{"id":353446,"date":"2026-07-27T09:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T09:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/353446\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T09:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T09:02:09","slug":"gone-to-texas-mike-watkins-takes-north-floridas-foster-care-playbook-to-the-permian-basin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/353446\/","title":{"rendered":"Gone to Texas: Mike Watkins takes North Florida’s foster care playbook to the Permian Basin"},"content":{"rendered":"

North Florida\u2019s biggest experiment in child welfare is headed west. About 1,200 miles west.<\/p>\n

Mike Watkins, the longtime CEO of NWF Health Network<\/a>, will serve as founding CEO of the newly formed West Texas Community Network<\/a>, carrying the community-based, faith-aligned foster care model he built in North Florida to 30 counties in the Permian Basin, centered in Midland.<\/p>\n

He isn\u2019t giving up his day job. Watkins will keep running NWF Health Network while he gets the Texas operation on its feet.<\/p>\n

The launch follows the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services\u2019 decision to tap West Texas Community Network to lead the state\u2019s Rural Community-Based Care Pilot Program<\/a>. The pilot was created by Senate Bill 513<\/a>, carried by two Midland Republicans, Sen. Kevin Sparks<\/a> and Rep. Tom Craddick<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI see remarkable parallels between West Texas and West Florida,\u201d Watkins said. \u201cBoth regions possess strong local identities, value family, and have active churches and faith partners \u2014 and they don\u2019t instinctively look to Austin or Tallahassee to solve their problems. These communities are prepared to take care of their own. They simply need the authority and resources to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Texas noticed the track record. NWF Health Network manages community-based care for family strengthening and foster care across an 18-county region<\/a> of North Florida, overseeing $280 million in care covering more than 65,000 lives, according to the organization.<\/p>\n

The network says it runs on administrative overhead below 2%, among the leanest in managed care, and hit a 43% permanency placement rate within 12 months, a figure it calls a national high. It also counts nearly 400 family reunifications and more than 500 adoptions.<\/p>\n

\u201cGovernment has an essential responsibility to protect its citizens \u2014 investigate abuse, protect children from imminent danger and hold systems accountable,\u201d Watkins said. \u201cBut government was never designed to raise children. Communities were. Families were. The community-centered, faith-based model restores the proper division of responsibility while restoring agency to communities and their faith partners \u2014 and the results speak for themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

Faith partners sit at the center of the model, not on the donor list. NWF\u2019s Faith Summit has funded local churches directly through congregation-based grants for behavioral health and teen methamphetamine prevention.<\/p>\n

In May, that work went national. NWF Health Network co-presented the National Child Protection Faith Summit<\/a> at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, where faith leaders, policymakers and child protection practitioners<\/a> gathered around family strengthening and foster care.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cFaith leaders were encouraged to hold awareness Sundays, collect backpacks or recruit foster parents \u2014 but rarely invited to share responsibility for how children and families were directly served, as James 1:27 calls them to do,\u201d Watkins said.<\/p>\n

Florida pioneered the approach. Community-based care<\/a> was first conceived under then-Gov. Jeb Bush, and Gov. Ron DeSantis\u2018 administration has kept the state behind it, with lead agencies like NWF Health Network running locally accountable, family-focused child protection systems.<\/p>\n

Washington is catching up. President Donald Trump\u2018s Nov. 13 executive order, \u201cFostering the Future for American Children and Families,\u201d<\/a> put foster care reform on the national agenda, and the related \u201cA Home for Every Child\u201d<\/a>initiative from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services had signed up all 50 states<\/a> as of this month.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe next great reform for foster care is keeping kids safely in their own communities, and that is only possible by returning care and oversight to the communities where children live,\u201d Watkins said. \u201cThis movement must extend beyond Florida and Texas and become a national restoration of responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

They have been pulling value out of the ground in the Permian Basin for a century. Watkins is betting the next big strike gets measured in forever families, not barrels.<\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

Ed. note: This story was drafted with assistance from AI. Editorial judgment, sourcing, and final review were performed by Peter Schorsch and the Florida Politics editorial team.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"North Florida\u2019s biggest experiment in child welfare is headed west. About 1,200 miles west. Mike Watkins, the longtime…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":353447,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[144479,44641,144480,409,144481,28,30,29,7069,144482,144483,54489,144484,7068,144485,412,144486,144487],"class_list":["post-353446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-a-home-for-every-child","tag-child-welfare","tag-community-based-care","tag-donald-trump","tag-faith-based-partnerships","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-foster-care","tag-fostering-the-future","tag-ike-watkins","tag-jeb-bush","tag-mike-watkins","tag-nwf-health-network","tag-permian-basin","tag-ron-desantis","tag-senate-bill-513","tag-west-texas-community-network"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=353446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353446\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=353446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=353446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=353446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}