Speaker 1: You literally have one church for every child, So whow
Speaker 1: do we still have kids without a foster or adoptive family.
Speaker 2: I'm how the heck is that a reality? In my
Speaker 2: state where we have more churches than gas.
Speaker 1: Stations, America has a foster parent deficit. We meet around
Speaker 1: one hundred and forty thousand more foster homes than we
Speaker 1: have today, and because we don't have enough home for
Speaker 1: these innocent kids, there's devastating consequences.
Speaker 2: And I get handed to two day old baby with
Speaker 2: no place to go, and I didn't know we had
Speaker 2: a place that we stuck kids with no place to go.
Speaker 2: It's places that we take eighteen year olds and we
Speaker 2: move them from the kids shelter to the adult shelter
Speaker 2: because we don't have a better plan for them. And
Speaker 2: that reality to me was like this is unacceptable.
Speaker 1: Today's guest is Chris Campbell, executive director of the One
Speaker 1: One to One Project in Oklahoma, which partners with churches
Speaker 1: to recruit one new foster family a year and help
Speaker 1: strengthen one vulnerable family a month so that they can
Speaker 1: avoid foster care. Hare Portal now operates in all seventy
Speaker 1: seven counties and has served over fifty four thousand children
Speaker 1: twenty thousand just last year, holy smokes.
Speaker 2: Dude, and every day gross right, like even since that
Speaker 2: sixty one thousand kids.
Speaker 1: As of today, you've reduced the foster system from eleven thousand,
Speaker 1: five hundred to six thousand children in foster care.
Speaker 2: We created pathways for people to engage and partner and
Speaker 2: what do you know that that makes a difference.
Speaker 1: Their success in cutting foster care in half is incredible.
Speaker 1: I mean it's wild. I've never heard of a state
Speaker 1: achieving such a reduction until now, and you're about to
Speaker 1: learn how so that you can do this in your
Speaker 1: state too. You can do small things from meeting a
Speaker 1: need on care Portal, which is the largest air sharing
Speaker 1: technology in the country, or significant things like actually becoming
Speaker 1: a foster parent. And if there's an army of us
Speaker 1: doing these things together, we can solve this problem.
Speaker 2: But I see four million people in the state of
Speaker 2: Oklahoma that if we can't figure it out, I don't
Speaker 2: know who can, but I believe we can't.
Speaker 1: This is the Army of Normal Folks podcast, where our
Speaker 1: mission is to make service easier for all of us
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Speaker 1: to the episode Chris Campbell from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, which
Speaker 1: is basically Tulsa.
Speaker 2: Basically Tulsa. Yeah, we would probably be offended, you know,
Speaker 2: but be Broken Airs part of Tulsall.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Memphis.
Speaker 2: He would love it.
Speaker 1: Chris is the executive director of the One One One Project,
Speaker 1: which very briefly that you're about to get into is
Speaker 1: the idea of one church for one family, for one
Speaker 1: purpose and that that can change everything. So explaining that
Speaker 1: and getting into it, you guys have helped cut foster
Speaker 1: care in half in your state in Oklahoma from eleven
Speaker 1: five hundred kids to six thousand.
Speaker 2: How Yeah, so there's sixty two hundred church in the
Speaker 2: state of Oklahoma. So the big idea was, Man, what
Speaker 2: if we got more people involved. There's enough churches, there's
Speaker 2: enough families, and there's enough people that want to help,
Speaker 2: they just don't know how to help. So how do
Speaker 2: we create those pathways for more people to help Because
Speaker 2: the government can't do it on their own. So we
Speaker 2: created pathways for people to engage and partner and what
Speaker 2: do you know that that makes a difference in the
Speaker 2: lives of kids and families. That can keep kids out
Speaker 2: of foster care, can help kids reunify faster, it can
Speaker 2: support those professionals that work day in and day out
Speaker 2: to take care of those families. So that play what
Speaker 2: we've gotten to see over the last ten years has
Speaker 2: actually led with a whole bunch of collaboration and work
Speaker 2: on our government side as well to changing our system
Speaker 2: making a difference in it.
Speaker 1: So I love that you're not one of these guys
Speaker 1: is just saying government sucks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you worked with you got to work with government,
Speaker 2: you know, like in our state, you know, our state
Speaker 2: agencies is some of the largest. I mean, if you
Speaker 2: look at capital and investment and staff count, you know
Speaker 2: they're they're doing good work because they care. But sometimes
Speaker 2: they have obstacles and red tape that prevents them from
Speaker 2: doing it as well as we would all like to
Speaker 2: see it done. And so we can either throw rocks
Speaker 2: at them and say just get better, or we can
Speaker 2: lean in and and try to help learn what needs
Speaker 2: to be changed and fill those holes, those gaps in
Speaker 2: the system where they can't they can't function. But just
Speaker 2: put a number on it. It's a lot of people.
Speaker 3: From what you told me, it's like three thousand Child
Speaker 3: and Family Service, So.
Speaker 2: Just in the child Welfare division. There's a there's about
Speaker 2: three thousand staff employees employees. So if you look at
Speaker 2: it from a corporation, you're right, it would be one
Speaker 2: of the largest employers in the state of Oklahoma.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: So if you look at these different government enties, they're
Speaker 2: they're investing a lot in people. And we talk about
Speaker 2: all the time. You know, a lot of churches will
Speaker 2: know about their fire chief and their police chief, but
Speaker 2: they don't know nothing about child welfare some these other
Speaker 2: government agencies. But these are the people that are responsible
Speaker 2: when it's the ceiling fan. It's the government child welfare
Speaker 2: folks that are in the middle of the hardest of
Speaker 2: the muck with families. And so I have deep respect
Speaker 2: for my government counterparts and the work that they do.
Speaker 1: I love. I actually love to hear that. I don't
Speaker 1: hear that all the time, and I love to hear that.
Speaker 1: So I think it was two thousand and one, this
Speaker 1: idea of one one one it started to become a
Speaker 1: thing kind of take me through what you were doing
Speaker 1: and why and what happened, and just give us, give
Speaker 1: us a little bit of a foundation before we go forward.
Speaker 1: So we understand that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so even in the state of Oklahoma, which is
Speaker 2: traditionally more of a red state, more of a faith community.
Speaker 2: I think what the child welfare people recognized is when
Speaker 2: we're having these government round tables and problem solving, there's
Speaker 2: not church people sitting at this table. And that's a problem,
Speaker 2: right because they bring so much connection and favor and
Speaker 2: relationship and resource, both tangible financial resource but people resource,
Speaker 2: and they're not here and they don't care or seemingly
Speaker 2: care as their perspective. So, Oklahoma had a lawsuit related
Speaker 2: to some child dust that happened, and that lawsuit required
Speaker 2: the government to partner in the community better. That was
Speaker 2: one of the required outcomes from the settlement. But it
Speaker 2: also was the felt reality that hey, we're alone in
Speaker 2: this work. We're doing these visits with these families that
Speaker 2: somebody called in on and it's the worst of the
Speaker 2: worst situations, and we don't have anybody to support us,
Speaker 2: let alone to support these families because we've not invited
Speaker 2: them or there's not pathways for that. So that was
Speaker 2: kind of the environment that it was like, enough is enough,
Speaker 2: Let's figure out how to partner. And some of the
Speaker 2: leaders at the agency were like, Hey, this can't beat government, right,
Speaker 2: because government smells like government, it looks like government. It's
Speaker 2: going to be received as government is to be some
Speaker 2: entity or something out here that's separate. And so one
Speaker 2: one One Project was created through some government people, some
Speaker 2: church people, some community advocates that said, hey, what would
Speaker 2: it look like to create a nonprofit that's its sole
Speaker 2: focus was community faith mobilization in the state.
Speaker 1: And the idea of one church for one family, for
Speaker 1: one purpose, the purpose supporting foster ko.
