{"id":387544,"date":"2026-07-27T10:44:22","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T10:44:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/387544\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T10:44:22","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T10:44:22","slug":"finding-family-435-west-texas-children-in-foster-care-need-local-families","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/387544\/","title":{"rendered":"Finding Family: 435 West Texas children in foster care need local families"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">ODESSA, Texas (KOSA) &#8211; There are 435 children in the West Texas foster system, and the majority of them are living far from home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">According to data highlighted in this week\u2019s Finding Family report, 89% of West Texas foster children are placed outside the county where they grew up. Sixty-one percent are living outside the region entirely \u2014 separated not only from their parents, but from their schools, churches, coaches and friends.<\/p>\n<p>Research points to local placement as key to better outcomes<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Research indicates that when foster children remain close to their home communities, healing happens faster. Children who stay connected to their schools and communities show better outcomes and a greater chance at family reunification.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The primary solution, according to the report, is more local foster parents in West Texas.<\/p>\n<p>Resources available through Foster West Texas Kids<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Foster West Texas Kids is a collaborative effort among several nonprofits that connects prospective foster families with licensed child-placing agencies across the region. The organization provides resources to help families learn about fostering, find support and take the first step toward becoming licensed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Those interested in fostering, adopting, volunteering or sharing a child\u2019s profile can find more information by visiting firstalert7.com and clicking on the Finding Family tab.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 KOSA. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ODESSA, Texas (KOSA) &#8211; There are 435 children in the West Texas foster system, and the majority of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":387545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[136598,136597,136596,6085,27,29,28,136595],"class_list":["post-387544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-finding-family-first-alert-7","tag-foster-children-placement","tag-foster-west-texas-kids","tag-permian-basin","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-west-texas-foster-care"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=387544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/387545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=387544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=387544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=387544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}