Elijah Rising
Elijah Rising
Community-Driven Solutions for Foster Care Challenges - Amber Knowles of Riverside Project - Ep. 80
Why do so many foster care systems fall short in providing adequate support for vulnerable children and families?
Amber's firsthand experiences highlighted critical gaps within the foster care system, motivating her to establish the Riverside Project.
Riverside Project focuses on collaborative system change and the mobilization of churches and communities to fill gaps in the foster care system.
We also explore the complexities and potential of transitioning to a community-based foster care model. Amber emphasizes the benefits and challenges of fostering regional ownership and community collaboration.
Whether through volunteering, praying, or responding to local needs, everyone has something valuable to offer.
Learn more at https://riversideproject.org/ and don't forget to like, subscribe, and share.
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Welcome back to the Elijah Rising podcast. My name is Micah and today I'm joined by Amber Knowles, founder of the Riverside Project. Amber, you've been with us before. We're so glad to have you back. Thanks for having me. It's great to be back. So why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself? You have a fantastic history. You were a pediatric nurse and you did some other work in the healthcare field before you started this, so why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Speaker 2:Sure, well, I started out, I would say, kind of my first interaction with foster care was as a nurse practitioner. So I worked in pediatric, community health and school-based healthcare and I had patients that came in who were either in foster placements or just biological families that were really vulnerable, and so through that experience started learning just a little bit kind of a disconnected view but started seeing the complexities that some of these families were facing and so and also recognizing the complexity of their medical needs and behavioral health needs and the referrals that they needed and just all the things that they were navigating, and so that was kind of my first interaction with the foster care space. And then my husband and I became foster parents back in 2014. We started the process in 2014, became licensed and then our very first placement was in 2015, which ended up being the placement of our now adopted son. It was our first placement. He never left and which is not normally the case and then since then had another biological kiddo and then the brother of our adopted son came to us very unexpectedly in 2018.
Speaker 2:So, of course, the personal experience of working in the foster care space really gave us this front row seat to some of these gaps in the system and, just through a lot of different circumstances, the Lord kind of put this in front of me and really wanted to see how do we actually move from. The foster care system is broken and it always will be to. There are some very real, very felt gaps within this child welfare system, but there really are solutions out there that we can work with. But we have to figure out how to work as organizations and churches and different people all doing it together instead of doing it kind of separated and siloed. And so in 2018, we started the organization and we've been doing lots of different things since then. That's amazing.
Speaker 1:That's an incredible story. I didn't realize that your kiddos were brothers. It's really special. So last time you were with us we talked a little bit about, you know, the vulnerabilities of children who are aging out of the foster care system and how that makes them vulnerable to trafficking. But today we wanted to talk a little bit kind of more focusing on the Riverside Project, what you guys do, who your clients are. So do you mind sharing with our listeners just our recap what do you guys do at the Riverside Project? And maybe, if you could add, why did you found it?
Speaker 2:Sure, yeah, I think the last time I was here we may have still been operating under Fostering Family was our actual legal name. It's still, technically, is our legal name, and now Riverside Project. We rebranded a couple of years ago really, because the Riverside Project was the name that we gave to our church mobilization effort. Once we started that program, we called it the Riverside Project and it came from this analogy of you know, if you were and two of your friends were walking down the side of the river and you see kids and families in the water.
Speaker 2:One person jumps in. One person sees there's a waterfall downstream. We have to do something about this.
Speaker 2:So one person runs that way and then one person starts thinking well, you know what's happening upstream, why are these kids and families in the water in the first place? And so they go in a completely different direction, but they're all attacking the same problem. And so we use this analogy that came from a book by Jason Johnson, who works in this space, and this analogy really gave people handles for attacking this complex issue of foster care. And so, because it really helps people to understand it a little bit better, we then kind of rebranded to become the Riverside Project completely, to become the Riverside Project completely. And so we say our mission statement at the Riverside Project is that we are a collaborative network of organizations and passionate people who are all working together to transform the foster care system in Houston.
