Tulsa Advocates for the Protection of Children (TAPC)

Louise Marr: Tulsa Advocates for the Protection of Children.
We support all the children that are
in DHS custody in Tulsa County.
The new shelter has been a labor of love
with our board and many years of work and we've raised
3.3 million dollars to build a new facility
and really enhance it from what DHS was able to do.
So, we have contributed with building the gymnasium,
the cottage for the youngest residents,
the playgrounds, many of the upgrades that you'll see
at the facility.
We also have a staff that employs a teacher
that works with the children at the shelter, and a
social worker that assesses the children, and we contract
with a nurse practitioner to do a medical assessment
on all the children that come into the shelter.
The Kinship Bridge Unit that is at the Laura Dester Shelter
work to place the children immediately into kinship homes
or placements that can be available right away,
so they don't have to experience the trauma
of being entered into the shelter.
So, being able to place them immediately
also places an immediate need on the families
that are taking them in.
So, they need cribs, clothing, diapers, infant items,
and they need help with all those things right away.
We opened the resource center in July.
We were able to be ready to serve the children
when school started.
Maura Browne: A good example of how the resource center comes
into play is we may have a child placed on a Friday afternoon
in a foster home and they need school uniforms
on a Monday. They are able to come over
to the resource center and we can outfit those
children in the school uniforms.
Louise Marr: There's an economic hardship on the foster families
and not only with their basic needs of clothing,
and groceries, school uniforms, all those kinds of things,
we also try to compliment what they are able to do
for those children at times like Christmas.
Maura Browne: They partner with us for the Christmas for Kids program
and that is the program here in Tulsa county
where we provide 1200 wishes for 1200 children
to various donors throughout the community.
Louise Marr: So, each child in foster care turns in a wish list
with what they'd like for Christmas.
And then we fill that wish list.
The Tulsa community has been very generous
in helping us work with these children.
We have private foundations, lots of individuals,
lots of volunteers that have helped make this possible.
Nancy Robison: I've had a relationship with the TAPC board
ever since I've been in child welfare in the early 90's.
It began with me when I had my own caseload.
I can remember with the children on my caseload,
anytime that I needed something special for a child
that we were unable to meet those needs internally
I was always able to reach out to the TAPC board.
They gave my children on my caseload things-
specific things- such as, one time I had a child
who needed a larger size football helmet
so he could participate and they met that need.
I had a little girl, who wanted to do a musical contest,
and we needed the fees for that-
they couldn't be waived- they wrote me a check for that.
Or if a child grew out of their basketball shoes
before the season was over.
I mean they had just always met every specific need.
Maura Browne: One of the other things that I think is really unique
about our situation in Tulsa,
besides just having this resource center, is my partnership
with lots of other agencies.
Agencies in Tulsa that accept goods on behalf
of families and children, we meet monthly and we all
network with each other to share our resources.
If I have too much of something-like
I have a donation of 100 army blankets that I would not use-
I gave those to the Day Center.
Something a foster parent has a formula need
that I don't have, I can contact Emergency Infant Services.
I work a lot with our prevention unit
and also with intake-and that's another area that
the resource center, we do not have to remove a child,
because we are able to go in there and bring them
cribs and beds and maybe even help them furnish
the apartment a little bit.
So, that's another area that keeps that child
from coming into DHS custody.
So, it really is a remarkable and very unique
partnership that DHS has with TAPC.