starplott
UKC Forum Member
Registered: Oct 2003
Location: SW Missouri
Posts: 1405 |
Re: Re: Re: star plott
quote:
Originally posted by Lee Stocking
I respect a post like this. Ive always said, give an inch and take a mile. My wife and I discussed many times taking children into our home and I opted out. I guess I am a little selfish when it comes to personal quite-ness. This country is full of irresponsible, lazy, over weight people. Its good we (they) have folks like you making a difference.
I own a assisted living home for the mentally ill. Many of these people are what I call drug induced, meaning they overdosed. Not all but some live off SS and cannot function on their own so we(tax payers) get to pay for their mistakes.
They dont have the best eating habits either, and are somewhat unhealthy from medication. Medicaid pays the doctors and none have personal insurance, some are wealthy. America is one messed up system. Until we bring the good Lord back into homes and Gov America will stay this way.
I agree.
The sad fact is there are more in need than what people like you and I can be there for. I use to take high level teen boys with issues. Bipolar, schitzo affected, conduct disorder, delusional disorder, borderline personality order, RAD, chem dep, and the list goes on with the majority of them (if not all) having several co-occurring disorders. Not to mention HUGE entitlement issues! Most of their parents have mental illness and dependency issues.
The sad fact is at 18 programs stop and free will takes over. Working with law enforcement I have seen programs go by the wayside. This means that at/above the age of consent these people are on their own. We can't put them in halfway houses or in assisted living programs, they have to be willing to go (and there are very few).
So, law enforcement keeps putting their life and safety dealing with these same people over and over again. We don't have programs to keep them locked up or send them where they can be assisted.
Kids age out of foster care and are 'free' to do as they wish, many on social security in addition to food stamps/Medicaid. They don't want to go to programs, there are rules and limitations along with expectations. They don't need any help as long as they have social security, food stamps, and their medical paid for. They just pack up like a pack of dogs with free range in society. That is until they get caught committing crimes and jailed. Which blows me away how many view that as a savings and loan program, get locked up 3 mos and have 3 times the benefits when they get out.
A lot of pensions have clauses that benefits stop if convicted of a felony. Yet our tax dollars keep getting paid, sometimes on many levels, to support criminal behavior by those who should not be turned loose in society to begin with, because they cannot function. We pay to have them in jail, to pay their public defenders, pay for their court time, then to pay them their soc sec and benefits while they sit in jail or in treatment facilities, which we also pay for.
A lot of these people we also pay for their kids.
So often I get kids that are from pretty heafty sibling groups. One boy, a family of 9 raised by the state. Typically 3-5 kids taken from these parents and scattered in the system. Half of them don't really even know their siblings, let alone have much of a connection. Some stay in care while others get adopted out, while others stay with family. Some parents of the teens I've had over the years are still having kids! Few are allowed to keep them, most are taken at birth by the state.
Some kids are so messed up by parents, and then the system, that they can't be helped. They are just passed through homes to get them to 18 to make the state's obligation. Often I get kids from other foster homes with just the clothes on their back. You drop $100+ in clothes and get them in school the first two days. They run the first day of school and your 'reimbursement' for what you put into the kid for 3 days is a whopping $39. Doesn't matter if you have $20 in food out for the 2 days or $300 in food, clothes, movie tickets.
I can TOTALLY understand people not getting involved. You open yourself up to being kicked around on several levels. Most of us who take the harder kids have been mistreated in our own homes, I've had a kid attempt to poison me, had animals abused, holes in walls, had to replace entire doors, required to get expensive alarm systems so we know who is going in and out what window, bedroom, exterior door, etc.
It is not a life for everybody. BUT, there are rewards from time to time nobody can put a price tag on. I've had kids go into the military to make a better life. I've also got kids that graduated to the adult prison system. Some parents have pulled themselves up by the bootstraps and got their kids back after 5-15 years, some work out. Some get a hold on their life and use the system for all it is worth and become the first to go to college. We never know which ones we can help when they walk in. I've seen some amazing turn arounds from deeply troubled kids. But I have seen more waste of time, care, and tax payer dollars too.
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It ain't the bark, it ain't the growl, it's the bite that hurts!
Last edited by starplott on 11-25-2011 at 05:19 PM
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11-24-2011 02:17 PM
TREE BLAZIN KENNELS
