CATANZARO There are 401 minors living in residential services, of which sixty-five under ten years of age and six under two years of age, four hundred of whom are fostered by relatives or hetero-family units. This is the scenario in Calabria on the anniversary of Law 184 of 4 May 1983 which establishes the minor’s right to a family and regulates one of the main instruments of protection for children: “family foster care”. This is supported by the Coordination of associations of foster and adoptive families in Calabria which reports data relating to the year 2021. “We can bring – writes the coordination in a note – numerous positive experiences of minors welcomed in these 40 years, now adults and many who have become parents. Family foster care is based on the essential principle of protecting and protecting children and adolescents from seriously harmful situations. We would all like there to be no need for foster care but this is not the case, unfortunately. The principle of “the superior interests of children and adolescents in living and growing up in their families of origin” – writes the coordination – must be adequately counterbalanced by their right to adequate care or not to be mistreated or live in violent or criminal contexts, not to be abused. The children we welcome arrive after years of staying in highly disturbed families, undermined by drug addiction, mental distress and violence. We need to act with determination, placing the child’s well-being at the center and giving trained and supported foster families the opportunity to encourage their growth in a healthy environment.” Too often, according to the coordination, “the assessment times of families of origin and recovery interventions are not synchronized with the crucial stages of the development of minors who find themselves in situations of neglect and mistreatment for an inadequate amount of time. With a trend that cannot be stopped in the placement of small and very young minors in residential services. This, perpetuated over time, leads to the development of fragile and problematic young adults. Do we wait for the irreparable and then ask ourselves why nothing has been done? We need to intervene on the large number of situations awaiting decisions from judges that are sitting in the courts’ offices due to a lack of staff and resources of all kinds.. It is desirable – we read – to invest funds to support families available for reception in their education, families that are increasingly fewer and less numerous and demotivated, with increasingly complex situations to deal with. Then finance treatment and care programs for the families of origin, from which the children are temporarily removed, so that they can truly recover”.
For coordination “it is necessary to build relationships based on trust and not on fear, between institutions, families of origin, foster families and family associations. Family foster care is a precious resource that deserves to be promoted and supported at a regional/territorial level. To the Calabria Region with which a dialogue on these issues was opened, with the President of the Regional Council Roberto Occhiuto and with the Councilor for Welfare, Emma Staine – we read again – we renew the request to promote the transposition and contextualization of the national guidelines on foster care, to involve the Social Territorial Areas and the Health Districts as well as the Juvenile Courts, for concrete and continuous operations in listening to the boys and girls risk of estrangement from the family and in providing adequate responses to their needs. With the essential recognition of the role of family networks envisaged by the guidelines for the planning and execution of the measures”.
The coordination includes the associations of foster families in the Calabria region M’Ama D:P:D:B operational headquarters of Calabria, Papa Giovanni XXIII Community, Agape Community Centre, Family Associations Forum, Emmaus Centre, Meta Cometa, Coop Kroton, Masholw . (Act)
