National podcast features Foster America

A national podcast showcasing efforts to transform child welfare has focused the spotlight on the work of Foster America.

Executive Director Marie Zemler Wu and Fiscal Innovation Specialist D.L. Moffitt were invited on Community In-Site to talk about a new, innovative Foster America fellowship, the Fiscal Leadership Circle.

The Fiscal Leadership Circle launched in 2024 with an inaugural cohort of 14 finance professionals from across the country. Collectively, they oversaw $4.3 billion in funding. Each came to the fellowship to further a project to provide resources to families without the need for formal child welfare involvement.

In the episode “Finding the Money,” host Valarie Frost – a mom, advocate and lived expert of the system – explored how Foster America is reshaping the way the conversation around child welfare financing, shifting the focus from intervening after a crisis to preventing crises altogether by supporting families early.

Marie and D.L. emphasized several challenges to reimagining how child welfare is funded; namely, that the rules for obtaining federal funding for prevention programs (those that strengthen families) are exceedingly complex, even under new legislation that makes more tax dollars available.

“It is much easier in this country to put the next dollar towards foster care than it is to put the next dollar towards things that prevent circumstances where foster care is even a consideration,” Marie said.

This highlights a systemic issue: funding is often more reactive than proactive. Resources are often allocated only after crises occur, instead of being invested in early support systems that could help families who may already be struggling, D.L. said.

The episode details how Foster America’s Fiscal Leadership Circle is working to change this, bringing together decision-makers from state, local, and nonprofit sectors over the course of a year to learn from experts in the field about resource allocation.

You can listen to the full episode here.

Foster America’s FLC fellows graduate in April, but the conversation around reimagining child welfare funding continues. Recruitment for the next cohort of fellows will launch in summer 2025, inviting new fiscal innovators to catalyze change.