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Dear California Reader,
Good morning, Inequality Insights readers. I’m CalMatters reporter Wendy Fry.
Last week, Ed Center, a foster parent from San Francisco County, told a budget subcommittee a painful story about reaching his breaking point during his son’s COVID-era mental health crisis, which included violent tantrums and the boy blacking out his face from family portraits with a marker.
“When we were in crisis, we needed Wonder Woman with a social work degree,” Center explained.
That’s what his family found in the Family Urgent Response System , a free, trauma-informed support system for foster youth and their caregivers. The $31 million state program sends counselors out to foster families in crisis at all hours.
Now, as the state faces a budget shortfall that the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office predicted could be as much as $73 billion, the Family Urgent Response System and several other programs to support children and foster youth in new ways are on the chopping block.