A foster care nonprofit has received $5.5 million to expand a program aimed at providing support for children and their families across the state.
Part of the funds “Crossnore Communities for Children” received comes from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. The department has a $1.8 million contract for two years with Crossnore. An additional $3.75 million grant came from “The Leon Levine Foundation,” which supports nonprofit philanthropy in North Carolina and South Carolina.
Crossnore’s “Bridging Families” program launched back in 2021. It helps foster kids work toward reuniting with their biological families or appointed guardians.
“We were able to start on our Avery campus, and we started with one home, and then due to lots of funding opportunities and kind of growth and kind of different strategies, I guess internally, we were able to add homes,” said Sarah Norris, Crossnore’s Chief Program Officer. “A couple in Hendersonville region, a few more up in our Avery region, and then in our Winston-Salem region.”
The Bridging Families Program’s goal is to have foster parents co-parent with the child’s birth parents or guardians. Although the children are not living with their parents or guardians at the time, their parents still get to participate in a lot of decisions around what the child needs. That includes extracurricular activities and setting up doctors appointments.
Norris said some needs include not separating siblings, which is another big focus with the program.
“We have been able to see sibling sets of four, five, and even six be reunited with their parents,” she said. “We actually have a sibling set of six that are going to be going home this week. We talk about how if this program hadn’t existed, what would be the likelihood that these six kids would be waking up on Christmas morning in their own home.”
Norris said nearly 30 kids have been reunited with their families through the program. Moving forward, she hopes the program can be offered in every region across North Carolina.
