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In San Mateo County, nearly 40% of foster care placements are relative care placements - the placements of children in the home of a grandmother or other relative as an alternative to traditional foster care. Based on the national rate of over 1 in 20 children being raised by a grandparent caregiver, it is estimated that at least 8,250 children in San Mateo County are being raised by a grandparent. When other relatives - from great-grandparents to older siblings - are included, and when California's higher-than-average rates of kin caregiving are taken into account, this figure may be as high as 10,000 children.
Maintenance of these primary family attachments can be crucial to a child's self-esteem and mental health. Children being raised by relatives have already suffered the trauma of losing their birthparents through alcohol or substance abuse dependency, abuse, abandonment, neglect, or death. They are vulnerable to many emotional, developmental, social, and learning problems as a result of their past experiences, and need the security of their extended family providers.
Relative caregiver families have special needs linked to elderly caregivers' poverty, poor health, social isolation, and inadequate access to information and services.
Though relative caregiving crosses all age, education, and income lines, the typical grandparent caregiver is 55 years old, has a low level of formal education, and lives on a limited income.
The largest percentage of relative caregiver families is within the African-American community. Relative caregiving is also quite frequent in San Mateo's Filipino, Asian, and Latino communities.
Much of the burden on relative caregivers is economic. If a child welfare agency has custody of a child under a court order, the government will financially assist a non-relative caregiver at a significantly higher rate than if a grandparent has legal custody of the child. Public assistance payments to grandparents are usually only one-third the amount of payments to non-related foster parents. Nationwide, 27% of children in grandparent care live below the poverty level, and only 40% qualify for free or reduced priced lunch.
Elderly relative caregivers - grandparents, great-grandmothers, and great-great-grandmothers - typically face greater health risks than their peers, including general and mental health, physical stress, loss of vitality, and emotional problems.
Relative caregivers are often socially isolated from their peers due to their return to parenthood. At a time when their peers are enjoying retirement, travel, or even going back to school, relative caregivers instead have the added stress of a new family to care for.
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