Speaker 2:And the way that we kind of communicate what we do, it's a little bit a little difficult to communicate because we're not we don't provide direct services to families for the most part, and so that sometimes is a little bit difficult for people when they're saying, hey, what is it that you do every day? We work primarily in two different arms. One is system transformation, so we develop collaborative and innovative strategies within the system to solve some of these problems, to fill in some of those gaps. So we work with CPS, we work with agencies, we work with group homes and supervised independent living facilities, really sometimes asking the questions of what is the problem that you're experiencing, that we're hearing from everyone and then how can we come up with a creative solution that helps us to do this work better? Essentially, in terms of the river, it's how do we actually get kids and families to the side faster and more efficiently? The other side of the work that we do is really church and community mobilization.
Speaker 2:So, again in terms of the river, how do we, once the kids do get out of the water, how do we keep them there in the community so that they don't fall back into involvement with the system? And so through that, we have a team of people church mobilization specialists and community resource people, coordinators who really help to mobilize the church and community partners to get kids and families and keep them out of the water. That's great. Yeah, it looks like a lot of different things sometimes, but it's really coming at the idea that one single organization cannot fix this problem. We all have to be in the right place with the right tools.
Speaker 2:And then we actually have a shot at making change in this space.
Speaker 1:I love that you talked about systems change, so that's so fascinating. We'll touch on that later, don't let me forget. I want to make sure that you answer some of those questions around what that looks like. Don't let me forget, I want to make sure that you answer some of those questions around what that looks like. You know, I've heard you say before that you know kids and families in the river right, and so I think there's, you know, some misconceptions around. Oh, we just want to separate the kids and make sure the kids are safe and kind of disregard the family unit and make sure the kids are safe and kind of disregard the family unit. Would you speak to that and maybe some other misconceptions that we kind of, as society, hold around the foster care system?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's really important because the public image, as you also, I'm sure, interact with just within the trafficking space, those misconceptions change the way people view it and their willingness to get involved in that work right. And so, yeah, one of the things that we say even going back to that river analogy, what we say a lot in just conversations that we're having about this is that when we talk about going upstream and we talk about figuring out why kids and families are in the water and why they are vulnerable, what we often mostly don't see are really stable families just throwing their kids into the water. It's just, yes, abuse happens and horrendous abuse does happen. 100% of those things do happen, but for the most part, it's vulnerable families who are in the water and sometimes generations of families who have been in the water and maybe have never known or, if not for a very long time, have known what it's like to live on the side, and maybe they don't have the relationships or the resources or the stability to find their way out, and so that's a very real um.
Speaker 2:I think misconception that people have is that foster care means kids and families are in the water because parents don't love them, parents are bad um, or parents, you know, don't love their children, and that's just not the case most of the time. And so just recognizing that starts to build some compassion for what's actually happening. Why are kids and families in this situation? And then, in terms of what we do as a system, it's having the discernment to know when we're looking at a kid or a family, is this a situation where we can get the family out together?
Speaker 1:which is ideal?
Speaker 2:Or is this a family where, if nothing, if we don't get the kid out, the family's gonna like they will drown. They may all drown, and that's a really when you talk about CPS and the misconceptions there.
Speaker 2:It's a very hard job to be able to discern that and get the kid and the family out as well as we can as a unit, while keeping everybody safe. So I think there's a lot there that we have to kind of, you know, shift in our mindset and a lot of discernment that we have to utilize with those situations too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we see, I mean we probably our listeners for the most part know this. But you know, if you're talking about the river, I feel like even downstream from that you see trafficking situations or just self-exploitation, survival, sex, that kind of thing. Absolutely, and I'm sure there's other forks of the river that go different places. But so can you talk a little bit about? When you're saying vulnerable families, what are you referencing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the way we are speaking of it. So foster care is a system we would say is kind of midstream of this river. There are things upstream like poverty, addiction, crisis, pregnancy, lack of education, all these things that are happening upstream that then funnel them down into the foster care system. So we would say we primarily at this point, work on the midstream of the river, from the point at which CPS gets involved so kind of upstream of the midstream all the way down to when a kid ages out of the foster care system, which then gets them kind of into this. What we would say is downstream. So, yes, kids who age out, or even kids who, or families who interact with the foster care system and then do not find the support and stability that they need.
