DR Grantee Denvers Villages

Margaret Booker – Project Director Denver Human Services Linda Trantow – Project Administrator Denver Human Services Michele Hanna – Evaluator Butler Family Institute University of Denver Denver ’ s Village Wrapping Families with Community Support

The Fabric of Denver
The City and County of Denver is 156 square miles in size. That is 3 times as big as Washington DC.
Denver’s population is 592,052, with 153,102 being people Under the age of 18. 1% of the population is multi-ethnic and 1% are Native American 11% of the population is of African-American Descent Hispanic Peoples are 35 % of Denver’s Population 49% of the population is Caucasian

A Patchwork of Denver’s Villages

Colorado is a County Administered, State Supervised System.
At any given time Denver has approximately 1700 children in out of home placement utilizing both agency resources and the resources of Child Placement Agencies
Over 50% of DHS Certified Homes are Kinship
48% of DHS Certified Homes are Foster Care, Concurrent and Adoptive Families
Vast majority of children placed out of county and away from their home community
Our Current Pattern

Vision
Increased numbers of approved resource and concurrent planning homes reflecting the racial, ethnic, and cultural characteristics of children coming into care.
Build and maintain DHS and Community Infrastructure to support early and active permanency planning Increase the number of children placed in kinship homes Increase retention rate of resource families and reduce the dropout rate of prospective families Streamline processes to achieve Completion of certification in a shorter time period

Community Based Resource Team
What is it?
What does it do?
Why?
The Idea for a New Pattern

Community Collaborative Participants
Resource Families
Youth
Child Placement Agencies
Schools and Churches
Business and other community based organizations
DHS Resource Staff
Recruiter
foster Care support workers
Adoption Liaison
Kinship Navigator
Resource Section Supervisor
Home Study worker

Patching it Together
Identify our needs and where the needs come from
Identify our community partners
Geo assign the Resource Staff
Meet with Community partners to develop vision
Develop community specific plans
Implement strategies
Measure success or make course corrections

As it Comes Together
Increase activities in each community and tie training opportunities to these events
Implement targeted recruitment plans
Train resource families as recruiters and trainers
50% net increase in the number of resource families by October 2009

Pieces that Might be Problematic
Agency Trying to Define the Community
Geo Assigning of Staff
Building from concept to action
Involving resource families and youth
Providing Data specific to each community
Licensing Barriers

Contact information
Margaret Booker
720-944-2804
[email_address]
Linda Trantow
720-944-2484
[email_address]

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DR Grantee Denvers Villages

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