By Grant Ayers |
Provided by Haven Hills Foster Care Community
Haven Hills Foster Care Community Nonprofit organizations are oftentimes overlooked in the community due to a lack of promotional funds and advertising, amongst other reasons. To help spread awareness of these efforts being made, we feature a local nonprofit in each issue that we believe deserves a spotlight shined on the great work that they’ve done and continue to do within the community. Haven Hills Foster Care Community (HHFCC) is an entirely volunteerrun nonprofit working to establish a neighborhood of foster homes and on-site services built on 80 acres of land, 10 miles north of Bismarck. It will provide the support, encouragement, and resources necessary to attract new and retain existing, experienced foster families, as well as bring stability to dramatically improve the quality of healing for children in foster care and their entire family unit. I had the pleasure of connecting with Amber Bohl, Founder & Executive Director of Haven Hills Foster Care Community, to discuss the HH's ambitious plans to make an impact on our region's foster community, the funds they're in search of, how you can help, and more.
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MAY 2024
Over six years ago, Amber became a foster parent and saw firsthand many of the struggles in foster care. She experienced and heard from fellow foster parents about their struggles, lack of support and communication from social workers, isolation, and burnout. She heard from social workers about their day-to-day chaos, the case overload, not being able to do their jobs of helping the families and children because their time was consumed with transportation, and the constant staff turnover. Lastly, Amber spoke with the children in foster care. She heard from them about their lack of consistency, stability, loss, family trauma, and identity issues.
"Foster youth often have unique challenges and need additional services that are difficult to navigate," Bohl said. "Foster parents are often balancing children from multiple families in addition to their own family, marriage, jobs, and activities. It can be difficult to get the support they need since there is only a small group of people who understand the unique challenges of being a foster parent. In the last 15 years, the gap in fostering services between need and resources has grown and will continue to widen unless innovative resources are added." CONTINUED
According to the Foster & Adoptive Care Coalition, research has proven that retaining foster parents is one of the most powerful ways to dramatically improve the quality of healing for kids in care. "This is due to the knowledge that can come from numerous years of experience and education as foster parents."