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spokesperson. The state would spend up to $150,000 on ads targeted at recruiting foster parents to care for Native American children, teenagers, siblings or those with medical problems.
• The ads would be targeted at Sioux Falls, Rapid City, Eagle Butte and Mission, identified as areas that need foster parents.
• Virgena Wieseler, director of the state Division of Child Protection, said South Dakota now has about 700 foster homes for the approximately 1,000 children in foster care at any one time. She said it's hard to find foster families in general, but tougher to find those who can care for a child with medical problems or other special needs.
• "It's about matching the needs of the child with the strength of the family. We have to meet the individual needs of the kids," Wieseler said.
• But Richard Wexler, director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, which seeks to reduce the number of children unnecessarily placed in foster care, said the state's recruitment effort is "nonsense."
• "South Dakota does not have too few foster parents. South Dakota has too many foster children," Wexler said. "If South Dakota stopped tearing apart families at one of the highest rates in the country, there would be plenty of room in good, safe foster homes for all the children in South Dakota who really need it."
• Wieseler said the agency has to find foster homes when law enforcement agencies or judges determine children need to be removed from their homes, which happens mainly for their safety.
• Presto residents Jan and Bob Fuller have fostered more than 200 infants over the past 40 years. She believes there is always a need for more foster parents, and doesn't think South Dakota puts too many children in foster care.
(Continued on page 38)
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