Speaker 2:That also includes the kid who has been adopted into a family and then put back into the system or a kid who is adopted into a family that's really not meeting their needs appropriately and still dealing with the traumatic experiences that they experience and that will then, you know, continue to keep this cycle going, essentially. And so, yeah, I think vulnerable, I would say, is kind of anyone interacting, whether they're interacting with the foster care system or not. Vulnerable means they're, they're not thriving right they're not rooted in a community um and they're not experiencing health and wholeness I'm sure there's a lot who fall into that scenario.
Speaker 1:I mean, there's a lot of different factors, right?
Speaker 2:I can think of dozens right, whether they have involvement with the system or not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there are many, many, many vulnerable kids and families in our city, but understanding how all those different factors and social issues fit together and how they interact, rather than kind of this is poverty, this is trafficking, this is, you know, incarceration, and we kind of deal with the issues as individual problems and we miss sometimes how does poverty interact with foster care? How does foster care then interact with trafficking? It's like the connection piece of how one gets to the other. I think sometimes we miss that and we miss opportunities to understand the problem in its entirety, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:No, it totally makes sense. We see that all the time in trafficking. You know all of the risk factors that you can think of like the vulnerabilities are. We see them all in trafficking. You know you mentioned poverty, homelessness, lack of education, lack of adequate adequate like healthcare or access to medical services, crisis pregnancy abuse, addiction, disease. I mean. You name it so many. So we, we have the same view that you know it's not a one organization or 50 organizations, anything, it's like the community at large coming together. So I would love to hear more um from you. I don't know if you want to talk a little bit about how do you see those pieces coming together with the work that you guys do at the riverside project? You talked about getting kind of churches engaged, getting communities engaged. How do you see those pieces coming together with the work that you guys do at the Riverside Project? You talked about getting kind of churches engaged, getting communities engaged. How do you try to bridge those gaps for people?
Speaker 2:Yeah, a lot of it is first, I think, starting out with just helping them to learn. So we say, hey, just let's have conversations about what it is that you see in your community. Just let's have conversations about what it is that you see in your community. So, speaking specifically to churches, the way that we come alongside them, we know that churches in our community care about these things.
Speaker 2:I've never really met a church that would say like, yeah, we just don't care, they're the church, hopefully they care, right. But the problem is more. I don't understand this issue. I don't understand what I have to give here. I don't want to hurt people unintentionally, and so what we can do? We say right off the bat we're not the organization that you just give money to, and then we go solve the problem because theologically we don't believe that that's how things get changed in our city.
Speaker 2:We believe that in many ways the church is that vehicle for redemption and so if we can then come alongside and give tools doesn't mean that every church needs to be an expert on all things foster care but if we can say we can be a guide for you, we can help you understand why these things are happening and then really drill down into your context as a church.
Speaker 2:Who are your people? How big is your church? How do you operate? Is it small groups, is it mega church, is it Sunday school and what languages do you speak? What are your people already excited about? How many foster families are in your church. It helps us to then come alongside them and say, okay, here are some tools, here are some things that you should know, and then let's plug you into a way that your church can get more engaged and sometimes that's them creating a program.
Speaker 2:Many times it's not. We always say it's. It's not putting something on your website, necessarily, it's not creating this big budget. Sometimes it's just hey, we're going to bring you a need in the community that we get from a CPS worker that's two minutes from your church. When we do that. Can you say yes and walk alongside that family? Yeah, we can do that.
Speaker 1:That's amazing.
Speaker 2:And sometimes it's connecting them to like hey, there's a nonprofit down the road that works in this space and they run a foster closet. How about we pair you together and you start working in tandem? So it's not just connect all the churches to us. It's based on who you are and what you care about in this space. Let's find some ways for you to get involved, and we do that for people too. People will reach out and just say, hey, I want to get involved somewhere.
