Thanksgiving is a time to be with family and friends, to see
aunts and uncles you haven’t talked to all year, and to show
gratitude for the opportunity to gather everyone together for even
just one day.
Hollister – Thanksgiving is a time to be with family and friends, to see aunts and uncles you haven’t talked to all year, and to show gratitude for the opportunity to gather everyone together for even just one day.
But for about 80 San Benito County children who are placed in foster care in other counties, Thanksgiving is a holiday that will be spent far away from family and friends in an unfamiliar community.
The number of children needing foster care in San Benito County is growing, but only six foster homes are licensed by the county to take care of them, said Donna Elmhorst of San Benito County Protective Services, and only two of the six homes accept children on a short-term basis. The lack of local foster homes has forced San Benito County Protective Services to seek placement for about 80 kids in Modesto, Fresno, Monterey and Marin County, Elmhorst said.
This is a larger number than San Benito County has seen in past years, according to County Protective Services Social Work Supervisor Vivian van Dal-Tiboni.
“When I came here four years ago, there were fewer kids (in need of foster homes). But with the community growing, and with San Benito County becoming kind of a bedroom community of Santa Clara County, the need is getting bigger,” said van Dal-Tiboni. “Right now I’m assigning 15 to 20 emergency cases to social workers every week.”
The growing community produces more children in need of foster care, van Dal-Tiboni explained, but the small number of volunteer foster parents hasn’t increased with the population. This makes it very difficult to place children locally, which can make the transition to foster care even more difficult for the kids, said Elmhorst.
“In addition to the emotional trauma caused by separation from their parents, they are also separated from their community, friends, school and familiar surroundings,” said Elmhorst.
Reverend Ardys Golden, who currently has two teenage girls living with her as long-term foster children, as well as the two-month-old son of one of the girls, said foster kids are often torn away from their communities only to be put back later.
“Most of the time the kids are placed in temporary foster care with the hopes of being reunited with their families. So when you send them to another county, they have to go to a new school and make new friends. You’ve totally destroyed their continuity. And when they go back to their normal school, there’s this stigma on them that their family’s been torn apart,” Golden said.
That’s why Golden said short-term foster parents are so needed in San Benito County: Placing children in short-term care in their own community allows them to stay at their own schools, keep their friends, and maintain some stability until they are sent back to their parents.
Cynthia, who has been living with the Goldens since July and gave birth to her son Enrique two months ago, said she was originally from Hollister, but was moved to Nevada, Washington, Salinas and Carmel for short-term foster care before Protective Services was able to place her in a shelter in her home town. Cynthia said she was there for three or four months before a friend who was living with the Goldens at the time convinced them to take her in.
“Being moved around so much made it really hard. It’s still really difficult for me to make friends,” Cynthia said.
In order to see their families and friends back home for even just an hour while they are still in foster care, children often have to wait until school gets out, ride an hour or two in the car to San Benito County, and drive back to their foster home later that night, according to van Dal-Tiboni.
“They don’t get back until around 8:30(pm) and then they still have to do their homework and get to bed so they can go to school the next day,” she said.
Golden said her foster children will not be visiting their families on Thursday, and she and her husband will take both of them and Enrique to a family dinner at their son’s house on Thanksgiving.
“Once they come here, they’re family,” Golden said.
Golden and her husband have had seven foster children over the past four years, and are planning on adopting Cynthia or becoming her legal guardians.
“Cynthia was really such a gift. Hopefully good things will happen for her and she can graduate high school and go to college,” Golden said. “The thing with foster parenting is, it’s instant gratification. If you really want to try, you can see things happen,” she said.
Seeing this happen is the real pay-off, said Elmhorst. While foster parents do receive money for food and clothing for the children, ranging from $425 to about $600 a month based on the age and special needs of the child, Elmhorst said foster parents don’t do it for the money.
“It is a calling or a mission. The reward is knowing you have helped a vulnerable child in the community,” Elmhorst said.
In order to become a licensed foster parent, one must attend a special orientation, take parenting classes specific to foster parenting, and undergo a criminal background check. And especially during the holiday season, Golden encourages everyone to think about what they can do to help.
“There are 35,000 people in Hollister, and how many of those people have a spare bedroom in case someone maybe comes to visit someday? And that whole time the room is empty…” Golden said, and then paused before Cynthia finished her sentence: “There’s somebody out there who really needs it.”
Anyone interested in becoming a foster parent can contact Donna Elmhorst at 831-636-4190.
Jessica Quandt is a staff writer for the Free Lance. Reach her at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or at
jq*****@fr***********.com
.