Speaker 2: Yeah, foster kids. And so at the time, we had
Speaker 2: eighty two hundred kids in care. Actually the first event
Speaker 2: that happened was the eighty forty six conference because there
Speaker 2: was eight thousand and forty six kids in care on
Speaker 2: January first of twenty eleven. Well, we did this conference
Speaker 2: and then the numbers continued to rise and they rose
Speaker 2: to a level that they begin to get out of control,
Speaker 2: almost twelve thousand kids in care. So it's kind of
Speaker 2: one of those things where you have a great idea
Speaker 2: thing is going to work, and it seems like, actually
Speaker 2: the opposite happened, right, And it really wasn't until twenty
Speaker 2: fifteen where we implement and I think you guys have
Speaker 2: had care Portal on on the show.
Speaker 1: One of the things we talk about often because it
Speaker 1: is such an effective idea and it's implemented. Implementation has
Speaker 1: now been incredibly effective across a broad array of uses.
Speaker 2: But you guys, we were the very first implementer of
Speaker 2: care portal, were really yeah we were. Yeah, we were Oklahoma, surprise,
Speaker 2: you know. So care Portal had done a couple of
Speaker 2: pilots and a couple of different locations, and one of
Speaker 2: those locations was Oklahoma.
Speaker 1: For those who haven't listened to the care Portal episode
Speaker 1: or even though what care portal is that maybe listened
Speaker 1: to us for the first time briefly, Yep, what is that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you have workers over here that are working with
Speaker 2: families that need help, and you've got people over here
Speaker 2: that want to help. Care Portal is the web based
Speaker 2: platform that connects the two and really simple to give
Speaker 2: opportunity without the red tape to directly serve families through
Speaker 2: that worker. And so that platform has now been around
Speaker 2: ten years, over five years. Cell phone, Yeah, on cell
Speaker 2: phones it's web app and a phone app. Now over
Speaker 2: five hundred thousand kids served through this. Hey, somebody who
Speaker 2: knows the family advocates for the family. Somebody in the
Speaker 2: community that cares responds and says, hey, I can help
Speaker 2: with that, whether it's a dishwasher to a car seat,
Speaker 2: to a bed to utility bill.
Speaker 1: Yeah. One of the best stories I've ever heard is
Speaker 1: this lady gets a job, but she has to get
Speaker 1: her kids to daycare. The job helps pay for daycare,
Speaker 1: but she doesn't have a car seat. Some family knows
Speaker 1: about it, puts it on care portal, and somebody on
Speaker 1: a phone that's just sitting there and they say, hey,
Speaker 1: this woman needs a new car seat so she can
Speaker 1: go to work. And you just have your care Portal
Speaker 1: app and you see the needs and anything you like,
Speaker 1: you click done and you buy a car seat and
Speaker 1: that's It takes ten minutes and you change somebody's way.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, yeap one hundred percent. And to advocate for the
Speaker 2: needs of the family, to know what the reality is
Speaker 2: that they that they have, but also recognizing that there's
Speaker 2: that worker, there's that government worker who's saying, hey, here's
Speaker 2: a family that we think can make it right. I mean,
Speaker 2: they could put on a request for any family, but
Speaker 2: most likely the families that they're putting on careport are
Speaker 2: the ones that they think have a chance because they're
Speaker 2: cheering for him too, right, They're cheering for that dad
Speaker 2: that's waking up at five o'clock in the morning and
Speaker 2: walking twelve miles to get to work, but then trying
Speaker 2: to figure out how he's going to do his you know,
Speaker 2: addictive recovery case plan and his child welfare plans and
Speaker 2: his kid's visitation. Right, but he don't have a car.
Speaker 2: But the worker sees the hard work that dad's doing
Speaker 2: to try to change his life, and she's like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I want dad to have a bus pass, you know,
Speaker 2: like I want dad to be able to have transportation.
Speaker 2: I want dad to have people cheering for him because
Speaker 2: he's an amazing dude, you know, but when he's on
Speaker 2: drugs or when he's under the influence of alcohol, he's struggled.
Speaker 2: But he's making this progress and we all need to
Speaker 2: be celebrating that. And we want his kids out of
Speaker 2: foster care, you know. So sometimes the best family for
Speaker 2: kids is not a new one, it's the one that
Speaker 2: they've always had that just needs that extra support and
Speaker 2: extra advocacy for that.
Speaker 1: And so she puts that on care portal. Somebody buys
Speaker 1: a bus pass and it's great, and that way, it's
Speaker 1: not somebody that wants something asking, is somebody advocating for
Speaker 1: someone who needs it. So great. So in twenty fifteen,
Speaker 1: there's this thing called care port.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we launched it first time, and it was it
Speaker 2: was horrible. I mean it was really it was not good.
Speaker 2: I mean I could pick on Adrian in the room,
Speaker 2: but I mean it was pragmatically a newsletter an email list, right,
Speaker 2: it was like here you have somebody over here putting
Speaker 2: it on okay, email that out to everybody that's on
Speaker 2: our contact list, right. And then over time, I mean
Speaker 2: I joke, I've seen care Portal have like five or
Speaker 2: six brain surgeries and again, normal folks, I mean, these
Speaker 2: are some guys in Kansas City that have never built
Speaker 2: any kind of technology platform, just you know, like, hey,
Speaker 2: what can we do for the kids in our backyard?
Speaker 2: And an idea came from that and now this really
Speaker 2: cool platform and tool and partnership among thousands of churches
Speaker 2: and thousands of nonprofits and government entities all across the country.
Speaker 1: Okay, So in twenty twenty five, the one one one
Speaker 1: project I guess it's called celebrated a landmark milestone. Care
Speaker 1: Portal now operates in all seventy seven counties and has
Speaker 1: served over fifty four thousand children, twenty thousand just last year,
Speaker 1: holy smokes, dude.
Speaker 2: Yep, and every day grows, right like even since that,
Speaker 2: sixty one thousand kids as of today. And what's been
Speaker 2: really cool is, of course, strategically, I think we all
Speaker 2: look at and say, hey, where's the greatest amount of
Speaker 2: need go go there? And so you know, surprisingly Oklahoma
Speaker 2: City is twentieth fish and top largest metros in the country.
Speaker 2: A lot of people don't know about Oklahoma. Oh there's
Speaker 2: people there. Yeah, there's a lot of people. Guess some
Speaker 2: bits a great I mean, but it's a big city
Speaker 2: and has all the big city challenges in Tulsa's very similar.
Speaker 2: But we're also very rural. I mean, Oklahoma has the
Speaker 2: same land mass as Florida does, right Like, it's just
Speaker 2: as big of a state, more coastline actually than Florida
Speaker 2: than because of all of our lakes, right, but very rural,
Speaker 2: very rural. And so you can drive three four hours
Speaker 2: and still be in Oklahoma and a lot of tribal
Speaker 2: lands to a lot of tribal lands, a lot of
Speaker 2: rural poverty because of that lot of isolation. And we
Speaker 2: joke in some of our communities there's more cows and people,
Speaker 2: you know, but there's kids there, there's families there, and
Speaker 2: those families are just as important to us as the
Speaker 2: ones in the urban core, but they're just as disconnected
Speaker 2: because of the isolation in those communities. Sometimes it's just
Speaker 2: the distance and the lack of knowledge, or the stereotypes,
Speaker 2: or you know, just the challenges that our rural communities face.
Speaker 2: And so it was really important for us that we
Speaker 2: just didn't show up for the metros, you know, especially
Speaker 2: in day and age, post COVID and even with Amazon
Speaker 2: delivery and all these other services. A family can be
Speaker 2: in their isolated community and never go into town right
Speaker 2: and sometimes even with some of the rules on schooling,
Speaker 2: never go to school right. They're they're doing everything in
Speaker 2: their little isolated spot, and so when things boil up
Speaker 2: and there's a crisis, they have no one to call,
Speaker 2: have no one that knows about their situation. And yet
Speaker 2: oftentimes that's child Welfare is interacting there for the first time,
Speaker 2: and oftentimes it's some sweet, you know, young caseworker, you
Speaker 2: know twenty three, twenty four stepping into this really difficult situation.
Speaker 2: And there's no nonprofits that are in this community. There's
Speaker 2: no food bank or services, and so it's really isolating
Speaker 2: you when you don't know what to do, how to
Speaker 2: help where who are you going to call? But yet
Speaker 2: there's churches and every one of those communities more churches
Speaker 2: and gas stations. In the state of Oklahoma, there's a
Speaker 2: church that somebody planted way back in the nineteen hundreds
Speaker 2: in every little county seat in town, not far away.