Speaker 1:Where do you live?
Speaker 2:What are you passionate about? What capacity do you have? And here's a mentor organization.
Speaker 1:Here's you know a place to volunteer.
Speaker 2:Here's a way to you know if you're thinking about fostering and adopting. Here's some agencies to talk to. A lot of what we do is just making connections and then giving people some tools to do what they really would love to do. They just don't really know it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, You're almost like a mentor to people Like let me help you.
Speaker 2:You're a mentor, You're a consultant, You're you know it's like all those things.
Speaker 1:Let me help you get engaged in this issue. Let us just let's just connect the dots for you. That's good, yeah, that's really good Like a guide. So let's circle back, cause you talked about systematic change. Systems change, right, organizational. If you will think about it in that measure, what are some gaps or some places that you see, maybe in the welfare system? Or what have you that really need maybe updating? Or you see, man, these problems are solvable, like you mentioned earlier. Do you see any themes that are kind of coming to the?
Speaker 2:forefront of your mind in this realm of service. Yes, let me think of all of them. No, there's a lot, I think, because it's such a complex problem and it has so many different facets. Right, you're talking biological families and their needs to keep families together, which is absolutely a priority. If we're ever to kind of like fix foster care, it doesn't start by just doing a big campaign for more foster parents, and sometimes we have to fight against that idea. It's not that we don't want people to become foster parents Absolutely we do. We care about foster care and see the need for it, and adoption too. We also understand that if this issue is going to be tackled, we have to try to keep families together in the first place.
Speaker 2:It's that upstream aspect of it, because we see downstream the things that happen and the trauma that happens. I see it in my home, I see it with my kids. I know what happens when those things don't work out the way that they should and when a family can't stay together, and it's a very real thing and a part of the conversation that they should. And when a family can't stay together, um, and it's a very real thing and a part of the conversation that we have to be having, and so it it's difficult because there's so many aspects that need to be fixed all at once, um.
Speaker 2:But in addition to that I would say you know, the mental health aspect is a big one. The need for really good, solid, trauma-informed, attachment-focused behavioral health and mental health resources is unfortunately kind of lacking, even in a city like Houston. There are lots of services out there, but, as you would probably agree with in the trafficking space, the things that are needed they have to be relationship-based, because the trauma that happens in these spaces is so relational and so the ability to trust is fractured, the ability to connect is fractured to family or to a grandmother and be successful in their learning and in just in life, because they're still dealing with a lot of those ruptured relationships. And so that's one that we talk a lot about. It's a conversation we're having with a lot of stakeholders and they believe that too. We're all kind of recognizing the need for this but still trying to figure out.
Speaker 2:You know there's money involved, like there's someone has to pay for that, so there's money involved, like there's someone has to pay for that, so it's very complex, and so those types of things are a really big deal and we're trying to come up with some more innovative ways to work on those things.
Speaker 1:It's fantastic. I mean it's at the basis, the, the foundation, rather, of everything that you want to build upon that trust, that place of trust, feeling like I'm safe, I can let down my guard, I can, and then learning right and then like new behaviors, new patterns, new relationships even are being able to formed out of that. So, yeah, we absolutely see that in, um, I mean in the trafficking, the safe home that we run, yeah, and then we're dealing, we're serving women in their adulthood who maybe have a decade of this in their past.
Speaker 2:Right, so it can, it can really impact them just the rest of your life, every little factor you know yeah, and I mean I think it also impacts the ability, the way that it kind of affects generations after that. Yeah, absolutely, when moms or moms that you see in the restoration home who have been in these exploitive circumstances and then they're also trying to parent their children, those things influence one another and the trauma that the kid then experiences and the just instability of the home. When a mom is still dealing with that, it's hard for them to navigate and it's hard to sometimes find the resources that are actually going to be effective in those spaces.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And even though so much has been done and I can only speak for really, the anti-trafficking space, so much work has been done to like build homes and launch this program, in that program, it still feels like in that crisis moment it's sorely lacking. In that emergency moment we are like, yeah, always scrambling to find the right resources for the individual because they have unique needs, right.
