Missouri governor signs bill banning state from seizing foster kids' benefits
After Aug. 28, Missouri will end the state's longstanding practice of seizing foster children's Social Security benefits to cover the cost of foster care.
Gov. Mike Kehoe on Wednesday signed a bill that would also ban child marriage and stop child sex abusers from using non-disclosure agreements to silence their victims. The bill was sponsored by Republican state Rep. Melissa Schmidt of Eldridge, and handled by Republican state Sen. Jamie Burger of Benton in the upper chamber.
Missouri's child welfare agency takes millions of dollars each year in foster children's benefits and uses the money to help pay for foster care. In fiscal year 2024, the Children's Division spent more than $10.6 million recovered from children's benefits. Over 1,200 foster kids were receiving benefits in Missouri of late last year, or just over 10% of all kids in care.
As a result, kids who are orphaned or have disabilities are responsible for paying toward the cost of their care in state custody.
The bill would ban the state from using those benefits to pay itself back for routine foster care expenses. Instead, the division could use the funds for the child's 'unmet needs' beyond what the division is obligated to pay, such as housing as the child prepares to age out of foster care.
The effort to ban the practice won bipartisan support during the 2024 session and was on the verge of passing. But it died when GOP infighting forced the state Senate to adjourn early.
The foster benefits ban was the starting point for the bill, with other provisions, including the ban on child marriage added when it reached the state Senate.
Other provisions include:
Increasing a tax credit for donations to certain youth programs.
Stating that the state Children's Division cannot hold itself harmless in contracts with private service providers when there are issues resulting from the state's negligence.
Requiring Children's Division caseworkers to present identification of themselves when conducting investigations of child abuse and neglect, and inform parents of their rights.
Requiring the Children's Division to take into consideration the religion of the foster child when determining placement, in order to ensure children are in households of a similar religion to their families' when practicable.
Under current Missouri law, anyone under 16 is prohibited from getting married. But 16 and 17 year olds can get married with parental consent to anyone under 21.
Under the new law, which goes into effect Aug. 28, marriage for anyone under age 18 will be illegal.
The bill garnered bipartisan support, but an outspoken group of Republican lawmakers condemned the child marriage ban — saying they knew couples who were married as teens and are still together and warning that more teens would get abortions if they couldn't marry.
'There are legitimate reasons for people 16, 17 to become married,' state Rep. Dean Van Schoiack, a Savannah Republican, said during an April House debate. 'A pregnancy could be a legitimate reason to become married, for one thing.'
Last year, the bill stalled due to GOP critics.
In 2023 Republican state Sen. Mike Moon's opposition to the child marriage ban garnered national attention when he said: 'Do you know any kids who have been married at age 12? I do. And guess what? They're still married.'
The bill also voids nondisclosure agreements in childhood sexual abuse cases and expands access to legal counsel for families in child abuse and neglect cases.
SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Post
22 minutes ago
- New York Post
Kamala Harris' latest Stephen Colbert flop shows exactly what's wrong with both of them
Kamala Harris' visit Thursday to Stephen Colbert's 'Late Show' was a fine reminder of why both of them are failures. Mind you, this marked Harris' eighth Late Show appearance — one more illustration of the futility of doing the same thing over and over and somehow expecting different results. What made her think this would help promote her new book? Advertisement The marquee moment was her inability to say who's leading the Democratic Party just now — which was actually simple honesty, since neither Dems nor Republicans have clear leaders these days unless it's a sitting president. But she couldn't explain that simple truth, nor did Colbert show any sign of getting it as he pushed for an answer. Her incoherence was part of another classic Kam performance, full of word salads and non-answers. Advertisement So why did Colbert even bring her on a supposed comedy show? Because he's followed most of the late-night crew down the 'we need to promote liberal politics' toilet, of course — hosting 176 Dem politicians and one Republican since 2022, and hewing one side of the aisle every minute in between. That formula earned him cancellation and may well take out all his peers. It's another puzzle of modern life that so much of the entertainment industry somehow forgot that sanctimoniousness (political or otherwise) is the enemy of humor.
Politico
23 minutes ago
- Politico
The Supreme Court just dropped a hint about its next big Voting Rights Act case
The order came in a case challenging Louisiana's congressional map, which contains two majority-Black districts out of the state's six House seats. The court heard arguments in the case in March and had been expected to rule by June. But on June 27, the justices punted the case into their next term and ordered that it be reargued. Now, Friday's order loosely sketches the terrain on which the justices want further arguments: the claim that the longstanding practice of drawing majority-minority districts under the Voting Rights Acts may be unconstitutional because of its focus on race in drawing district lines. The voters challenging Louisiana's map had already advanced that constitutional claim in the case, but the justices' call for further briefing on the issue suggests they want to consider the claim more fully. Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, a landmark law passed during the civil rights era, generally prohibits race-based discrimination in voting laws and practices. In redistricting, the law is used to protect against racial gerrymandering that would unfairly dilute the voting power of racial and ethnic minority voters. States across the country routinely seek to comply with Section 2 by drawing congressional districts where minority voters can elect their chosen candidates. Louisiana's previous map contained only one majority-Black district, even though Black residents make up about a third of the state's population. After a court struck down that map for likely violating the Voting Rights Act because it diluted the power of Black voters, the state's Republican-controlled legislature drew the new map with two majority-Black districts. A group of voters — who self-identified as non-Black — challenged the new map. That's the case now before the Supreme Court. A ruling overturning the current map could result in Republicans picking up an additional congressional seat in Louisiana. The state's two majority-Black districts are both represented by Democrats, while the other four districts are represented by Republicans.