Speaker 2: And so it would make rational sense that that would
Speaker 2: be the network. If you could figure out how to
Speaker 2: engage that could really change a lot of things in
Speaker 2: those communities, acting at as a as a hub for
Speaker 2: service and connection and resource.
Speaker 1: Flow, which is the whole idea behind project one one one.
Speaker 1: And then you have this cool tool called care Portal
Speaker 1: that you implement in supports that network twenty fifteen, the
Speaker 1: sports network and the connectivity starts. That's right, and now
Speaker 1: a few messages from our general sponsors.
Speaker 2: But first, earlier this.
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Speaker 1: We are now really, because of the success of these
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Speaker 1: be right back. So you've reduced the foster system from
Speaker 1: eleven thousand, five hundred to six thousand children in foster care,
Speaker 1: and Alex says, there's sixty two hundred churches in your state, right,
Speaker 1: you literally have one church for every child. So why
Speaker 1: do we still have kids without a foster or adoptive family.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a great question, and I think part of
Speaker 2: that is not by.
Speaker 1: The way that question can be misconstrued, that is, by
Speaker 1: no means a criticism. Yeah, that's right, because you've cut
Speaker 1: it in half. Yep, but it still is an inconvenient
Speaker 1: fact that there's that many. So what I guess, I
Speaker 1: guess what next? Why do we still have this going on?
Speaker 2: I think we all recognize that sometimes we have simple
Speaker 2: goals for the sake of communication, but then when we
Speaker 2: get underneath, we realize the problem is a lot more
Speaker 2: complicated than any of them want to make it out.
Speaker 1: Is not universal, that's in business, families anything.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So we we want to make it the reality
Speaker 2: of it simple, but we would be ignorant to say
Speaker 2: it's that simple. And so on the church side, the
Speaker 2: reality is a lot of our churches are small, little
Speaker 2: family churches. A lot that you know are aging right,
Speaker 2: that are that are of an age that they're like, hey,
Speaker 2: we can't we can't raise kids anymore. But they have
Speaker 2: a lot to offer, but it may not be in
Speaker 2: opening up their home. We'd also recognize the challenges with
Speaker 2: a lot of our kids in the system. Not not
Speaker 2: every family is out of the gate equipped. You know,
Speaker 2: even even if you've had kids, you you probably need
Speaker 2: some additional equipping and training and development to make you
Speaker 2: ready to parent kids that come from our places, kids
Speaker 2: that come from trauma. Are kids that come from a
Speaker 2: different cultural context that you do. And so what we
Speaker 2: recognize is that kids are coming out of places of need,
Speaker 2: sometimes of rural poverty and even sometimes of urban poverty.
Speaker 2: But kids in the foster care system come from all
Speaker 2: sorts of different scenarios. So even a blanket foster care
Speaker 2: is ignorant because it's as complicated as people are, right,
Speaker 2: it's different as people are. But I think the simple
Speaker 2: idea is we've got more than enough people, you know.
Speaker 2: But it's a lack of development and it's a lack
Speaker 2: of connection that keeps people from saying yes, which ultimately, Bill,
Speaker 2: I think is fear.
Speaker 1: I think I think we have talked foster care a
Speaker 1: fair amount on here. I mean, it's not something that
Speaker 1: we just it's not a focus. It's just come up right, right,
Speaker 1: I from all of those interviews and all of the
Speaker 1: different faces and all of the different work being done.
Speaker 1: I do think fear plays a huge role in it.
Speaker 1: And I don't think it's fear of opening your home them.
Speaker 1: I think it's it's the fear of, you know.
Speaker 2: How how much work is this going to be, which
Speaker 2: is to.
Speaker 1: Is this child going to interrupt my already organic nuclear family,
Speaker 1: and what's that going to be on my own children?
Speaker 1: I mean, and I think those are legitimate.
Speaker 2: Fears, are all legitimate fears, and I think for all
Speaker 2: of us, experience and relationship over time is what gives
Speaker 2: us the context of the wisdom to say, Okay, I'm
Speaker 2: ready for that, right, or there's other ways that I
Speaker 2: can be involved, and that is just as good, Right,
Speaker 2: That's just as helpful. And so all of us that
Speaker 2: are in the foster care space would say, our heart
Speaker 2: is not to grow foster care. Our heart is to
Speaker 2: keep kids out of foster care.
Speaker 1: And you'd like to work yourself out of there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely right. And so I think every state, if
Speaker 2: they're doing the things that they should be doing, they're
Speaker 2: thinking more about going upstream and prevention and community work,
Speaker 2: and then secondarily they're thinking about kinship care because like,
Speaker 2: kids should belong in, if not their immediate family, in
Speaker 2: this broader family if possible. And so that work is
Speaker 2: all work that we're trying to do. So to say, hey,
Speaker 2: more families is the easy answer. Yeah, but it's the
Speaker 2: right kind of families that really can provide those kids
Speaker 2: a thriving environment, whether it be their complex behavioral needs,
Speaker 2: whether it be the disability that they have, or whether
Speaker 2: it be just the room. You know, hey, I've got siblings,
Speaker 2: and we want those kids to all be placed in
Speaker 2: a home together. Well, for anybody to take on one
Speaker 2: extra child in their home, but to take on three,
Speaker 2: four or five, that's a significant jump, right, But we
Speaker 2: would believe there's more than enough families. It's finding them,
Speaker 2: it's equipping them, it's giving them pathways to have those
Speaker 2: experiences to get them to a yes, versus just trying
Speaker 2: to cherry pick them off and throwing them in. And
Speaker 2: because they saw a picture of a kid and we're like, oh,
Speaker 2: you know, I feel empathy, but they're not ready. And
Speaker 2: so I think the big work that even what you're
Speaker 2: talking about on this podcast to do is how do
Speaker 2: we develop a community and a culture that gets the
Speaker 2: experiences so that they are ready for those yeses instead
Speaker 2: of coming in for the wrong reasons and the wrong ideas.
Speaker 1: I got a question about you. I didn't know this,
Speaker 1: but Alex told me. You've got a music degree and
Speaker 1: you got an MBA. You've worked in manufacturing, you've worked
Speaker 1: in consulting, you were pastors, now you're running a statewide nonprofit.
Speaker 1: I mean confused, that's a lot. I guess with all
Speaker 1: of those different experiences, when was it and what was it?
Speaker 1: And I can't believe it was just that two day
Speaker 1: old baby, But when was it? What was it that
Speaker 1: pivoted you and said, Okay, this with all of this background,
Speaker 1: this education, and all these opportunities, and you've got.
Speaker 2: Five children, I think five children, yeah.
Speaker 1: And Ashley, your wife, you'll be married, yeah, thirty years.
Speaker 2: I think five years. Coming to say five years?
Speaker 1: What pivoted to this? Is it?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I mean that's a million dollar question for all of
Speaker 2: us that I think we all should take some time
Speaker 2: to explore. But one of my favorite quotes is every
Speaker 2: and I don't I don't even know. Somebody, please help
Speaker 2: me figure out who said this quote. But every man
Speaker 2: seems lazy pursuing another man's dream.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've heard that too.
Speaker 2: I don't know, right, I don't know who is facious
Speaker 2: or somebody else very smart? Right, some wise somebody old?
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: But from an early age, I've loved mobilizing people. I'm
Speaker 2: a galvanizer. I love I love putting people together for things,
Speaker 2: and so everywhere that i've I've ever been. That's part
Speaker 2: of if I'm not living, if I'm not doing that right.
Speaker 2: And so I love the people component. I feel like
Speaker 2: God cursed the work of my hands. I can't build
Speaker 2: a thing for the life of me, you know, with
Speaker 2: my hands, and so I had to learn how to
Speaker 2: do things with people. So I love the people side
Speaker 2: of things. But personally, we had you know, we had
Speaker 2: a typical suburban family from the outside, white family and
Speaker 2: the burbs with Oklahoma and broken Arow. I grew up
Speaker 2: in Broken Arrow. It would look like everything was like
Speaker 2: working and together, but inside we had some financial troubles.
