Wanted: foster families

It is not a problem unique to Belize…but with what appears to be a growing epidemic of juvenile crime and violence, the way we care for our youngest citizens is more crucial than ever. News 5’s Patrick Jones reports on an initiative that seeks to provide help for kids at the most basic level of society: that of the family.

Patrick Jones, Reporting
Their innocent faces tug at the heart. And that?s just what officials of the Ministry of Human Development are counting on as they inaugurated their annual Give Your Hear to a Child Campaign. Child Placement Supervisor Jolene Arnold says foster homes are badly needed for a number of children currently in the care of the state.

Jolene Arnold, Supervisor, Child Placement Team
?Presently at the Dorothy Menzies Child Care Centre there are approximately forty-eight children that need to be in a home environment.?

Patrick Jones
?Who can be a foster parent??

Jolene Arnold
?Basically, anybody can apply once they are over twenty-one years of age; they are mature; they have a stable environment. After the study is completed, then they will be approved to become a foster parent. So basically anyone can apply.?

Arnold says the application process is easy and straightforward.

Jolene Arnold
?Foster care is a temporary process and this process is explained throughout the home study process that it is only for a temporary period. The permanency plan for each child is shared with that foster parent so that family will be able to know what is the time frame that they will be fostering that child.?

Since the programme started in 1994, hundreds of children have felt the love of a foster family. CEO in the Ministry of Human Development Anita Zetina says the initiative is a crucial to part of helping children in especially difficult circumstances, especially those who have been abused, abandoned or neglected.

Anita Zetina, C.E.O., Ministry of Human Development
?So a campaign like this is very, very important because this is the time we take to invite families and individuals to foster children; children who come into our care for abuse, neglect, abandonment or even as orphans. We don?t think that children will grow and develop as well in an institution. Therefore we believe that children should grow and develop in families.?

And those who have dared to open their hearts say they have no regrets.

Donn Logan, Foster Parent
?It?s been a challenge but it?s a very wonderful thing to do. You get to not only think about yourself, but you get to think about other people and sharing your home with them, helping them in life because these children really need foundation. If they do not get the love, the care from they are small they are going to grow up very insecure and sometimes it?s that insecurity that bring about problem later on in years.?

Irene Vernon, Foster Parent
?Some people have a negative thinking about child care kids. And that I don?t like. Because children, they are not bad kids. They are just kids that have been neglected and abused. If they get in a home that have love, they will do good. Because they will realize these people don?t have to have me, but they?re giving me their love. So someday it will take time, it?s not something that is sudden, but it will take time and they will understand what love is and they will grow to love their foster parents.?

Jolene Arnold
?The response has been very good, but we still need families that could take care of young babies that come into the system as well as foster parents for older children that are presently in institutional care right now. Children come in from time to time over the years for various reasons and we always need to identify new families for this programme.?

If there is room in your heart, your home or your family for one of these children, then you are invited to call the Family Services Division of the Ministry of Human Development. Patrick Jones, for News 5.

That office is located at the Belize City Commercial Centre. You can visit or call during normal working hours at 227-7451. Arnold says that there are currently two hundred and seventy-two children living in a hundred and seventy-two foster families around the country.