CLYDE, N.C. _ It's birthday party time here, which means there are gifts and cupcakes and some chartreuse juice the children slurp with lip-smacking gusto. Everybody sings "Happy Birthday" to the birthday girl: the little littles, the tweens fresh from the swimming pool, the kids playing dodgeball; even the teenagers drop their air of disaffected cool long enough to join in.
Everyone gets their own special cupcake: "Would you like chocolate or vanilla?" the adults ask. In short time, faces are coated in neon shades of pink, blue, green and yellow. There's lots of love and laughter and snuggles.
The party breaks up. This child has an appointment with her therapist; that one needs to meet with her caseworker; and that one over there is badly in need of a nap. All told, 45 children are living here in the Broyhill Homes, a sprawling compound of homey bungalows, a gymnasium, swimming pool and fishing pond. In the world of foster care, it is what is known as a group home. Back in the day, they called it an orphanage.
Tucked in the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina, Broyhill is one of 25 group homes operated by the Baptist Children's Homes of North Carolina, one of the largest such companies in the state. But now, a landmark federal law aiming to revamp the foster care system will make it much harder for group homes like this one to exist. (States can delay implementation of the law up to two years, but that means forgoing funding for prevention services.)
The law, called the Family First Prevention Services Act, goes into effect this fall. Starting in October, the federal government won't pay for more than two weeks' stay for a child in a group home, with a few exceptions for children who need extra care.
Baptist Children's Homes fought hard to stop the federal legislation _ so hard, in fact, that it took years for Family First to get through Congress, in part because of the company's opposition. Baptist Children's Homes was able to enlist the help of U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican, who blocked the bill in 2016.
To the dismay of Baptist Children's Homes officials, though, the law passed in 2018 as part of a massive spending bill.
The law had overwhelming support from nearly every state and the U.S. Congress. Many child welfare experts say that group homes, even the homiest among them, are far from an ideal place for a child to grow up. Research shows that foster kids in group homes face worse outcomes, from lower educational attainment to increased rates of homelessness and criminal justice involvement.
And so the lobbying effort drew national attention in child welfare circles.
"Baptist Children's Homes almost single-handedly killed the Family First Act," said Richard Wexler, executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, a child welfare advocacy group based out of Alexandria, Virginia.
"They were prepared to derail even a minimal effort to provide more options for children," Wexler said, "in order to protect their own institution."
On any given day, Baptist Children's Homes houses 180 of the state's children in group homes and manages cases for 30 kids who are placed with foster families, according to J. Keith Henry, Baptist Children's Homes' chief operating officer. To be sure, the organization may lose much of the money it receives from contracts with the state of North Carolina.
(Company officials said it's too soon to know how much and that the state does not tell them which children are eligible for federal funding. But another group home company, Black Mountain Home, told Stateline it could lose up to 40% of its funding.)
Baptist Children's Homes leaders say they provide a needed service when other options aren't available.
"There's not enough foster homes out there," said Linda Morgan, Broyhill's director. "Where would these kids go? Don't just move them around because some law says so."
The company invited Stateline to visit one of its communities, to watch the children interact and attend their events. A Stateline reporter underwent a background check before the visit and agreed not to reveal children's identities and to speak to them only with a staffer present.
