Foster-care supporters walk, stroll, roll through Youngstown

May 13, 2012 at 12:07a.m.

YOUNGSTOWN

If you ask Amy Brungard to list her top 10 blessings, seven would be easy: Each would be one of her foster children.

“Being a foster parent is a huge blessing,” Brungard, of New Middletown, said. “The Lord has blessed us with seven foster children in the last seven years.”

Brungard and her husband, Matt, now have five foster children age 4 to 7. Amy and some of her children were among those who took part in Saturday’s second annual 2-kilometer walk that began and ended at the Mahoning County Children Services Board building at 222 W. Federal St. downtown.

Sponsoring the three-hour walk, titled “Walk, Stroll and Roll for Foster Care” was Mahoning County CSB.

As May is National Foster Care Month, the family-oriented walk was to support children in such care toward reaching their full potential. Other goals were to increase awareness of and respond to crises many young people in protective state custody face and to call attention to the need for foster-care parents locally, organizers said.

An estimated 145 young people in Mahoning County from birth to age 19 are in foster care, noted Marita Emmert, president of the Foster Parent Association of Mahoning County. She did not have figures for Trumbull and Columbiana counties.

Brungard, a first-grade teacher at Lloyd Elementary School in Austintown, said it’s critical that foster-care parents maintain a healthy relationship and work with the youngsters’ biological parents. Just as important is open, honest and continual dialogue with children on their level about their situations, she stressed.

“Read to and talk openly with your kids. Ask them questions,” she advised.

In addition, foster families should keep photo albums that include pictures capturing special events they attended, as well as information about youngsters’ birth parents and others in their lives, Brungard continued.

Several children, including three in foster care that are 7, 8 and 14, keep Venita Collins and her husband, Roger, of Lake Milton quite busy.

Many potential foster-care parents want to adopt young children, but teenagers also need guidance, boundaries, mentors and positive role models that such parents can provide, noted Collins, an assistant vice president and branch manager with Charter One Bank.

“They need to be normal,” she said while cooking hot dogs for walkers and other participants. “They need to be able to be kids.”

Safety, which includes computer safeguards and supervision, is a top priority in the Collins’ household, she explained.

Collins said despite the occasional high-profile story about child abuse and neglect in the foster-care system, the vast majority of such parents are loving and well-suited for those in their care.

Along those lines, foster-care parents have to take 20 hours of continuing- education courses yearly and be subjected to background checks, recertification every two years and psychological evaluations, Collins pointed out.

Requirements for those wishing to provide foster care include being at least 21, married, divorced or living together for a minimum of one year and having a source of income, said Margaret Messer, a CSB caseworker and inquiry specialist.

In addition, she said, they cannot have either a criminal record or a history of abuse and neglect.

“Our social workers work very hard to keep families together,” Messer said, adding: “Our foster parents are absolutely wonderful.”