A child generally enters foster care after a dependency court and a child welfare agency have determined that the child should be removed from his or her home, for reasons such as substantiated abuse or neglect. Children in foster care may be temporarily placed in various types of out- of-home care arrangements, including in a foster home with relatives, in a foster home with nonrelatives, or in a group residential setting. Federal law requires that state child welfare agencies consider giving preference to placing children with qualified relatives, if consistent with the best interest of the child. Approximately one-quarter of children in foster care in fiscal year 2009 lived with relatives, according to HHS data. Federal law also requires child welfare agencies to make “reasonable efforts” to preserve and reunify families in most cases, but leaves it to states to define what these efforts entail, on a case by case basis. However, at a minimum, child welfare agencies must make a diligent effort to identify and notify all adult relatives shortly after the child’s removal from the custody of the parent. They must also develop a case plan for each foster care child which, among other requirements, must describe the services that will be provided to the parents, child, and foster parents to facilitate the child’s return to his or her own home or permanent placement, and address the child’s needs while in foster care. The plan may also specify goals for placing the child in a permanent home and the steps that a parent (or the principal caretaker) must take before a child can be returned home, if reunification is the goal. In general, returning children to their home is the preferred goal of state child welfare agencies, but this goal is still dependent on various factors, such as the extent that a parent has completed rehabilitative treatment or maintained a meaningful role in the child’s life through visits or other forms of contact. In fiscal year 2009, about half of the nation’s children who exited foster care were reunified with their parent or primary caretaker (see table 1). The Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 (ASFA) was passed, in part, in response to concerns about the length of time children were spending in foster care and included provisions to facilitate child welfare agencies’ ability to place children more quickly into safe and permanent homes. For example, the law requires child welfare agencies to hold permanency hearings within 12 months of the child’s entering foster care to determine the permanent placement for the child and requires child welfare agencies to file a petition to terminate parental rights when a child has been in foster care for 15 of the most recent 22 months (see fig. 1). However, states are not required to file for termination of parental rights if a child is in the care of relatives, the state has not provided necessary services to the family consistent with the case plan, or the state agency documents a compelling reason why filing for termination is not in the best interests of the child. These timelines and possible exceptions are relevant for incarcerated parents who have children in foster care, as 44 percent of inmates released from state prisons in 2008 served sentences longer than a year. Since the enactment of ASFA, the number of children in foster care nationwide has declined by more than 100,000, based on HHS data collected on children in care at the end of each fiscal year. HHS administers federal grant programs and provides information, training, and technical assistance to state child welfare systems. It uses its Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) to capture, report, and analyze information collected by the states. On a semiannual basis, all states submit data to HHS concerning all foster care children for whom state child welfare agencies have responsibility for placement, care, or supervision. HHS also uses its Child and Family Services Reviews (CFSR) to regularly evaluate state child welfare systems’ conformity with federal requirements and help states improve their provision of child welfare services. These reviews examine a range of outcomes and actions to assess states’ performance and enhance their capacity to ensure children’s safety, permanency, and well-being. For example, among many other factors, HHS examines states’ attempts to preserve parent-child relationships and involve parents in discussions about the child’s case plan. To help states provide child welfare services, HHS offers states training and technical assistance through its Children’s Bureau, as well as through its regional offices and various National Resource Centers. HHS also provides information and resources through its website, “The Child Welfare Information Gateway,” which is meant to serve as a comprehensive information resource for the child welfare field. Many children, not only those in foster care, have an incarcerated parent, and this number has grown over time. Since the early 1990s, the number of individuals in prison almost doubled from a little fewer than 800,000 in 1991 to more than 1.5 million in 2009. Many of these individuals have children. As of 2007, an estimated 1.7 million children under the age of 18 had a parent in prison—an increase of almost 80 percent since 1991 (see fig. 2). Fathers comprise more than 90 percent of the parents in prison and their numbers increased about 75 percent between 1991 and 2007. Meanwhile, the number of incarcerated mothers, who were more likely to be primary caretakers before incarceration, more than doubled during this time. Children who are minorities are disproportionately more likely to have an incarcerated parent than white children. In 2007, compared to non-Hispanic white children, non-Hispanic black children were more than seven times more likely to have a parent in prison and Hispanic children were more than two times more likely. Incarcerated parents may have a history of complex problems, such as substance abuse, mental illness, or past trauma. For instance, in 2004, about two-thirds of parents in state prisons met clinical criteria for having substance dependence or abuse based on BJS’s most recent available estimates. The federal government supports a number of residential treatment programs that focus specifically on the treatment of parents with substance abuse problems. Although these programs may require parents with substance abuse problems to live away from home, they generally serve nonincarcerated parents. (See app. II for more information.) Mental health and medical problems were also common for incarcerated parents, although women reported these at higher rates. Incarcerated mothers were also much more likely than fathers to report past physical or sexual abuse (64 percent for mothers in state prison versus 16 percent for fathers). The Second Chance Act of 2007 was enacted to, among other goals, reduce recidivism and provide for services to assist people transitioning back into the community from prisons and jails. The act amended existing federal grant programs and established new grant programs for state agencies and nonprofit organizations to provide a variety of programs or services that include employment assistance, substance abuse treatment, and help in maintaining or reestablishing family ties. DOJ’s Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) oversees and establishes central policy for 116 federal prison facilities, but it does not have authority over or establish policies for state or local corrections agencies or facilities (see table 2). Nevertheless, DOJ provides assistance to these entities in the form of discretionary grants, technical assistance, and information. The complete number of foster care children with an incarcerated parent cannot be identified in the database that HHS employs as part of its oversight of state programs, but their numbers can be reasonably estimated as being in the many thousands. HHS has proposed changes to state reporting requirements that would shed more light on these children; however, the department is currently in the process of revising that proposal and officials had not yet determined if collecting additional data on incarcerated parents will be included in the new proposed requirements. Also, some states are attempting to better identify them and to determine their needs. HHS data provided by states identified at least several thousand children nationwide who entered foster care due to the incarceration of a parent in a recent year, but this does not include the total population of foster care children with incarcerated parents. Through its national data system, AFCARS, HHS collects information about the characteristics and experiences of children in the foster care system, such as their age, race, and the factors associated with their removal from the home and placement into foster care. One potential reason for a child’s removal, among many others listed in AFCARS, is the incarceration of a parent. From this information, it is possible to identify some foster care children with an incarcerated parent—those who have entered foster care solely or in part for the reason of parental incarceration—but it is not possible to identify these children in other circumstances (see figure 3). Our analysis of AFCARS information identified approximately 14,000 children who entered foster care at least partly because of parental incarceration in 2009 alone (about 8 percent of all children entering foster care in 2009); however, this is an undercount of foster care children with an incarcerated parent for several reasons. First, this number does not include children who enter foster care in other circumstances, such as:  When a parent is incarcerated sometime before the child enters foster care. For example, a child welfare official and a researcher told us that some children are placed with a relative when a parent is incarcerated, and then enter foster care when this relative-care situation places the child at risk of abuse or neglect.  When a parent is incarcerated sometime after the child enters foster care.  When an incarcerated parent, such as a noncustodial father, was not the child’s caretaker at the time of removal. Researchers and local officials we interviewed noted that these circumstances were more common than placement in foster care specifically due to parental incarceration. While such additional information about a parent’s incarceration may be in the child’s individual child welfare case file, it is not reported in the data conveyed to HHS and incorporated into AFCARS. Second, state reporting on these children for AFCARS is not necessarily as complete as HHS requires.