New South Carolina Law Expands Kinship Care

The South Carolina Department of Social Services (DSS) is implementing a new state law that expands the definition of kinship care to include “fictive kin”: non-relatives who have a significant relationship with a child removed from home due to abuse or neglect. Previously, kinship placements were limited to a child’s relatives by birth, marriage, or adoption. Currently about 22% of the 3,885 children in South Carolina’s foster care system are cared for by a kinship caregiver. DSS estimates there are about 70,000 kinship caregivers.

Kinship caregivers are eligible to be foster parents before being licensed . . .