On July 1, a new state office officially opened its doors. The Office of Family Representation and Advocacy aims to help children and families in the foster care system or at risk of entering care.
The Office will provide teams that include lawyers, social workers, and peer navigators to help families identify their own strengths and weaknesses.
Executive Director Beth Gillia said the teams will prioritize family reunification with less repeat of maltreatment. The goal is that kids will be out of their home for less time which reduces both trauma and educational gaps. But if necessary the system should provide a faster adoption or guardianship process.
She said, realistically the office should be able to fully implement all its services within three years, but she hopes that from now it will help families come out of the foster care system more successfully. She sat down with KUNM to discuss her new role further.
BETH GILLIA: What we're doing now is we've actually contracted with a series of attorneys, most of whom have been doing this work already under contract with the Administrative Office of the Courts. But all those contracts have moved over to OFRA now. And those attorneys are now representing all children, youth, and respondents, which is usually parents, and all child and family welfare cases involving children who are either in state CYFD custody, or who are at risk of going into CYFD custody. So those are what are normally called abuse and neglect cases, or for young adults, Fostering Connections cases for 18 to 21 year olds, and also in some kinship guardianship cases.
And although we don't have interdisciplinary services, yet, that is a key feature of the representation that we'll provide. And so we will have master's level social workers who help us assess family needs. And then we'll have family peer support navigators, who are people with lived experience of state systems, in particular, the foster care system, so that our families, they get people who can speak to them from experience of the system, help them understand what they're entitled to, in plain language that they understand and provide the emotional support that our clients will need.
KUNM: I want to get back to your point that OFRA could shorten the time children spend in foster care, which I read could generate cost savings for the state. Can you tell me a little bit more about that?
GILLIA: To talk about the funding piece a little bit, we had an economist work with us and that economist did some estimates for us, based solely on the shortened time in care. And her estimates were fairly conservative. And what she estimated was that initially, as we're building up the program, we will see savings of approximately $3.6 million. And that once we're at full implementation, which I think is going to take at least three years, to be honest, where we have five offices across the state where we have full interdisciplinary teams across the state, she's estimating $13.8 million in savings, just from the shortened time of care.
KUNM: In your opinion, what is something that OFRA can offer in order to move the state in a better direction when it comes to the child welfare system?
GILLIA: Really moving our legal representation into a much more supportive approach for the attorneys themselves. We've been really focused on making sure that the attorneys and the interdisciplinary teams have adequate compensation, that they have all the supports that they need to do the work effectively. And we know that that involves a number of things that have been, I'll say hit or miss in the past in New Mexico like access to experts, CYFD has ready access to experts. Our contract attorneys for parents and children have not had equal access to experts. And that can change the way judges make decisions because they'll have more accurate information, they'll have more timely information, while they're in court. Making sure that our attorneys have a case management system that enables them to stay on top of all their various cases. And then having the critical support of the family peer navigators who will stand side by side in court, in meetings with CYFD to help families understand in the moment what's happening. This model has proved incredibly effective in other states, so I just really look forward to it rolling out and rolling out statewide.
This coverage is made possible by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and KUNM listeners.