Associated Press
23 minutes ago
- Associated Press
Not just Big Bird: Things to know about the Center for Public Broadcasting and its funding cuts
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which helps pay for PBS, NPR, 1,500 local radio and television stations as well as programs like 'Sesame Street' and 'Finding Your Roots,' said Friday that it would close after the U.S. government withdrew funding. The organization told employees that most staff positions will end with the fiscal year on Sept. 30. A small transition team will stay until January to finish any remaining work. The private, nonprofit corporation was founded in 1968 shortly after Congress authorized its formation. It now ends nearly six decades of fueling the production of renowned educational programming, cultural content and emergency alerts about natural disasters. Here's what to know: Losing funding President Donald Trump signed a bill on July 24 canceling about $1.1 billion that had been approved for public broadcasting. The White House says the public media system is politically biased and an unnecessary expense, and conservatives have particularly directed their ire at NPR and PBS. Lawmakers with large rural constituencies voiced concern about what the cuts could mean for some local public stations in their state. They warned some stations will have to close. The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday reinforced the policy change by excluding funding for the corporation for the first time in more than 50 years as part of a broader spending bill. How it beganCongress passed legislation creating the body in 1967, several years after then-Federal Communications Commission Chairman Newton Minow described commercial television a 'vast wasteland' and called for programming in the public interest. The corporation doesn't produce programming and it doesn't own, operate or control any public broadcasting stations. The corporation, PBS, NPR are independent of each other as are local public television and radio stations. Rural stations hit hard Roughly 70% of the corporation's money went directly to 330 PBS and 246 NPR stations across the country. The cuts are expected to weigh most heavily on smaller public media outlets away from big cities, and it's likely some won't survive. NPR's president estimated as many as 80 NPR stations may close in the next year. Mississippi Public Broadcasting has already decided to eliminate a streaming channel that airs children's programming like 'Caillou' and 'Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood' 24 hours a day. Maine's public media system is looking at a hit of $2.5 million, or about 12% of its budget, for the next fiscal year. The state's rural residents rely heavily on public media for weather updates and disaster alerts. In Kodiak, Alaska, KMXT estimated the cuts would slice 22% from its budget. Public radio stations in the sprawling, heavily rural state often provide not just news but alerts about natural disasters like tsunamis, landslides and volcanic eruptions. From Big Bird to war documentaries The first episode of 'Sesame Street' aired in 1969. Child viewers, adults and guest stars alike were instantly hooked. Over the decades, characters from Big Bird to Cookie Monster and Elmo have become household favorites Entertainer Carol Burnett appeared on that inaugural episode. She told The Associated Press she was a big fan. 'I would have done anything they wanted me to do,' she said. 'I loved being exposed to all that goodness and humor.' Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. started 'Finding Your Roots' in 2006 under the title 'African American Lives.' He invited prominent Black celebrities and traced their family trees into slavery. When the paper trail ran out, they would use DNA to see which ethnic group they were from in Africa. Challenged by a viewer to open the show to non-Black celebrities, Gates agreed and the series was renamed 'Faces of America,' which had to be changed again after the name was taken. The show is PBS's most-watched program on linear TV and the most-streamed non-drama program. Season 10 reached nearly 18 million people across linear and digital platforms and also received its first Emmy nomination. Grant money from the nonprofit has also funded lesser-known food, history, music and other shows created by stations across the country. Documentarian Ken Burns, celebrated for creating the documentaries 'The Civil War,' 'Baseball' and 'The Vietnam War', told PBS NewsHour said the corporation accounted for about 20% of his films' budgets. He said he would make it up but projects receiving 50% to 75% of their funding from the organization won't. Influence of shows Children's programing in the 1960s was made up of shows like 'Captain Kangaroo,' ''Romper Room' and the violent skirmishes between 'Tom & Jerry.' 'Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood' mostly taught social skills. 'Sesame Street' was designed by education professionals and child psychologists to help low-income and minority students aged 2-5 overcome some of the deficiencies they had when entering school. Social scientists had long noted white and higher income kids were often better prepared. One of the most widely cited studies about the impact of 'Sesame Street' compared households that got the show with those who didn't. It found that the children exposed to 'Sesame Street' were 14% more likely to be enrolled in the correct grade level for their age at middle and high school. Over the years, 'Finding Your Roots' showed Natalie Morales discovering she's related to one of the legendary pirates of the Caribbean and former 'Saturday Night Live' star Andy Samberg finding his biological grandmother and grandfather. It revealed that drag queen RuPaul and U.S. Sen. Cory Booker are cousins, as are actors Meryl Streep and Eva Longoria. 'The two subliminal messages of 'Finding Your Roots,' which are needed more urgently today than ever, is that what has made America great is that we're a nation of immigrants,' Gates told the AP. 'And secondly, at the level of the genome, despite our apparent physical differences, we're 99.99% the same.'
