PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Lynette Lometred, Member of Parent Council at The Children's Village
2:11:47
ยท
4 min
Lynette Lometred, a member of the Parent Council at The Children's Village, shares her personal experience with the foster care system and advocates for increased investment in families and support services. She emphasizes the importance of staff retention, preventive services, and listening to all families involved in the foster care process.
- Lometred highlights the positive impact of The Children's Village on her family, including finding supportive foster parents for her son.
- She stresses the need for more funding to retain quality staff and maintain consistent support for families and children in the system.
- Lometred calls for investment in preventive services and support for both biological and foster families to better serve children's interests.
Lynette Lometred
2:11:47
Greetings to the committee and thank you for the opportunity to testify.
2:11:52
I am Lynette Lometred, a member of the parent council at the Children's Village.
2:11:57
We provide one of the broadest continuance of programming in New York with an emphasis on trauma informed and based family based community programming to keep at risk youth safe at home with families and to not youth with with their families after placement.
2:12:14
We hear so much about family values.
2:12:17
How about investing in families?
2:12:18
I came to the Children's Village after many years of trying to heal my family and help my son.
2:12:25
There was a time for, like, two years in a row.
2:12:27
I'd leave the doors open between 1AM and 6AM because if the cops were gonna tell me my son was dead, I wanted to see them coming.
2:12:37
I chose Children's Village because I had never heard from him before.
2:12:41
I am grateful for the time my family had there.
2:12:44
Staff retention was high and had great people working with us.
2:12:48
I made Wednesday dates with my son, and though children's through children's village, we found the two best foster dads I could ever explore ever.
2:12:59
These dads still are part of my family.
2:13:02
Now I was lucky.
2:13:04
Some parents aren't.
2:13:05
We're at a time when we need more funding to keep staff.
2:13:08
Families are only good as the people pouring into us.
2:13:11
Family are only good as strong as the people who help us through.
2:13:15
But when you take an angry, untrusting child, tell them to trust, and then their worker has to leave in a few months and not by choice, but because they cannot pay their own bills and they need to beat their own kids, it disrupts everything.
2:13:30
I have had great workers, and I've seen great workers at the Children's Village.
2:13:35
It took my and I've seen how hard it is when families lose those connections.
2:13:42
It took my son a while to get right.
2:13:45
We didn't just stop at the he messed up in a few places.
2:13:52
What I'm asking for today, he's 26, and he has a family of his own.
2:13:57
But if you take the same services you take my grandson's mother.
2:14:02
She was left at a police station as a child, placed in numerous ballstorms, and never received the services she needed.
2:14:09
As a result, she's left two of her children.
2:14:11
My grandson has felt abandoned and deeply hurt.
2:14:14
If we invest in preventive services and family and staff, we will are ultimately investing in children.
2:14:22
I've been part of the Children's Village Parent Council for ten years.
2:14:26
I believe in this work.
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I believe in paying forward the the blessings my family has.
2:14:33
I believe in investing in families.
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I believe in hearing in families.
2:14:38
I believe certain times like, they gave back my my grandson.
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I had my grandson for a little bit.
2:14:46
They gave him back to the mother, and the mother, again, just dropped him off.
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And I get it.
2:14:56
I get she needs services too.
2:14:59
That's what I'm also fighting for as well.
2:15:02
But I also urge you to listen to us, the the people that take care of the children, that you drop the children, give the children to, because we matter, and we should also be heard.
2:15:14
I urge the city council to invest in policies and programs that I'm almost that uplight uplift families rather than break them apart, but also listen to all families, not just the biological ones.
2:15:28
Foster care should be the last result, not the first response, but also listen to the foster parents.
2:15:35
When more investment in prevention family preservation services, foster parents, equity support, we can build a system that truly serves the best interest of children and families.
2:15:47
Thank you for your time and your patience.