Fostering Connections to Success

Foster youth approach the age of 18 with serious health and socioeconomic risk factors, but do so with optimism and a sense of support, according to the baseline findings from a five-year study on California youths released late last week.

A key compromise in two-year-old legislation in California promised the expansion of Transitional Housing Placement Plus, a well-regarded transition program for older foster youth with high needs. Now, proponents of the program fear that the circumstances of a proposed state budget realignment may steer many of the state’s 58 counties away from it.

By Orville Thomas A key legislative committee today approved a bill aimed at providing services to foster youth after they turn 19. Assembly Bill 1712 passed through the California State Assembly Committee on Appropriations with a 12-0 vote today, with the committee’s five Republicans abstaining.

Two of California’s largest counties, Alameda and Los Angeles, have announced they will protect foster teens facing a disruption in foster care coverage because of the structure of Assembly Bill 12, a 2010 law that gradually expands foster care services to age 21 by 2014.