Speaker 2: We had some bumps with mental health and mental illness
Speaker 2: that led to chaos in my family in a way
Speaker 2: that God redeemed and restored and made some beautiful things
Speaker 2: out of. But there were some moments if I didn't
Speaker 2: have the extra supports and resources, we could have been
Speaker 2: bumping up to some system things right. So I think
Speaker 2: that gives me some empathy to recognize that all of
Speaker 2: us are one family decision away from go in a
Speaker 2: wrong direction, and there needs to be some humility with that.
Speaker 2: But the other thing, I'd give some credit my sister.
Speaker 2: I'm the youngest of four siblings, three older siblings, and
Speaker 2: they one that's closest to me is nine years older,
Speaker 2: and when she was on a college break, she actually
Speaker 2: invited me to go with her down to Mexico on
Speaker 2: a medical trip, medical mission trip. And I was eight.
Speaker 2: I was like, extra baggage, that's kind of cool. So
Speaker 2: I had this opportunity with my sister to go, and
Speaker 2: that was one of the opportunities of we're all standing
Speaker 2: on somebody else's shoulders. But a cultural is like.
Speaker 1: My dad, my mom.
Speaker 2: My mom was one of the most servant hearted people
Speaker 2: in the world, like set an example for me to
Speaker 2: serve and to give. It was a culture that was
Speaker 2: created in my life and I can't leave that right,
Speaker 2: Like I think the Scripture points to this idea. If
Speaker 2: we point a child on the way that they should go,
Speaker 2: they're not going to depart from it. And I think
Speaker 2: it's about culture, even team culture, when you create a
Speaker 2: culture that this is just what we do it and
Speaker 2: it's healthy, right, we want that for our family and
Speaker 2: our kids in our life. And so no matter what
Speaker 2: I was doing, whether it was working in the ice
Speaker 2: cream Planet Bluebell, I was thinking about families and kids, and.
Speaker 1: There's really very few creative football coaches. There's a few,
Speaker 1: there's pioneers. Nobody will know this, but how Mummy was
Speaker 1: the guy who kind of invented the air raid and
Speaker 1: it changed the way offenses work. And as a result,
Speaker 1: there are people like Pete Carroll who changed in money
Speaker 1: Kiffin money Kiffin in a big way, who changed the
Speaker 1: way defenses work as an answer to the way offenses worked. Right,
Speaker 1: But I'm naming two or three coaches in the history
Speaker 1: of youth, high school, college, professional sport of football over
Speaker 1: the last seventy years, So think I can name two. Really,
Speaker 1: Bear Brownt was pretty greative with the Veer, but that's
Speaker 1: maybe three names that really created a way football world
Speaker 1: and millions of people who've coached it yours truly. What
Speaker 1: we do is we copy each other. Yeah, And in coaching,
Speaker 1: you've got the exes and o's, but you also have
Speaker 1: the way you interact with your players because you know,
Speaker 1: it's not about the ex's and o's, it's about the joke.
Speaker 1: So inspiring kids to play well and teamwork and all
Speaker 1: that is an equal part of coaching as it is
Speaker 1: just knowing the mechanics of the game. And other coach
Speaker 1: those Right. So the point is a guy like news
Speaker 1: coach thirty three years, I am not like any I
Speaker 1: am not exactly like any one coach I've ever had,
Speaker 1: But they are parts of me as a coach that
Speaker 1: are made up of the pieces of all these coaches. Right.
Speaker 1: So my my reality as a coach, my ara, my
Speaker 1: work as a coach is truly a culmination of what
Speaker 1: I think are the best parts of each coach that
Speaker 1: I liked, pulled together to make me to be the
Speaker 1: best that I can be. Right. I wonder, creatively, as
Speaker 1: a musician, having worked in manufacturing, having been a pastor,
Speaker 1: three very different disciplines all rolled up into one psyche,
Speaker 1: how if all of those parts have kind of created
Speaker 1: this odd mix of the guy that runs a nonprofit
Speaker 1: and if you use each of those parts and how
Speaker 1: you do it? Because here's the deal. You're the first
Speaker 1: dude in three years to show up with props to
Speaker 1: metaphorically make a point. That's got to be the artist, right.
Speaker 1: But I do wonder. I wonder about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think that's what I would encourage your kids.
Speaker 2: That's what I want for kids, right, because I think
Speaker 2: we all need data and experiences to help us discover
Speaker 2: right like to and that's I think part of the curiosity.
Speaker 2: I would encourage all your listeners even in this thing
Speaker 2: is ask a bunch of questions. Right, I'm like, I
Speaker 2: had no Like I think back to my college experience.
Speaker 2: Looking out the window of my dorm room was a
Speaker 2: government DHS child well for office. There were kids in
Speaker 2: that office when I was in college, and it not
Speaker 2: once crossed my mind. But now every time that I
Speaker 2: go back, I see that office and I know there's
Speaker 2: kids there, and I'm wondering just the community of that. Right,
Speaker 2: you are hyper passionate about that.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I mean hyper where why? Uh? You know?
Speaker 2: I think it's a gift that God gives you, right,
Speaker 2: And I think that's where you have to you not
Speaker 2: apologize for it, just embrace it and just say, hey, like,
Speaker 2: this is this is what I'm called to do.
Speaker 1: It's clear and all this other stuff set it up. No,
Speaker 1: all of these other things on in life set you
Speaker 1: up and be where you are. But for you to
Speaker 1: be as passionate about what you're doing it it's inspiring.
Speaker 2: Well, and we're all volunteers. At the end of the day,
Speaker 2: we have choices, And I think that's the thing we
Speaker 2: have to remember, is we have a choice where we
Speaker 2: put our time and our energy and our effort. We
Speaker 2: have the choice which boat we're going to get in
Speaker 2: and go for the ride. And so if it's not
Speaker 2: the thing that is helping you fulfill your calling and
Speaker 2: your design, man, wouldn't it be more fun to be
Speaker 2: on a different boat that fits you know who you
Speaker 2: are and what you're created to be, And so you know, I, yeah,
Speaker 2: I do care about the foster care system, but I
Speaker 2: care just as much about mobilizing people into their calling.
Speaker 2: And so that's what probably keeps me motivated.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. Alex made a point all air,
Speaker 1: that's an interesting question, which is how many falster families
Speaker 1: do you still need to recruit? And maybe more importantly,
Speaker 1: not more importantly, but equally importantly, what's that gap and
Speaker 1: what happens to kids inside that gap?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a great question. So in foster care, just
Speaker 2: like any entity, right, if you're not recruiting new you're dying, right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: because there has to be attrition. There's always attrition, and
Speaker 2: a lot of it's fair attrition, right I change of
Speaker 2: seasoned life circumstances whatever, moving moving. But in Oklahoma and
Speaker 2: every state, we try to not talk about it too much,
Speaker 2: but the reality a lot of children are being adopted.
Speaker 2: And so every year in Oklahoma, fifteen hundred to twenty
Speaker 2: five hundred kids are being adopted out of the state
Speaker 2: of Oklahoma Childwell First system. About fifty percent of kids
Speaker 2: go home in the state of Oklahoma, but about fifty
Speaker 2: percent of the kids will never go home, And so
Speaker 2: those families adopt those kids that the foster families that
Speaker 2: love those kids, who knew those kids, who have fought
Speaker 2: for those kids, tried to get them reunified with their families.
Speaker 2: When that doesn't work out, ninety five percent of the time,
Speaker 2: it's the foster family that adopts that child, and we
Speaker 2: want to celebrate that, but the reality is that work
Speaker 2: is still not done at adoption. We want to say, hey,
Speaker 2: this moment, check gets done right and everything's great, and
Speaker 2: when in reality that we know some of the toughest
Speaker 2: work actually happens post adoption, right when a child goes
Speaker 2: through those teenage years and they're dealing with their realities
Speaker 2: of how can my mom and dad do these things right?
Speaker 2: Like when that weight begins to hit, and the emotions
Speaker 2: and the feelings. Even in the best of homes, it
Speaker 2: can really rock a young person and create some really
Speaker 2: tumultuous years. And that family doesn't need to be fostering
Speaker 2: more kids as they're walking through that with that child.