Speaker 2:So um, I'm sure you guys find the same thing oh yeah, and I think it goes back to the funding conversation as well Like we keep saying we need another program and then we need to. We see it a lot in foster care. Right it's. We have a program for a teenager in foster care who doesn't have a family, so we create a group home. Well, then the kid ages out of the group home and they're still not, you know, restored. Right, they haven't gotten the right kind of treatment, or they just they haven't. They're still not able to be successful on their own.
Speaker 2:So we create a supervised independent living facility, yeah. Then they start another program, right, yeah. And then it's like, well, what happens when they're 23 or 24? And now they have to leave that? And then we wonder why they end up incarcerated. Yeah, because we go from program to program to program, what we see is that what's sometimes lacking?
Speaker 2:All of those programs cost money, and I think often we're like there's another problem, throw more money at it and absolutely we have to have the funding to keep these things going. But the currency we have started saying a lot lately is the currency in the space is relationships. If these programs are not, then, helping kids and young adults to find and moms, biological families to find relationships that are safe and stable and loving and secure and can help them move into stability, then the program's ineffective. It all comes down to whether or not these programs are helping them to access safe and stable relationships, and that is really really hard. You know who provides those things. How can one organization provide the type of relational support through a traumatic experience and then keep doing it for more than a day, right?
Speaker 2:It's just a lot to take on, and so we have to be really innovative, I think, in the way that we engage the church the way that we engage the community, to be those and to see what's happening in these spaces and be a friend right To offer that type of relationship. They're not going to provide all the mental health resources right, but people can be, can provide relationships in a really healing way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's something that we see as a key for women who, you know, to end recidivism, to give them a successful launch, outside of our program. I mean, I think it all comes down to community healthy, stable, godly, you know, restorative community.
Speaker 2:So much of that healing just happens around people and like those deep relationships that are formed, those connective bonds, and then you see you, know when families or these women who come out of an exploitive situation and they're trying to find that community, so often the trauma keeps them from it the very thing that they need, they isolate.
Speaker 2:We see it with foster and adoptive families too. When you're in the trenches and life is crazy and you're trying to deal with these, you know the behaviors of the child in your home and the struggles that they have. Our tendency in those moments, for whatever reason, is to isolate ourselves, away from community. And so, again, it's helping the church to be a loving presence, even in those moments where they feel like they need to isolate, to stay present. Um, it's really hard to to do that when you're in the midst of it. You know, to access community and to want people involved, um, we just kind of start to start to move away from each other yeah, well, it takes a lot of vulnerability.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and a lot of not putting on. You know, yeah, face I can, I can handle it and also like trusting other people that they can handle it right. They can, they're gonna step into that mess or what have you, and they can support you in it yeah, absolutely well, you have a lot.
Speaker 1:Um, I just really commend you because I think what you guys are doing with the church is it's something that I think both parties are hungry for. The church wants to help and you guys need people. You you know everyone obviously in society, but y'all specifically need people to help. But it's a big job what you have in front of you.
Speaker 2:And unfortunately the reputation of the church has become in many ways not a place where people find safety, and I think there's something to really mourn and lament in that that people are not often finding safety and stability and wholeness by being a part of the church.
Speaker 2:I do think it is happening. Yeah, hey, let's really prioritize becoming a church where people feel like they can find real, not just the gospel-centered community, but really be able to carry people's burdens and needs. And, unfortunately, whether it's through just distraction or I don't really, can't even really put my finger on what it is exactly. But in our culture we've kind of shifted away from discipling our people to get in the water. People don't. We say often. We don't fish people out of the water, we have to get in. That's what Jesus did.
