Protecting foster kids begins with keeping them at home

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a much-needed bipartisan anti-trafficking bill into law in May, proving that Florida lawmakers can still do what’s right for the most vulnerable citizens.

The new law (SB 1690) finally puts teeth in the state’s anti-trafficking efforts by imposing steep fines on hotels, casinos, and other businesses in the hospitality industry that repeatedly violate anti-trafficking laws. 

Crucially, as the South Florida Sun-Sentinel recently reported, the new law, which went into effect this week, also “helps steer foster teens away from traffickers and creates state oversight of group homes that cater to trafficked women.” 

Before DeSantis signed SB 1690 into law, the Sun Sentinel report continued, Florida “had done little to stop foster teens from falling into traffickers’ hands, and places them in group settings where trafficking is more likely.”

It’s hard to overemphasize how important this facet of the law is.

Young people in state care are uniquely vulnerable to sex traffickers who prey on the instability of their home life, as well as low self-esteem, high rates of substance abuse, and overcrowded group homes. 

The new law aims to thwart sex trafficking near foster facilities by posting warning signs of the dangers of trafficking, providing education and hotline numbers, and employing trained security personnel to identify and detain potential traffickers.

Those are all steps in the right direction to protect young people in foster group homes.

But many of Florida’s most at-risk kids will remain unsafe due to a lack of suitable foster-home families.

The sheer number of kids entering the foster system is overwhelming.

Each year, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, more than a half-million American children experience foster care. 

At Better Together, the Florida-based nonprofit of which I am CEO, we focus our resources on families upstream — before children are removed from their birth families — to keep kids out of a foster-care system.

Thanks to the Family First Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law in 2018, state and local governments are now funded to provide community-based counseling and job training to help prevent the poverty, neglect, and abuse that may result in a child being taken into state custody.

The Family First Act’s four main tenets are “(1) Provide assistance to needy families so that children may be cared for in their own homes or in the homes of relatives; (2) End the dependence of needy parents on government benefits by promoting job preparation, work, and marriage; (3) Prevent and reduce the incidence of out-of-wedlock pregnancies …; and (4) Encourage the formation and maintenance of two-parent families.”

My nonprofit is just one of many across the country that works to keep families together whenever possible.

Our “families-helping-families” approach helps couples succeed as spouses and parents.

When a crisis occurs, our volunteers step in with short-term care, while helping parents find jobs, housing, counseling, and treatment for alcohol or drug abuse.

It’s true that, as Sarah Font and Naomi Schaefer Riley wrote in a March 23 Wall Street Journal essay, “Demand for foster care is driven in large part by [America’s] drug addiction problem … as well as the mental health crisis we see playing out in a burgeoning homeless population.”

But helping parents combat these challenges before their children are put in state care has proven successful here in Florida. 

Since 2015, we’ve served more than 7,200 children and 42,000 job seekers through two programs: Better Families and Better Jobs — all privately funded.

By mentoring and empowering parents through local faith communities, counselors, and volunteers, we’ve created more stable home environments and job opportunities for parents who want a hand-up, not a handout.

Over 60% of the families we serve are introduced to us by law enforcement and child investigators.

No matter how they find us, our only goal is to reunify the family.

Of the 7,200 children we’ve served across Florida, 98% have been returned to their parents without further government intervention. 

Clearly, bills drafted to protect kids in foster care from sex traffickers, like the one signed by Gov. DeSantis, are important and necessary.

And it’s critical that lawmakers in all states continue to support accountable, community-based foster care with the goal of stable and safe homes for all children.

But it’s also critical that communities prevent the dissolution of families in the first place.

After all, strengthening the bonds between parents and children is the most effective way to keep kids from entering an overburdened foster-care system that too often puts them at risk.

Megan Rose is the founder and CEO of Better Together.