Speaker 1: Right, that makes so much sense. So as they adopt
Speaker 1: and as they move on the number of foster kids,
Speaker 1: if we haven't gone upstream far enough and stopped it,
Speaker 1: they keep coming. So if you're not constantly developing families,
Speaker 1: you're losing.
Speaker 2: You're always your numbers are ratio wiser going down. So
Speaker 2: if you look at the math, you know, I didn't
Speaker 2: love algebra, but you know you got numerator denominator that
Speaker 2: kind of thing, right, you can you can impact one
Speaker 2: of the two sides. You get more foster families and
Speaker 2: your ratio looks better, or you help prevent less kids
Speaker 2: going into the system, you know, and so both both
Speaker 2: are worthy causes. Both you don't have a whole lot
Speaker 2: of control of if you're doing the work right, other
Speaker 2: than how can we provide more supports for these kids
Speaker 2: and families from different communities to make sure kids don't
Speaker 2: go in care? So in Oklahoma, you know, we have
Speaker 2: zero point five five families for every child in the system. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so one family for every two kids, pragmatically, right.
Speaker 1: You know what's interesting Also, as you said, there were
Speaker 1: three thousand people working for the government and there's about
Speaker 1: six thousand. That also means you have one worker for
Speaker 1: every two kids. You would think with one worker for
Speaker 1: every two kids and one family for every two kids,
Speaker 1: that y'all would have this thing under wraps.
Speaker 2: Right, And from the outside, looking in the data makes
Speaker 2: seem like, well, there's a lot of waste there, right,
Speaker 2: or a lot of fluffs. What it feels like, what
Speaker 2: it feels like. So let me let me unpack that
Speaker 2: even a little bit, because I think this is really important,
Speaker 2: and I would say every day I learned something new.
Speaker 2: I've been doing this now ten years, and I can
Speaker 2: share part of my story. I had a friend invite
Speaker 2: me to a local shelter church leader of a really
Speaker 2: large church was a church leader as I was a minister.
Speaker 2: I was a paid vocational pastor, and my job at
Speaker 2: this big church was to help people serve in the
Speaker 2: community and be connected in community outreach. I was the
Speaker 2: outreach small group's pastor. I was in charge of all
Speaker 2: things adults for a church of about six to ten
Speaker 2: thousand at the time. It was a big church, lots
Speaker 2: of people. And I had a friend that said, hey,
Speaker 2: I love God was doing some really cool stuff with
Speaker 2: adoption in our church. A lot of families were adopting.
Speaker 2: People were saying, hey, man, our kids ministry looks like
Speaker 2: the un right that because these kids were coming in
Speaker 2: from all over the world, and it was really cool.
Speaker 1: That's Christ.
Speaker 2: It was beautiful. But one of my good friends comes
Speaker 2: knocking on my door one day and she's got an idea.
Speaker 2: And as a leader, you know, ideas are a diamond dozent, right,
Speaker 2: everybody's got an idea, right, But this is a really
Speaker 2: good friend, a really smart friend, a friend that I
Speaker 2: deeply respect. And she's like, hey, I want to take
Speaker 2: you some place. And I'm like, absolutely, Rachel, where do
Speaker 2: you want to go? And she's like, I want to
Speaker 2: take you to our local kids shelter. But I didn't
Speaker 2: know we had a kids shelter. I'm a you know,
Speaker 2: not old old man, but thirty year old man, right,
Speaker 2: that's been highly involved. My head has not been in
Speaker 2: the sand. And it's my job to get people connected
Speaker 2: in the community. And I didn't know we had a
Speaker 2: place that we stuck kids with no place to go.
Speaker 2: And so she takes me to the shelter and I
Speaker 2: get handed to two day old baby with no place
Speaker 2: to go in the state of Oklahoma. And this is
Speaker 2: pre one, one one, this is like two thousand and nine,
Speaker 2: and literally she's like, yeah, this baby came from the hospital.
Speaker 2: Why the heck is this baby here? Well, there's no
Speaker 2: foster family available anywhere in the state of Oklahoma that
Speaker 2: at this moment can take this to dal old baby.
Speaker 2: And I'm like, how the heck is that a reality
Speaker 2: in my state where we have more churches than gas stations?
Speaker 1: How was that a reality in.
Speaker 2: The United States of America?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: And I'm taking families around the world to do these
Speaker 2: trips to work in orphanages and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2: Ragmatically in our backyard, we have this thing we.
Speaker 1: Call shelter ten minutes.
Speaker 2: It's supposed to be temporary, but yet, as Ashley crossed
Speaker 2: that same place that Ashley talked about on this podcast,
Speaker 2: it's places that we take eighteen year olds and we
Speaker 2: move them from the kids shelter to the adult shelter
Speaker 2: because we don't have a better plan for them. And
Speaker 2: that reality to me was like my wattership, Boba, this
Speaker 2: is unacceptable, right, how can we tolerate that?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: And I think in the science of the stuff that
Speaker 2: we're talking about, right, like the pain of the current
Speaker 2: situation has to outweigh the effort that's going to be
Speaker 2: required for change.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: And so for me that was my moment where like
Speaker 2: the pain is too great, we got to change things,
Speaker 2: We got to fix things. So our church begin to
Speaker 2: lean in. We begin to send folks to that shelter
Speaker 2: to meet those kids and to play basketball and do
Speaker 2: hair and have pizza parties and do financial classes.
Speaker 1: Right, this is a temporary shelter.
Speaker 2: This is supposed to be a temporary shelter.
Speaker 1: That's just about that.
Speaker 2: If there's no home, it becomes permanent. It becomes permanent.
Speaker 1: But it was never designed or set up to be
Speaker 1: permanent for children, right.
Speaker 2: That's right. And we know institutions aren't good for kids. Yeah,
Speaker 2: if you don't have a mom and a dad, and
Speaker 2: then we say, hey, go bless you go be an adult,
Speaker 2: figure it out. And you've never had an example of
Speaker 2: what a functioning household looks like, right, You've never done
Speaker 2: your laundry, you've never done your dishes, you can't cook
Speaker 2: meals because of the liability associated with you know, food
Speaker 2: handler permits and all that. Right, Like the complications of
Speaker 2: institution make things not healthy for kids, and so it
Speaker 2: sets them on a trajectory and spiritually for the church.
Speaker 2: I echo to this, churches, how can a kid ever
Speaker 2: fall in love with this heavenly father if they've never
Speaker 2: had a go to earthly one? Right, Like, we could
Speaker 2: talk all we want about God loves you, when they've
Speaker 2: never seen it with skin on, it's going to be
Speaker 2: a big jump for them, right, So foster care. The
Speaker 2: thing I didn't know is state of Oklahoma. Just state
Speaker 2: of Oklahoma eighty thousand phone calls every year to our hotline.
Speaker 2: That's how eighty thousand? Okay, So that's a coach, that's
Speaker 2: a teacher, that's a neighbor, that's somebody who cares, one
Speaker 2: or two on of calls a day. Somebody who cares
Speaker 2: says something's wrong here, right, And I think it's a
Speaker 2: scary thing. As a youth in Oklahoma were mandatory reporters.
Speaker 2: So if you're the youth pastor and you see a
Speaker 2: kid come to come to camp and he's got bruises
Speaker 2: or scart like you're required to call, right, we're supposed
Speaker 2: to report. But the reality, that's a lot of things
Speaker 2: to investigate, and so our three thousand staff their primary
Speaker 2: responsibility is if that seems like a legitimate call, because
Speaker 2: some of them are silly, right, like there's there's a
Speaker 2: marital spat that's happening and husband or wife because they're
Speaker 2: mad at their spouse, or making calls just to create
Speaker 2: some drama because they're mad, they're angry, and that's their
Speaker 2: only thing that they can do. But in the midst
Speaker 2: of all that chaos and sometimes even deception, there's a
Speaker 2: reality that kids are being harmed and they're unsafe, and
Speaker 2: so our frontline child investigation staff it's their job to
Speaker 2: figure out what's true or not.
Speaker 1: And they're handling twenty two hundred calls a day.
Speaker 2: And then not only do they just deal with the child,
Speaker 2: they're dealing with the mom and the dad, but maybe
Speaker 2: the aunt and the uncle, maybe the neighbor, maybe the teacher.
