In 2016, the Clark County Quality Parenting Initiative Child Welfare Workgroup collaborated with the District Attorney’s Office to address the issue of inconsistent information sharing. The workgroup created a brochure that summarizes law and policy governing information sharing in federal law, Nevada Revised Statutes, Nevada Administrative Code and Clark County Department of Family Services policy. The brochure highlights the benefits of sharing information, which includes building meaningful partnerships between caseworkers, birth families and foster caregivers. It outlines the types of information that must be shared with care providers, such as children’s health and education information, case plans, permanency plans and visitation plans, as well as information that cannot be shared, such as mandated reporter information, court reports, birth parents’ financial records, and HIPAA protected health information, e.g., parents’ drug test and psychological evaluation results. The QPI lead in Clark County reports that the brochure has been helpful in dispelling confusion on the part of caseworkers and supervisors about what information must be shared with foster parents.

Clark County, Nevada has changed its messaging to both current and prospective foster parents to emphasize support for reunification. Families that are interested in adoption are referred to the adoption unit.

The Foster Parent Champions program was started in 2012-13 in response to a need for peer support of foster parents. It employs ten part-time champions who work about 20 hours a week. Minimum qualifications include being a licensed foster parent for at least two years with no disruptions or investigations. Each champion has a unique set of skills, interests and experience, and so the program is able to support families with teens, infants, medically fragile children and sibling groups. The program was initially funded with a federal diligent recruitment grant. When the grant ended, the county Department of Family Services continued the program with its own funds after seeing the program’s results, which included a decrease in placement disruptions.