Loved forever

27.08.2013 — Analysis

The dream of orphans in the southern Urals

About 4,500 children in the Chelyabinsk region who cannot be cared for by their parents dream of having a family. The state's job is to make their new home a permanent family for them.

In the southern Urals there are 18,598 children who are either orphans or are not in the custody of their parents, including 14,105 children who are growing up in foster families. Since early 2013, almost 1,574 children have acquired a new family home: 860 orphans have been placed into care, and more than 150 live with foster families, while 147 have found adoptive parents. And 416 children in the southern Urals were able to return to birth parents who have begun rehabilitating their own lives. But another 4,500 children wait to be claimed.

The Chelyabinsk region is focusing not only on treating "society's ailments" but also on their prevention. Professionals work actively with families if there is a danger that parents will have to relinquish their children. The region has created a consolidated database with information on 6,455 such families that include 12,426 children. Individualized rehabilitation programs are being developed for them, which include educational, psychological, and medical strategies.

In addition, the Strong Family project has been operating in the region for over ten years. It has been successfully tested in the Satka district. During this period of working with "at-risk" families, the number of local residents stripped of their parental rights has decreased almost fivefold. Juvenile crime has also dropped. Other municipalities are now duplicating these practices.

Working with "at-risk" groups requires vast resources - not only psychologically, but also in terms of staff. Governor Mikhail Yurevich added more than 100 employees to municipal guardianship agencies in 2013.

"By focusing on this issue we have been able to significantly increase the number of children who are returned to their families of origin," emphasizes Irina Gekht, deputy prime minister of the Chelyabinsk region. "One of our main goals is to avoid stripping individuals of their parental rights if it is possible, instead making every effort so that children can remain with their families. We offer assistance to such families and sponsor them. Because of this work, the number of children who have been able to return to their birth families has increased 20% in recent years."

More and more people are also willing to love and care for other people's children. The number of those who seek to look after a child in distress is rising each year by more than 10%. "Another statistic that makes us truly proud is the decreased number of children who are returned to institutions of social protection. Nationally, about 4% of orphans are returned to orphanages by foster families, but this figure is only 0.6% in the Chelyabinsk region. I think this year we can reduce that number to zero," says Irina Gekht. She stressed that children are primarily returned due to external events, such a guardian's illness, and not because of relationship difficulties.

One of the main problems with placing children in foster families is that potential parents want babies under the age of one, and less often up to the age of three. There are currently 300 families on the waiting list for very young children. Infants, except those that are seriously ill, can always find new parents. However, toddlers make up only 10% of the total number of residents of social institutions. And 80% of orphans are over the age of eight, plus they have brothers and sisters from whom they cannot be separated. Of course, prospective parents want healthy orphans, but most of them have chronic diseases (i.e., their health is classified at levels three or four).

The state is now providing more substantial help to foster families. Monthly stipends for caring for a child increased to over 5,000 rubles in 2012. The authorities of the Chelyabinsk region use public funds to help buy furniture and other essential items for children and also to reimburse public-transportation expenses and partially cover utility bills. More than 8,700 children and 828 parents receive such social support.

Many misconceptions exist regarding the bureaucratic hurdles to adoption. "In the beginning of the year, a number of changes were made to federal regulatory documents, greatly simplifying the procedure for adopting a child. For example, medical reports are now valid for a longer period of time, documents proving the home meets health and hygiene standards are no longer required, and the procedure for transferring a child to the care of a close relative who is willing to act as a guardian (foster parent) has been simplified. Larisa Moshkova, the minister of social relations in the Chelyabinsk region, told РусБизнесНьюс, "In view of all the changes, we can call this an optimized system for this given period of time."

The subject of the adoption of orphans by foreigners must be dealt with separately. The growing scandal resulting from the series of deaths of orphans overseas meant that this door had to be slammed to adoptive parents from the US, and work with other countries had to be monitored more closely. Even before Dima Yakolev's Law was passed, oversight of foreign adoptive parents was stepped up as much as possible in the Chelyabinsk region.

The southern Urals had not worked with individual adoptive parents from the US for five years - interacting with them only through accredited agencies that offer a rigorous "screening." Statistics show that Russian children have suffered tragedies as a result of "independent" adoptions. No US citizens have been allowed to adopt orphans from the southern Urals since 2008.

Deaths of Russian orphans abroad are more widely publicized than similar stories that occur in Russia. But statistically, the number of foster children who die as a result of parental violence in our country is a cause for concern. The southern Urals has seen only isolated examples of such tragedies.

"The most recent case was in Troitsk, where a girl was killed by her foster family. I should mention that she was living with relatives and it is quite hard to imagine how a child could be treated this way by her own kin," comments Irina Gekht, stressing that intensified sponsorship of families in the Chelyabinsk region will help to avoid such irreversible disasters.

After Dima Yakovlev's Law was passed, the children's ombudsman, Pavel Astakhov, spoke about a total ban on adoptions by foreigners. However, the complete repudiation of this practice would deprive sick children who are not adopted by Russians of the chance for a normal life. It would be wiser to focus strict monitoring instead of a ban. In the past, the southern Urals has worked with accredited agencies in Spain, Italy, and Finland, and contacts are maintained with France and Germany.

Foreigners adopted 26 young residents of the Chelyabinsk region in the first half of 2013, and a total of 72 over the course of last year. Children with serious health problems, up to the point of being totally disabled, go abroad.

At present they have a better chance there to become meaningful members of society. Realistically, there is no way Russian orphanages can provide individual care for every disabled child. Children with cerebral palsy spend most of their lives staring at the ceiling, and, according to social workers for example, the vast majority of deaf-mute children exhibit mental deficiencies by the age of five because there are not given opportunities to develop.

In addition, the number of children with disabilities living in social institutions is growing, and there are many orphans with mental illnesses. Medical exams conducted in orphanages in the southern Urals since 2007 have shown that one in five children there suffers from mental or behavioral disorders.

To solve the issue of how to place disabled children into Russian families, an entire infrastructure must be created to help them resolve their problems.

Mikhail Yurevich, the leader of the Chelyabinsk region, has set a goal - to turn orphanages into adoption centers: the number of children who have found new homes will become the standard for the effectiveness of their work. The governor has ordered a plan to be drafted to optimize the network of orphanages.

"Our common goal is to eradicate orphanhood as a social phenomenon, to place children with families to the maximum possible extent, and to support foster parents and guardians," emphasizes Gov. Yurevich. "Of course, it is not possible to transition all children into families. But we need to try. During this process, it is very important to inform the public about what is involved in adopting a child from an orphanage and why it is not something to fear. The most important thing for people to understand is that an adopted child is their own child, and he or she will be part of them for life. That is an understanding that will come."

Lyudmila SOLODKOVA