Birth family information should also be shared, says foster parent

Disclosure could put foster parents at risk
Columbus Dispatch, Dec. 24, 2006, Editorial & Comment pg. F4.

It is very easy for The Dispatch to focus on finding out the identities of foster parents instead of helping our society to find answers for foster care ("The public's business," Dispatch editorial, Tuesday). I have served as a foster parent for six years and have foster children who have lived in foster care for five years. That's right: five years.

The laws are supposed to govern foster parents, agencies and the judicial authority, and yet they appear not always to be enforced. For example, in 1997, the Safe Families Act said that children cannot be in foster care for 15 of 22 months before permanency. I think that 61 months is more than 15 months.

Now onto revealing the personal information of foster parents: I welcome the opportunity to talk about the problems of foster care. However, I have known several foster parents and caseworkers who have had their lives threatened by birth families. In one incident, the birth father attempted to hire a hit man from jail. If we are going to open up Pandora's box, let's also reveal the information of the birth families.

If our community knew the kinds of situations that kids come out of, maybe we could look at long-term solutions. Additionally, I have children. If the birth families and every other person in town could know the location of my home and my personal information, my children would be at risk. That is not acceptable!

I value the trust that has been placed in me as a foster parent. I have had 16 children stay with me and have adopted several. But revealing all of my personal info is not the answer to the long-term problems of foster care. The newspaper's ignorance in believing that it will is irresponsible and just another attempt to pacify those on a witch hunt.

What happened to Marcus Fiesel is horrendous and yet, instead of letting his life stand for significant change to the system, we apparently are simply going to use it to create greater problems for the system. How sad.

-ANGELIA FOSTER, Gahanna