Other Services
The DFCS Prevention Bureau partners, teaches, and provides support through community-focused programs. The Prevention Bureau acts to prevent entry into foster care and reduce disproportionality in the Child Welfare System.
The Prevention Bureau focuses on 6 zip codes with high rates of referrals for General Neglect within Santa Clara County. The effort aims to create safe, caring & self-supported communities where families and children have access to basic needs to reduce the need for child welfare action.
The In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) program allows you to live safely in your own home. Services are provided in your home, hotel, or the home of a relative. IHSS is an alternative to out-of-home care, such as nursing homes or board and care facilities. If you receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or meet all Medi-Cal income requirements, you may be able to receive IHSS.
Adoption is the process that transfers the legal rights, responsibilities and rewards of being a parent. The rights and responsibilities of birth parents are permanently terminated and assumed by other people who become the child’s legal parent(s). Adoptive parents have the same rights and responsibilities as birth parents.
The Children and Youth System of Care have established a joint Interagency Leadership Team (ILT) committed to help ensure alignment of vision and trust, maximize efforts and share risk, reward and responsibility; and decreasing institutional trauma.
The Resource Family Approval Program (RFA) is the state program now implemented by Santa Clara County Department of Family and Children's Services, which oversees resource families who are approved to provide care and supervision for children 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Resource Family Homes are required to comply with the California Department of Children's Services Written Directives for the Resource Family Approval Program.
The KAFPA mission is to work as one to provide resources and stand up for the needs of kinship, adoptive and foster families in Santa Clara County. KAFPA is Northern California's largest kinship, adoptive, and foster parent group, and mostly volunteer run non-profit.
The KAFPA resource center gives families a space for meetings, trainings and support groups. It also has resource information on things from legal aid to summer camps.
Every year approximately 150 young adults emancipate, or "age out" of foster care in Santa Clara County. This means having to find a place to live, a job, as well as the means to support themselves and pay for education, often with little or no support from family.
Transitioned Age Youth (TAY) services and programs connect youth ages 16 to 24 to opportunities, experiences, and supports to propel them to self-sufficiency.