Speaker 2:He didn't stay in heaven, he actually entered into our world and therefore we can follow him there, but it's uncomfortable and it's messy and we don't always know what to say or what to do, but I do think that there's a a really a big need for the church to to think more deeply about how we're discipling our people into hard things rather than teaching our people to insulate. I love the world yeah, um. It's the only way that the church really becomes the type of place where people heal.
Speaker 1:And I love that so I could. We can talk all day long on that. Maybe next time. I love, I love that so much. I think that's spot on. Yes, we're raising disciples right, we're not not attendees. So you had mentioned that there were some developments, some changes coming to the foster care system statewide. Would you kind of walk us through what that looks like?
Speaker 2:Sure, it's trying to get too much into the weeds with all of it. It's got a little bit complicated. But essentially the state as a whole is redesigning the way that foster care is delivered. This has been rolling out for several years now. Some regions in the state have already transitioned, or in either phase one or phase two of this kind of redesign process. We are on the brink of it here in Houston. We actually anticipated that Houston would be the last region, so we weren't really expecting it fully until 2029-ish, but we're actually on the brink of this transition right now.
Speaker 2:And so a lot of the work, a lot of the conversation we've been having, some of the work that we've been doing has been with a lot of stakeholders, across from DFPS to different agencies and people like that, saying how do we prepare for this?
Speaker 2:Well, how's this going to change delivery for foster care? But essentially what it is the state is essentially privatizing an already somewhat privatized foster care system, if that makes sense. So the way on a local level, the way that foster care is delivered, is right. You have a state agency in DFPS and then locally there are DFPS regions or regions, offices of DFPS, and then you have lots of different agencies that then contract with DFPS to place kids in foster care. So for placement and case management, it's like the people you've heard of Arrow, depelchen Homes with Hope, pchas or Presbyterian Children's Homes there's 50 of them probably, as an estimate here in Houston, lots of different group homes. They all contract. What will happen is one lead agency will kind of take the lead for placement and case management in each individual area. So they're calling it community-based care. The idea is that each region will kind of take ownership of their own system with placement of their kids and case management of their kids.
Speaker 2:The idea is really right. A state organization is trying to create standards and all of these different things for all of these different places.
Speaker 2:Midland is different than Houston which is different than San Antonio and East Texas, and so the idea is that we would, through this type of community-based model, be able to really look at each individual community and say, okay, what is it that we need here in houston? What players, what assets, what struggles do we have here? And then how do we start to address them as a community and how do we keep houston kids here?
Speaker 2:rather than moving them from all these other different places. How do we keep siblings together? All of those types of things Got it, so it's a major overhaul. It's in my. Everyone asked me like what do you think about it? What's your opinion, what's your take?
Speaker 2:It's complex, it's going to be complicated and difficult, because it's a huge shift, I would say. The fear that I have is that, because we have many of the same problems that are going to be there either way, that we fall into the same struggles that we've had for ages, there's a very real temptation.
Speaker 2:I think, that that could happen is one lead agency takes the contract and then it just becomes the same old thing, yeah. However, I do think that there's a lot of opportunity, for it's supposed to be community based, so collaboration is at its core. If we really do take ownership of this as a community and start working together, we can create these really great innovative opportunities to change what's happening and actually fix and transform the system as we know it, but it's going to be a lot of work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it sounds like a ton, like everything has to shift. And so when, do you know when they anticipate that process being completed by?
Speaker 2:As of now, the agencies. There's kind of a RFA or a request for applications that's currently open and it is like this fall. So I know that certain organizations or agencies who are kind of vying for that contract, for the lead agency contract, have applied. I don't know exactly how many of them, I just know which ones have, and then DFPS will be a part of kind of selecting or entering into negotiations. They say this fall Could be extended. Who knows? But it really is. It's very imminent, and so our community is really just gearing up for what's this going to look like, how our kids and family is going to be affected?
Speaker 2:and then, how do we utilize this in a way that actually does get to system transformation?