Speaker 2: Right now, grandparents and foster parents, everybody's got an opinion,
Speaker 2: everybody's got a perspective. Right, they've got a supervisor, they've
Speaker 2: got a judge. So one situation involving three or four
Speaker 2: kids now becomes this inner web of complication. Here's the
Speaker 2: part I would. I would celebrate our agency and once again,
Speaker 2: the outside is much simpler than the inside of this.
Speaker 2: But in Oklahoma, seventy five percent of the kids, even
Speaker 2: in situations of abuse and neglect, stay home or stay
Speaker 2: with a family member that cares. So a lot of
Speaker 2: folks will be like, well, these agencies just they're trying
Speaker 2: to make money, they're trying to steal babies, they're you know,
Speaker 2: they're in it for their own profit. Find me an
Speaker 2: example where that's true. You know, there's always cases of fraud,
Speaker 2: but on a whole nobody's getting a bonus for taking
Speaker 2: another kid, and nor do they want that on their caseloading,
Speaker 2: you know. But the reality is seventy five percent of
Speaker 2: the time they're figuring out things to leave kids, even
Speaker 2: in cases where dad's done some things, because what they
Speaker 2: recognize is, man, it's much better to support that family
Speaker 2: than to remove that kid, because once we remove that kid,
Speaker 2: the trauma to the kid is not worth it. Right, Like,
Speaker 2: just removing a child from their family creates enough chaos.
Speaker 2: But even for dad. What happens psychologically to a dad
Speaker 2: when you remove his kids from even a dad this
Speaker 2: struggling with addiction, might that dad, when there's a kid
Speaker 2: in his home, have some checks even as faint, you know,
Speaker 2: as that that voice is still in his head, like
Speaker 2: maybe I should party this hard tonight because that's interesting, Right,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna have I'm gonna have my six year old
Speaker 2: that's gonna be knocking at my door tomorrow morning. I
Speaker 2: may throw some things at that six year old, you know,
Speaker 2: because I have a hangover. But is we would all
Speaker 2: recognize that there would be some accountability for having a
Speaker 2: child in most healthy situations or family situations. But when
Speaker 2: you remove that kid, what motivation is there for dad anymore?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: The one thing that he might be proud of, the
Speaker 2: one main thing that he might be hopeful for, the
Speaker 2: one thing that I mean, what parent doesn't want good
Speaker 2: parent wants their kids to thrive or wants to brag
Speaker 2: on their kids. And so when you remove the child
Speaker 2: from their home, it really hurts. Actually the success of
Speaker 2: progress you can actually have with a family. Whereas if
Speaker 2: you can leave that kid in there, wrap around supports. Right,
Speaker 2: So that's the work of the agency that people do
Speaker 2: not appreciate.
Speaker 1: So when you need to talk about three thousand people,
Speaker 1: it's really not that many. It's not that many for
Speaker 1: that kind of.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and recognizing also because we don't have enough foster
Speaker 2: families in the state of Oklahoma, that child may be
Speaker 2: placed three hours away from where that worker originated that case,
Speaker 2: So guess what they're actually really doing. They're driving to
Speaker 2: pick up this kid in this part of the state
Speaker 2: to this part of it just to do a family
Speaker 2: visit for an hour with mom, and mom because she
Speaker 2: didn't have transportation, might be there late, might not right,
Speaker 2: Like she's struggling herself and we're blaming mom. Well mom,
Speaker 2: Mom may be walking five miles to So the whole system,
Speaker 2: once you get inside of it, you realize how how
Speaker 2: really complicated and hard it is for somebody, and so
Speaker 2: the ones that are making it, and it's a forty
Speaker 2: five dollars bus pass to help them be successful, It's like,
Speaker 2: why wouldn't I want to fix that?
Speaker 1: So maybe I've got forty five hours total of hearing
Speaker 1: these stories and thinking through these things, which you know
Speaker 1: that's significant enough to start having a perspective, but it
Speaker 1: is nothing compared to somebody like you worked with. And
Speaker 1: I sit here and hear you talk. You even got
Speaker 1: emotional a little bit when you were talking about the
Speaker 1: two day old baby and what clicked for you when
Speaker 1: you went from being a pastor to ultimately this. Clearly
Speaker 1: your perspective on the foster system has changed. But I
Speaker 1: think also it's important to talk about the perspective on
Speaker 1: the foster families themselves and how we support them, and
Speaker 1: how that perspective has shaped what Project one one one
Speaker 1: does today. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Yeah, Foster famous are my heroes. They're normal folk.
Speaker 2: Very few of them have the experiences that they really
Speaker 2: need to walk in or the training to walk in.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's the most underappreciated professional role, but yet
Speaker 2: it's not seen as a professional role, right, I mean.
Speaker 1: It is the most underappreciated that every time I sit
Speaker 1: across from someone who is a foster and I hear
Speaker 1: their stories. Lydia, the Memphis Service Club president, Yeah, just
Speaker 1: thirteen children and I think eight how many.
Speaker 3: She's adopted at eleven and eight have some form of disability?
Speaker 1: Every one of them? Yeah, every are you kidding me?
Speaker 1: I know that Lydia is not Christ because he came
Speaker 1: a while back. So there's no seat on the right
Speaker 1: hand of God for Lydia. But she going to be closed.
Speaker 2: And and this is the thing I get a little
Speaker 2: arranged about, Bill, is somebody on the bleachers is going
Speaker 2: to say, well, she's in it for the money.
Speaker 1: That is horse bride.
Speaker 2: We have words for it, right, because.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there are words for it. And from an Oklahoma
Speaker 1: god that that is a pal of cowdom, you.
Speaker 2: Do, yeah, right? And so because I know even yeah,
Speaker 2: there's additional stipends that are going for higher level needs
Speaker 2: of kids, and and there's even some recent things that
Speaker 2: I've seen recently, this tried to elevate some of that. Guys,
Speaker 2: look at look at the numbers. Most situations foster families
Speaker 2: are subsidizing the government to care for a challenge, a
Speaker 2: situation that's not they're making. They're taking their personal wealth
Speaker 2: and time and energy just step in to things that
Speaker 2: they didn't they didn't create voluntarily. And yes, they get
Speaker 2: a stipend that I mean barely pays for the eggs
Speaker 2: in a household, right like twenty dollars a day, right
Speaker 2: like twenty dollars a day for a kid. Okay, Like, guys,
Speaker 2: that like that that doesn't cover a lot. And it's
Speaker 2: different in different states and different challenges that kids have,
Speaker 2: but it's it's there because of the medical needs or
Speaker 2: or like we're trying to do this as best as
Speaker 2: we can. But nobody's getting rich from my experience off
Speaker 2: foster care. And and if you are, you got the
Speaker 2: wrong mindset on how to get riched, right, or that
Speaker 2: you're making money because you know know how to look
Speaker 2: at a budget or a balance sheet, because that's not
Speaker 2: a way that you make money. You can make a
Speaker 2: whole lot of money doing a whole lot of other things.
Speaker 2: And it's a twenty four to seven responsibility, right, It's
Speaker 2: there's not there's not bricks, there's not right. And and
Speaker 2: the amount of additional things that you're bringing in. So
Speaker 2: for a lot of our families, I mean, they say
Speaker 2: yes to foster care and they feel bad receiving help
Speaker 2: because they recognize they're the ones that made that commitment, right,
Speaker 2: But the amount of appointments, the amount of people that
Speaker 2: they're dialoguing with.
Speaker 1: Just the need to every once in a while go
Speaker 1: out and have dinner with your.
