Toll-Free Recruitment Line 1-866-661-5656

Imagine being taken away from your home. Not knowing where you will go. Leaving behind your favorite things. Now, imagine this through the eyes of a child. When you open your heart and home to foster or adopt a child, you open the possibilities for them - you foster hope.

Foster and adoptive parents are needed to provide safe, stable, nurturing homes for the thousands of children in foster care in Sarasota, Manatee, and DeSoto counties due to abuse, neglect or abandonment. Children range in age from birth through 17 and are frequently part of a sibling group. There is a critical need for foster parents who will care for sibling groups, teens, infants/toddlers and children with specific special needs. Families who can open their homes to provide temporary care for foster children are needed, recognizing that many will eventually return home to their birth families.

In some cases, children are not able to return home to their birth families, and more permanent adoptive homes are needed. We believe that there are no unwanted children - only unfound families - and that every child deserves a safe, loving "forever family".

For more information about fostering or adopting a foster child, please call our toll-free recruitment line at 1-866-661-5656.

You must be 21 years old or older You may rent or own, as long as you have stable housing and adequate space (a bed within a bedroom for each child) You must have adequate income to meet your family's needs now. You can't rely on public assistance to pay your bills. You can work outside the home, stay at home or be retired You may be married or single - with or without children You and all adults in your home must pass a background screening You must complete 30-hours of free, special training called MAPP (Model Approach to Partnership in Parenting) and have either a foster or adoptive home study completed You must be willing to partner with the Safe Children Coalition