Speaker 1:That's fascinating. I mean, it's a really unique, it's an interesting concept that people could maybe band together. I'm going to say regionally, but really it's smaller than that, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do think, when you think about God's timing for things, I started this organization not really having a clue what I was doing or what I was getting into and now kind of being on the brink of this not to say that this is the only reason why all this happened but everyone in different parts of the state who have already gone through a model, kind of some of this transition they've said this type of model really rises and falls with a community's ability to collaborate and work together.
Speaker 2:Wow, and because there's been this kind of foundation that we've really had a privilege and honor to kind of build over time, I do think we're set up very well to be successful. It's still going to take a lot of work. It's still going to take a lot of humility from a lot of the players involved and coming to the table to solve these issues, but I think because there has been this foundation, not just through us but by a lot of organizations coming together and figuring this out, I do think we have a really good shot to make it successful.
Speaker 1:That's really encouraging to hear that. Let me shift gears a little bit and let's talk a little bit about the preventative work that you guys do. We've touched on the vulnerabilities and everything you know when we serve women in our safe home. We have adults in our safe home and almost all the time they have children. They have children that have been. Either they're with family, they're estranged or, worse, they're in CPS. What resources would you say are available for families you know maybe who are facing the potential of CPS, taking away their kids or having to come up against something like that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a couple of things that I think I would point to there. One we run a program called the Response Network, and this would be for someone who has some level of interaction with the system already. So it's not far enough upstream, but it is a significant resource. A couple of years ago we started an initiative called the Response Network and so we work with CPS workers primarily, but also about 14 different organizations or agencies in Houston who are caring for biological families who have interaction with the system, or kinship families, so relative caregivers a grandma taking in their grandkids, aunt and uncle, things like that, or aged out youth, so kind of those most vulnerable
Speaker 2:not as much foster and adoptive families that tend to have the resources to get what they need, although we do have those, from time to time, caseworkers who are working with those families if they recognize a need, whether it's for a tangible you know, grandmother took on five grandkids and needs beds for them or bedding, something like that or it could be for a referral, like they need a housing referral, they need trauma-informed counseling, they need an extermination service or a house cleaning or something like that. They can fill out a form on our website and then, based on our network where the family lives, we will then say, hey, let's pair this family up with this church that's two minutes away and they can step in.
Speaker 2:The goal is for them to get the need met right. They need the thing or the service, but the goal is to offer relationship as well in the midst of that. And so, on the flip side of it, we train our churches. Hey, if we come to you with that need, there's a family two minutes from your house that's experiencing XYZ. Can you step in and provide this, but then offer to continue walking?
Speaker 1:with that family.
Speaker 2:It's been largely successful. It's churches that want to help. They just don't know where the needs are. And then families that are like, yeah, I would be willing to get help from a church, and so I don't know the exact number, but a large percentage of the needs that are coming in are for biological families that get put in by investigators. So a family is experiencing some sort of neglect or has a report, and the investigator steps in and says this is something that this family does not.
Speaker 2:the kidneys not need to be removed, but they do need help and so they'll bring that to us and we're able to then use our network to get those needs met and hopefully close the case so that they don't have to have any more interaction with the child welfare system. So that's one way, if they do already have some interaction, that hopefully their caseworker can help them get connected to the right resources through that program. Another thing I would say is that there are a few agencies around the city who do voluntary placements and that are very open.
Speaker 2:They're not necessarily with a removal a court-ordered removal, I know Loving Houston is one. Casa de Esperanza is one. Boys and Girls Country is more of a residential cottage home in Hockley that take voluntary placements from families. So they are working with the biological family to help them to become restored. But the family can also say, hey, can you care for my child while I get better and we don't have to go through a court-ordered, you know, judge. All that involvement and those can be really successful too. My caveat with that is just, you know, making sure that there are restorative services involved with it and not just like, hey, we can take your kid, you know, and foster parents or you know, the people who are caring for those kids have to also be very on board with being the cheerleader for the biological family and making sure that their heart is for family restoration, but those services are also available.
Speaker 2:There's a few agencies here in Houston that do that type of work.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. That's so good to hear. Now, if they wanted the first resource, that's through your website that you have families maybe listening or maybe somebody shares this podcast. Where do they go to fill out that form?
