Appendix A to Chapter 6 A Bridge Back Home: Visit Hosts New York City Administration for Children's Services Division of Family Support Services Office of

LibraryRepresenting Parents in Child Welfare Cases: Advice and Guidance for Family Defenders (ABA) (2015 Ed.)

APPENDIX A TO CHAPTER 6 A Bridge Back Home: Visit Hosts New York City Administration for Children's Services Division of Family Support Services Office of

Family Visiting (2007)

Background

Visiting is critical to children in foster care. Frequent and ongoing contact with family members reduces the trauma of removal for children, improves their adjustment to placement, and helps expedite permanency, regardless of whether the goal is reunification, adoption, independent living, or adult custodial care.

Visiting is also a critical element in the child welfare system's response to the Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA). Passed by Congress in 1997, ASFA was designed to ensure that children in foster care are either reunited with their families or found other, permanent, stable homes in a timely manner. In order to meet ASFA's time frames for permanency, it is critical that children maintain frequent contact with their families whenever it is safe for them to do so.

In August of 2006, Children's Services reissued the "ACS Best Practice Guidelines for Family Visiting Arrangements for Children in Foster Care." The guidelines addressed the increasing recognition that improved family visiting reduces the confusion and anxiety of children in foster care; is a critical factor in the safe reunification of families; and supports the achievement of another permanency arrangement when reunification is not possible. The guidelines are intended to make visiting a fruitful, family-specific, child-focused opportunity to sustain and strengthen family relationships.

The visiting guidelines direct that, whenever possible and in the child's best interest, agencies should:

(a) offer weekly visits of at least two hours in duration;
(b) arrange for visiting in a location outside the agency that is convenient for all parties;
(c) provide the minimal level of supervision necessary to ensure the well-being of the child; and
(d) increase the visit frequency and length in anticipation of reunification. Visits should evolve from weekly to more frequent visits of greater length, to overnight and weekend visits, leading to trial and then final discharge.

The guidelines introduce an intermediary category of supervision termed "monitored visiting," designed to offer caseworkers more options and assist the progression from a higher to a lower level of supervision. The guidelines also clarify that (contrary to common practice) the presumption is that visits are unsupervised unless supervision is warranted. Supervision must be justified by a safety concern and/or need for assessment. Finally, the guidelines direct agency workers to identify "significant relatives (or others)" who "can and should be considered resources for the case planner . . . they can help . . . by hosting parent-child visits." Research shows that visit arrangements significantly influence the quality of visits. One recent study suggested, for example, that agency visiting spaces may be the least reliable venue in which to make difficult and critical assessments about family attachment and a parent's abilities to meet his/her child's needs.

Introduction

Foster care agencies have cited insufficient resources and high caseloads as barriers to implementing frequent and quality visits. The practice of utilizing Visit Hosts offers a potential solution to these barriers on appropriate cases. These guidelines are intended to assist foster care agencies in recruiting and integrating Visit Hosts into routine family visiting practice for children in foster care. A Visit Host is someone identified by the family (parents, youth, or relatives) or by the foster care agency who can monitor family visits for children and their parents or siblings in lieu of the agency worker. The use of Visit Hosts is a promising approach because:

• frequent and high-quality visiting between parents and children in appropriate cases is a vital predictor of safe reunification;
• visits that are fun and permit a family to feel supported and engage in normal family activities support a child's overall well-being and adjustment to foster care;
• visits that are frequent and meaningful contribute to parents feeling empowered and motivated;
• it allows visits to be taken out of the agency earlier but still provides a level of supervision needed on the case.
• agencies often need additional resources to consistently provide frequent and high quality visits, particularly visits that occur outside the agency or for extended time periods;
• visit Hosts can be this additional resource
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