Kinship Care: A Salt Lake City Attorney Can Help
Grandparents and other relatives raised more than 2.7 million children in America at some time in their lives – including President Barack Obama – according to a new KIDS COUNT report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation.
“This longtime practice has become more prevalent in the last decade, which has seen an 18 percent increase in children living with relatives or close family friends because their parents can no longer care for them,” the report noted.
Grandparents or other relatives often step in when parents have passed away, are in jail, are drug-addicts, or for some other reasons can no longer take care of their children.
With an increasing number of grandparents raising their grandchildren, kinship care is becoming quite the buzzword. Many say this kinship care is best for children, but it is also taxing on the caregivers, especially those in the older generation.
The report details some of the challenges that caregivers encounter including emotional, financial, and legal issues. Often the caregivers lack the legal authority to give medical consent, access basic medical care, enroll a child in school, or possibly become a foster parent. A Salt Lake City attorney can help the caregiver jump through these legal hoops.
The report estimated that “9 percent of youths will live with extended family for at least three consecutive months at some point before age 18.”
With these numbers on the rise there are more people in need of legal help to deal with these legal issues so they can focus on the more important issues of caring for the children.
If you are a kinship caregiver, you can contact a Salt Lake City attorney or an attorney in your local area to help you with the legal issues presented with caring for a relative.
For more information about kinship care check out the article at: http://www.aecf.org/Newsroom/NewsReleases/HTML/2012Releases/MoreChildrenRaisedByRelatives.aspx or contact a Salt Lake City attorney with your legal questions.
Shumway Van & Hansen always offers free consultations and often times can schedule an appointment within 24 hours. For more information please continue to utilize www.shumwayvan.com, call us at (801) 478-8080 or (702) 478-7770, or stop by either of our offices which are located at 8985 S. Eastern Ave, Suite 100, Las Vegas Nevada 89123 and 8 East Broadway, Suite 550, Salt Lake City, Utah 84111. We look forward to hearing from you soon.