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a form on pretty much every page on our website. So, if you go to rivers, out that form. Yeah, there's a form on pretty much every page on our website. So if you go to riversideprojectorg, there is a contact form. And it can be hey, I want to mobilize my church. Or hey, I just want to learn more. Or hey, I'm looking for a resource for a family that I know.
Speaker 2:If they fill that out, then it will get to the appropriate person on our team and then we can just reach out and find out a little bit more about what they're looking for.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Yeah Well, let's wrap up with this. Do you have any kind of testimonial, or maybe? Yes, I hate to use the word success story, I really don't even like that, but something like that, like you know where you've seen the impact of your work in a person's life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there are a few. There's just through what I mentioned before on our response network, we've gotten to see these beautiful stories of not a success story from our organization necessarily because we're not typically the ones meeting the needs it really is providing kind of a connection.
Speaker 2:Here's a need and here's somebody who can meet it and we can put it together. One of them in particular we just released a mini documentary called as One, and it tells four specific stories of collaboration that leads to family flourishing. One of those is from one of our church partners at Sojourn, southside. Typically, what happens is, like I said a caseworker brings a need to us and then we go to a church. This actually came from the church. They had met some needs for some families in their community and then they said, hey, there's actually a family that we are aware of here. They're not involved with the foster care system currently, but we want to be able to help them. They brought us the need and said these are the things that this family needs Can you help us to meet them.
Speaker 2:And then we were able to connect um. This family in particular was a family who had been previously homeless. It was a mother of five Um, and she had been homeless, was able to secure an apartment but had nothing in it. Um, she, I think she had like one couch and that was it. Everyone was sleeping on the same couch. Um, and so we, because we have a partnership with the Houston Furniture Bank. We were then able to connect her with the Houston Furniture Bank and then a couple of other situations and different resources, but again the church was able to provide that.
Speaker 2:We were saying here's a connection. They were able to come with the family to the Houston Furniture Bank to get everything that she needed and now they're still walking with that family over time. Again, it's the things that are getting. The needs are getting met. The tangible needs are very important, yeah, but the relationship is still there. Yeah, that church was able to walk alongside, find resources quickly rather than going to like a you know 411 helpline like where do we find all this stuff? Yeah, you know, we can make those connections happen and I think it's really beautiful, um, when those types of things happen and then families are able to find stability.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Just working together finding ways to work together.
Speaker 1:Kids are going to remember right. This is when we got a kitchen table. Like you know, those are markers in their memory. So it's such an amazing opportunity for that church to just establish that relationship and hopefully demonstrate like the tangible love of the Father you know, Well, Amber, we could talk all day. There's so many things we haven't covered. I know that you have inside of you that need to be shared. Do you think you want to leave anything with our listeners? That something important we haven't touched on or talked about?
Speaker 2:our listeners that something important we haven't touched on or talked about. I mean, the only thing that I would say is I do think that every person in our city has a place along the river, whether that is with a trafficking organization or working with a poverty organization, or maybe it's not even working with an organization at all. It's just kind of giving really praying for the Lord to give us eyes to see what's happening in our neighborhoods or bringing somebody who is vulnerable in our midst into our purview and being able to have the courage to respond.
Speaker 2:I think just asking the question and being willing to say I have something to give. It's going to be different for every person but we always say everyone can do something. We just don't all need to do the same thing, and so really just thinking through, what is it that I have to give, and then whatever that thing that comes to mind, or that the.
Speaker 2:Lord brings, just having the courage to step forward with it and learn, connect, get involved, whether that's through your church or through an organization, or just through your neighborhood, it's always worth it.
Speaker 1:Thank you, that's amazing. Well, amber, it's been a pleasure to have you. Thanks for having me. I hope you'll be on our show again, and if anybody wants to connect with you, it's RiversideProjectorg. Well, you guys go and check her out and if you haven't already, like and subscribe to this podcast, share with a.