The Marshall County Public Library is one of four libraries in Kentucky launching programs with grant money to strengthen families and prevent unnecessary removals. (Photo provided)
When children are unnecessarily removed from their homes, experts say the separation puts them at risk of chronic mental and physical ailments.
With that in mind, four Kentucky libraries are launching programs to keep families together, well resourced and educated, aided with $200,000 in grant money from the national nonprofit Youth Villages.
Libraries in Jackson, Johnson, Marshall and Spencer counties received around $45,000 each for a variety of programs to help parents meet their children’s needs.
Britany Binkowski, the executive director of the Youth Village initiative New Allies, said libraries are a “low stigma, high access point of contact for all communities” and make sense for grassroots outreach.
“They pretty consistently exist in most counties where they can be reached by lots of families, especially those in rural areas, and they’re (places) people trust to get information, to get access to resources,” she said. “They don’t carry the stigma, for example, of going to a child welfare department and asking for resources in a way that might feel very vulnerable.”
Among other things, the libraries are using the grant month to host trainings on growing food in an apartment setting, teaching parents how to deal with challenging behaviors and how to cook basic recipes, and connecting families to other community resources where they can get car seats and other necessities.
Libraries are also a more “natural” place to host visitations for parents who are working toward reunification, Binkowski said.
It’s “often not the case” that a child is removed from a home because the parents are outright bad, she said. Most of the time, parents lack the resources to properly feed, clothe or otherwise care for their children, she said. In fact, about 70% of all Child Protective Services allegations are related to neglect and poverty, the Lantern previously reported.
“We see substance use disorder and parents who are struggling with that as a significant driver of entries into foster care — not only in Kentucky, but across the country,” Binkowski said.
Other preventable issues contribute to removal, she said, like a parent not being able to buy a car seat or access safe child care.
“Things like that can cause safety issues that have to be resolved for a child to remain safe and stable,” Binkowski said.
‘Before there’s a problem, let’s fix it.’
Tammy Blackwell, an author and the director of the Marshall County Public Library, said libraries working in this space is just “logical.”
“Libraries are already reaching families and just doing a lot of good work giving families a place to be and form bonds,” she said.
Marshall County’s grant supported a renovation of the Hardin branch to create a more child-friendly space and funded an eight-week program for mothers of young children called Mom’s Night Out.
During the Mom’s Night Out program, which will start the first week in September, mothers who are referred by Court Appointed Special Advocates will gather weekly and have a meal together. During the meal, representatives from the Marshall County Extension Office and the health department will lead discussions about stress management, home upkeep and how to cook recipes with staples handed out at food distribution centers like rice and beans.
Because this is grant-funded, it’s not affected by recent changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) program, Blackwell said. Congress recently passed the Big Beautiful Bill Act, which cut funding for the SNAP Education program, among other things.
The Mom’s Night Out discussions will be in a “very non-judgmental way, and not in a lecturing kind of way, but as a conversation and getting those families very comfortable in that space, very comfortable with library staff, comfortable with community partners who they may need to call on at some point,” Blackwell explained.
“We’re hoping that they build a bond with each other; other people with similar lived experiences, and to really give them a sense of community and resources in order to help the mothers thrive, so that the children may thrive,” she added. “I love that it’s ‘before there’s a problem, let’s fix it.’”
The first round of the program will only include mothers — Blackwell hopes between 12 to 15 — who have children of preschool to early elementary school age. Should it be successful and receive funding for a repeat, she’d like to expand it to fathers as well.
“There’s been some coverage of how many kids in Kentucky are in either foster or kinship care situations,” Blackwell said. “It’s a lot of kids, and that really impacts their ability to be successful in life. And anything that we can do to strengthen those families and give those kids, then we need to at least try. And I think libraries are in a perfect position to really make a difference.”
The 2024 Kids Count report, from Kentucky Youth Advocates and the Annie E. Casey Foundation, showed there were nearly 46,000 youth in foster care in the state from 2021-2023. In that same time period, the number of children leaving foster care and reunited with their families dropped to 32%. Pre-pandemic, from 2016-2018, it was 36%.
Additionally, in 2024 there were around 55,000 Kentucky children being raised with a relative in a kinship care arrangement.
The Department for Community Based Services came up with the idea to partner with libraries, Binkowski said. Lesa Dennis, the DCBS commissioner, wasn’t available for an interview but said in a statement that “by meeting families where they are, we’re building pathways to stability, resilience and well-being so no family has to face challenges alone.”
Removal is ‘traumatizing’
Binkowski, who previously worked as Assistant General Counsel for the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, said that “a foster care intervention, even if necessary, is traumatizing to everyone involved.” It can damage bonds between parents and their children and upend daily routine and connections, she said.
“We have a substantial body of evidence that tells us that children do best when they are with their families of origin — when it can be safe,” she said. “We know that connections to biological family, knowing where you came from, feeling like you belong — those are really critical emotional stabilization and safety factors that support children’s growth and development.”
Experiencing brokenness in the home, abuse or neglect are Adverse Childhood Experiences, which refers to traumas or stressors in a person’s life before their 18th birthday. They include, but are not limited to, parental divorce, abuse, parental incarceration, substance use issues in the home and more. The more such experiences a person has, the more likely they are to have poor health, lower education and economic hardships. Childhood trauma also cost Kentucky around $300 million a year.
“Enough stressors on a child at early ages without protective capacities to keep them from having negative outcomes can literally take years off of their lives,” Binkowski said. “So, while we don’t want children to experience abuse and neglect … we also don’t want them unnecessarily being removed from their home if the issues are not creating those kinds of negative impacts and we can stabilize a family without requiring removal.”
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