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GOALS:

Tailoring services to the individual needs of children and families.

Redirecting funding toward preventive, family, neighborhood and community based services.

Reducing reliance on out-of-home and out-of-community placements

Promoting community planning, collaboration, and governance of service systems.

Developing service systems that more accurately reflect the needs of thechildren and families within the communities served.    

At the end of the day it's not about what you have or even what you've accomplished...it's about who you've lifted up, who you've made better.  Its about what you've given back.

-Denzel Washington-

ABOUT US

 

     The Child Welfare Decategorization Program was authorized by the Iowa General Assembly in 1987 as an initiative designed to deliver more effective services to children and families. Decategorization is designed to redirect child welfare and juvenile justice funding to services which are more preventive, family centered and community-based in order to reduce use of restrictive approaches that rely on institutional, out-of home, and out-of-community care.

 

     Decategorization is intended to help communities achieve a system in which services are driven by client strengths and needs, rather than by the diverse eligibility requirements and service definitions of categorical programs and funding streams.

 

Counties approved for Decategorization are expected to establish goals, objectives, and outcomes consistent with the legislative and statutory mandates for the program. In Decategorization, state and local officials work together to overcome barriers and develop more effective services for children and families. Community planning is an integral piece of this, as it ensures the projects are meeting the needs of the communities we are serving.

     The Community Planning Committee and Governance Board for Floyd, Mitchell and Chickasaw Counties were approved as a Decategorization Project in 1996. It was then known as the FMC Decat Project. Since then, to align more with the vision and mission, the name became Families Making Connections (FMC).

 

     The primary focus of planning efforts are concentrated on preventing and responding to child abuse and neglect, supporting and preserving families, exploring the best practices for placement decisions, resources for kinship caregivers and foster families, achieving and maintaining permanency, and providing stability in a child’s life. These outcomes not only apply to children and families involved in the formal child welfare system, but apply to families that are at-risk of entering the formal system.

 

    Families Making Connections has become the umbrella for many services that, first and foremost, strives to keep our children safe from abuse and neglect. Families Making Connections has brought together a variety of community members to identify the strengths and needs of families and children; identify ways to fill gaps in services to children ages 0-18; and make decisions regarding the allocation of resources to families and children who reside in or are in a school district within Floyd, Mitchell, and Chickasaw counties. Each year, planning efforts continue to:

 

  1. Coordinate with the Department of Human Services/Juvenile Court Services (DHS/JCS) to meet the needs of families currently involved with the formal Child Welfare system;

  2. Coordinate with other community planning initiatives affecting children and families; and

  3. Identify areas where existing services are not sufficient to meet identified needs.

 

     These are services that, if added to what currently exists, would increase our capacity to improve outcomes for children, families and communities.The philosophy of Families Making Connections is that knowledge is power and together we have the power to make a difference - a difference that will last a lifetime and a life-altering difference - for families and their children. As the saying goes, “It takes a village” and these counties and the communities within are our village.

 

For more information, call the Families Making Connections Coordinator at 641-228-5713; email at fmcdecatcoordinator@gmail.com.

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