Speaker 4: Spouse alone alone, right, And that's just an in normal parenting, right, right,
Speaker 4: but you add all these other layers associated with the
Speaker 4: complex things associated with being involved in foster care, and
Speaker 4: it's really tough.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back pure neked disclosure. What was your
Speaker 1: perspective of a foster family? Kind of just a snippet
Speaker 1: your foster family pre holding the two day old baby
Speaker 1: and today.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think all of us. You can
Speaker 2: either uh you know, glorify it. You can overly simplify it,
Speaker 2: right to make it seem you know, like this this
Speaker 2: really rosy thing, like this beautiful thing. Oh, you're you're
Speaker 2: saving a kid's life. Right, It's admirable, but it's it's
Speaker 2: complicated and it will push and test every part of
Speaker 2: you as a parent, right, and so uh so confession,
Speaker 2: I'm not a foster parent, and some people are really
Speaker 2: surprised about that. And I'm intentionally not a foster parent
Speaker 2: because I can't do the work of mobilization that I
Speaker 2: do and still foster. I can't be in all these
Speaker 2: different I am a parent, right, And we support foster
Speaker 2: families and we've done respite, we've we've we've stepped in
Speaker 2: in other ways because we recognize how hard it is,
Speaker 2: but we intentionally had a conversation to say, it's like, hey,
Speaker 2: you can't be in the battle and be a frontline infantryman.
Speaker 1: And be home to be a father to a FID right.
Speaker 2: And try to try to bring in resources, right, go
Speaker 2: get the stuff that those frontline people need. And so
Speaker 2: we felt a calling to try to really supply and support.
Speaker 2: But if I wasn't willing to get dirty as well,
Speaker 2: if I wasn't willing to get in the trenches, sometimes
Speaker 2: that creates a little disconnection like who are you to
Speaker 2: you know? And so I think the reality of with
Speaker 2: the foster families that I've walked with and the kids
Speaker 2: that we've loved as a community, you know, it takes
Speaker 2: a lot more than what people I think appreciate. And
Speaker 2: then I would add to that for the adoptive families,
Speaker 2: I think they are another I mean, they're twenty or
Speaker 2: twenty five thousand kids just in the state of Oklahoma
Speaker 2: that Oklahoma is still doing some case management that have
Speaker 2: been adopted.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: Right, So yeah, they're in a safe environment, good environment
Speaker 2: with a f but some of those challenges even for babies.
Speaker 2: You know, we all would recognize that if you have
Speaker 2: alcoholism in your family that at times there's this weird
Speaker 2: thing that we don't even really understand. But you have
Speaker 2: a predisposition to alcoholism even though you never drank alcohol. Right,
Speaker 2: So there is these things with the mind and the
Speaker 2: body that are so complex. As good as we get
Speaker 2: with science, we still don't understand. And so for a
Speaker 2: lot of kids that come from trauma, even trauma in
Speaker 2: the womb, what we recognize is that leaves a mark
Speaker 2: and there's hope that there's healing in their restoration. But
Speaker 2: there's things that still are complicated that we there's not
Speaker 2: a solution for, and so it leads to these situations
Speaker 2: that are really complicated for families. Behaviors, safety concerns that
Speaker 2: for a lot of our adoptive families, they're in a
Speaker 2: rock and a heart place because there's no one that
Speaker 2: has an answer. There's no pill that fixes that right
Speaker 2: or program that fixes that. We're just going to sit
Speaker 2: and hard for a really long time. And that heart
Speaker 2: actually leads to involvement with did just a system, you know,
Speaker 2: with jail and criminal backgrounds, or it leads to other
Speaker 2: addictive behaviors, or it leads to other mental health things
Speaker 2: that some of these families have had no experience with
Speaker 2: and those are those are the heart. I have to
Speaker 2: have support and they got to figure it out right.
Speaker 2: They don't have an option. It's living in their home,
Speaker 2: you know, and yet they say yes to it every day.
Speaker 1: Alex says, you have a radical vision of wanting to
Speaker 1: see families waiting on children instead of children waiting on families.
Speaker 1: How realistics that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would never have believed that we would be statewide.
Speaker 2: I would have never believed that we've seen them, the
Speaker 2: overwhelming surge of support that we have in Oklahoma. And
Speaker 2: you know, God, I think gives you just enough favor
Speaker 2: and success. That's like, hey, what like back here it's
Speaker 2: a pipe dream, But here it's like no, Like, I
Speaker 2: see the future of that, and I'm I'm far enough
Speaker 2: along now that I see the future of it. And
Speaker 2: the reason I still want to believe and believe that
Speaker 2: it's not a resource problem. You know, Jesus when he
Speaker 2: looked over Jerusalem, he wept over Jerusalem. But the prayer
Speaker 2: that he encouraged to supplect pray was the harvest is plentiful,
Speaker 2: but the workers are few. And what I see in
Speaker 2: a state of Oklahoma is not a resource problem or
Speaker 2: even a connection problem. But it's still a people challenge.
Speaker 2: But I see four million people in the state of
Speaker 2: Oklahoma that if we can't figure it out to serve
Speaker 2: six thousand kids at any given time, I don't know
Speaker 2: who can, but I believe we can.
Speaker 3: I want to ask two things before we move on.
Speaker 3: You have set goals for churches yearly and monthly. Can
Speaker 3: you talk about that and goals Maybe that may be
Speaker 3: saying a little too crasp but like targets that ideally
Speaker 3: in the idealize the world that all each church should
Speaker 3: be doing.
Speaker 2: And then how are you guys doing against that right now?
Speaker 2: Absolutely so? Simply you know, there's about fifteen thousand kids
Speaker 2: that come in and out of they'll Calhima foster care
Speaker 2: system every year. Right the math would say they're in
Speaker 2: twos on average, you know, like people were caring for
Speaker 2: them and doubles. So if you have six thousand churches
Speaker 2: that served one family every month, that's twelve thousand families
Speaker 2: that are served every year. That touches every case in
Speaker 2: the state of Boklon. So the simple challenge to an army
Speaker 2: of good is are you willing to serve a family
Speaker 2: a month a whole church one whole church.
Speaker 1: It's not much to ask.
Speaker 2: It's not much to ask, right, Like that simple goal. Now,
Speaker 2: it would be ignorant of me to say that that
Speaker 2: that takes care of all the problems, but dang it
Speaker 2: sure would help.
Speaker 1: Oh why that makes it do? Right?
Speaker 2: Yeah, because a caseworker is saying, Dad could make it
Speaker 2: if he had a little extra help. If that, if
Speaker 2: Dad had a rent deposit that he can't currently afford,
Speaker 2: we could speed up his pathway to housing because he's
Speaker 2: got a job, he's on a pathway for being clean,
Speaker 2: but he needs a dang rent deposit. So he's either
Speaker 2: going to wait three four months before he gets his
Speaker 2: kid back or we could do it today. Right. The
Speaker 2: scripture alludes to this idea of where our treasure is?
Speaker 2: There are hearts follow? Right? So the simple concept is,
Speaker 2: if I want to care about the stock market, what
Speaker 2: do I do? I put a little money into it,
Speaker 2: and now what I follow a stock because I've got
Speaker 2: some investment there.
Speaker 1: That's interesting. Right, And you're saying, if you put a
Speaker 1: little money in a human being, now you're interested in
Speaker 1: you follow and then relations.
Speaker 2: Time, energy, capital, right, time, treasure, talents, whatever those things are.
Speaker 2: But when you make that investment. You're in. You're in
Speaker 2: for sometimes a life you didn't realize where this thing
Speaker 2: was going to go. And the challenge with institutions and
Speaker 2: even with government is they control for liability and protection
Speaker 2: and they do this and nobody's ever able to get
Speaker 2: connected or invest. But when we open up some doors,
Speaker 2: some pathways, some on rance for people to they get involved.
Speaker 2: They begin to care. They begin to realize that child
Speaker 2: welfare worker is just like their college kid that they
Speaker 2: have that just graduated, that is pursuing a dream, and
Speaker 2: their dream was helping people. And so they got into
Speaker 2: social work because they felt called to social work. But
Speaker 2: yet the daily opportunity that they have kicks their butt
Speaker 2: every day and they want to quit, and so they
Speaker 2: don't last long, right, And so like you begin to
Speaker 2: meet people and make friends and see opportunities. But here's
Speaker 2: what's also beautiful is as you get involved, you begin
Speaker 2: to see the gaps. And what caring people do is
Speaker 2: they fill gaps. They solve problems. And there's so many
Speaker 2: problems that are so different in every community that if
Speaker 2: you don't invite the community in, they'll never solve it
Speaker 2: because they don't have any ownership in it. They don't
Speaker 2: have any buy in that's there, right, but when you
Speaker 2: invite them in to be a part of it. You've
Speaker 2: got churches that are starting bunk bed ministries because there's
Speaker 2: not enough beds for kids, Sleep and Heavenly Peace.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Or Judy Sharon from New Hope Baptist in small town, Oklahoma. Right,
Speaker 2: she didn't even have a Sleep and Heavenly Peace.
