Missouri Hopes to Lower its Foster Care Rate Through Rebuilding Effort

(MISSOURINET) – Missouri has nearly 13,400 children in foster care – making the state’s foster care rate one of the highest in the nation.

The Missouri Children’s Division has a 22-million-dollar rebuilding plan to add 100 workers focused on prevention measures that help keep families together.

Darrell Missey, the Children’s Division director, says this phase of the plan is in the governor’s state budget proposal and he hopes the plan will lower Missouri’s foster care rate.

He cites Maryland, a state that has reduced its foster care count over a decade from about 12-thousand down to less than four-thousand.