-wise, can pull together and have a support network to support the families in supporting our kids,” Deputy Director of Clark County Family Services Patrick Barkley says.
Clark County officials say this is only the beginning of their outreach efforts with church officials, They plan to set up a recurring meeting with the group of church leaders, but they also plan to support churches individually as they develop their own Foster Care Ministries.
“We want to give them some autonomy within their congregation on how they want to communicate about it, but I think we come in as the experts to try to figure out how to license within that group. We want to bring the service to them,” Clark County Manager Kevin Schiller says.
For more details on how to become a foster parent in Clark County, click here.
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