Speaker 1: She just making beds.
Speaker 2: You've got churches that are creating small little medical clinics
Speaker 2: because they're hearing in their community people are not getting
Speaker 2: their medical needs addressed and they can't drive, and there's
Speaker 2: not a close clinic, and so some of their clinicians
Speaker 2: are giving extra time and they're using a Sunday school
Speaker 2: class to serve two or three families a week.
Speaker 1: On the surface, sounds simple, you connect churches with kids
Speaker 1: who need families.
Speaker 3: Hold on, I think we missed one of the goals,
Speaker 3: though I didn't answer your question very well. The other
Speaker 3: one was so church is trying to recruit one family year,
Speaker 3: recruit and support one family a year. So in the
Speaker 3: state of Oklahoma, we have thirty five hundred families that
Speaker 3: are in the game.
Speaker 2: We have sixty two hundred kids. If we had a
Speaker 2: net three thousand families, we would have a one to
Speaker 2: one ratio, which the federal government says is like unreal.
Speaker 2: Yeah right, But if we had every church recruit and
Speaker 2: support one new family every year, it would overwhelm the system.
Speaker 2: The problem would be we would have excess, and we
Speaker 2: would say that it's waste, right, Like how do we
Speaker 2: license homes that we're not even going to use. It
Speaker 2: creates a whole other set of problems that we would
Speaker 2: have to solve. But there would be really good problems like, oh,
Speaker 2: we have options, we have five families to choose from.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would think that that would be what you
Speaker 1: would want.
Speaker 2: But no government is going to pay for waste, right,
Speaker 2: So the community's got to get creative, Like how do
Speaker 2: we create on deck foster families? How do we create
Speaker 2: people lining up that are ready to go when we
Speaker 2: need them?
Speaker 1: Maybe the state of Arkansas, it'spay the state of Oklahoma
Speaker 1: for the extra frame pitch that they love it.
Speaker 2: The mind is churning lumber people, Well, no, I.
Speaker 1: Mean if Oklahoma had extra places in Arkansas didn't, Maybe
Speaker 1: Arkansas invests the money they were going to invest.
Speaker 2: And the reality is I think again, like we've been
Speaker 2: dreaming about a volunteer program in our offices, because what
Speaker 2: we have kids that are at the offices that are waiting,
Speaker 2: and so wouldn't we want people engaging those kids there,
Speaker 2: just like we did at the shelter. And so we're
Speaker 2: trying to bring innovation to our system to say, Okay, hey,
Speaker 2: it costs you too money for the insurance and the
Speaker 2: case management to support an empty home. But what if
Speaker 2: that empty home is doing something that's helpful? And what
Speaker 2: if that empty home is also getting experiences while they're waiting. Right,
Speaker 2: they're meeting the kids, they're meeting the workers, right.
Speaker 1: They're developing the skill set.
Speaker 2: Oh, we need a development league in the foster care Systell,
Speaker 2: I got right. Yeah, what if you had a football
Speaker 2: team and there was no use sports in your community.
Speaker 3: Some of this is kind of like say Families for
Speaker 3: Children or Isaiah one seventeen.
Speaker 2: Another another amazing partnership. Right, And so what we recognize
Speaker 2: in this whole ecosystem is all these things are needed
Speaker 2: because it's your development league. It's how you get people
Speaker 2: the experiences to get them to these higher levels of care.
Speaker 2: They got to have the like they're gonna have these
Speaker 2: other opportunities that are that are easy on ramps. Okay,
Speaker 2: I guess is that how it works?
Speaker 1: I mean, because the execution cannot be just as simple
Speaker 1: as saying, okay, let's connect churches to kids that need families,
Speaker 1: and we're good. How does it actually? We don't have
Speaker 1: to get into a thirty minute detail, but yeah, just
Speaker 1: in general, how does it work?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'll tell you how it's worked so far.
Speaker 1: It is clear.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you how it has worked so far. So so.
Speaker 2: One of the things that I think is the challenge
Speaker 2: in leadership is you want to have a high expectation
Speaker 2: for the product and things that you do right. You
Speaker 2: want high quality. But to have a development league, you
Speaker 2: actually got to lower the bar. You got to make
Speaker 2: it super easy for people to play. Because if whatever
Speaker 2: game that you're playing is too complicated and I can't
Speaker 2: do it day one, I'm out, don't it is the
Speaker 2: learning of the game seems overwhelming. And so I think
Speaker 2: one of the things that we've just instead of coming
Speaker 2: into a church and saying, hey, here's all the things
Speaker 2: that you have to do, they want, it's like we
Speaker 2: just we just need to just go Yeah, church leaders.
Speaker 2: It's not like they're sitting around twelve learned thumbs wondering
Speaker 2: what they're going.
Speaker 1: To do today.
Speaker 2: Like they they've got plans, they've got dreams, they've got visions,
Speaker 2: they've got programs and ministries that they want to run.
Speaker 2: So you got to step in there and say, hey,
Speaker 2: this is important and we need you to advocate, but
Speaker 2: I need to quickly get this off your plate, right,
Speaker 2: And so our strategy has been that we feel like
Speaker 2: has worked, is to try to lower the bar to
Speaker 2: say how simple can we make this? And for churches,
Speaker 2: we say, hey, can you give us a person that
Speaker 2: we can interact with because you're the pastor you're busy,
Speaker 2: who is who's the best person at your church for
Speaker 2: us to begin dialoguing with to start a conversation, because
Speaker 2: we're not going to be a traveling salesman and give
Speaker 2: you a vision that we don't want to walk alongside
Speaker 2: you to fulfill. And so our first strategy is just
Speaker 2: give us a person. If you give us a person,
Speaker 2: we're in we're going to play damn right. And it's
Speaker 2: and it's kind of like this, I brought some props, okay,
Speaker 2: and this actually is a really great place and a
Speaker 2: prop But like, have you ever seen one of these? No,
Speaker 2: do you know what this is? It's a ball, it's
Speaker 2: a ball. Do you know what kind of ball it is?
Speaker 1: It's a ball with holes?
Speaker 2: Ball with holes. So this is actually a takra ball.
Speaker 2: They play this in Thailand. Okay, and what do you do?
Speaker 2: What would the game look like with that ball? With
Speaker 2: that ball? What would be your guest.
Speaker 1: Jugg it and kick it around each other?
Speaker 2: Actually, you're right, yeah, so they you can play it
Speaker 2: like volleyball like a kind of like, but these guys,
Speaker 2: actually old guys will like like do a overhand like
Speaker 2: hit like in tennis, but with their feet and hit
Speaker 2: it over a volleyball net. It's actually fascinating.
Speaker 1: I've seen that there's a volleyball that a volleyball, volleyball
Speaker 1: with the feet with.
Speaker 2: This with that, that would be the simple version, and
Speaker 2: there's other varieties of this. But what I love about
Speaker 2: this soccer ball is like we would we love to travel.
Speaker 2: They would throw this out in the park and anybody
Speaker 2: and everybody would just kick this around, right, old people,
Speaker 2: young people like it. Just it's simple, right, Like it's
Speaker 2: a it's a simple way. Sound So there's that's that's
Speaker 2: kind of like a cheaper version. I didn't bring in
Speaker 2: the taj mahal of, but he kind of developed some tenacity.
Speaker 2: But even like this ball, you know what that ball is.
Speaker 2: I've never held one of these in my hand highlight.
Speaker 1: It's not a handball. And what look like.
Speaker 2: Two point four billion people play with this ball.
Speaker 1: That's very one, not that very one. It's not it's
Speaker 1: not high I all right. You wouldn't kick this, you
Speaker 1: wouldn't hit it with your hands. It's too hard. So squash, no,
Speaker 1: squashes a little? Or is it cricket?
Speaker 2: It's cricket. That's a cricket ball. I have never held.
Speaker 2: Nobody's ever taught me how to play cricket.
Speaker 1: I guess it. Finally, did you know it?
Speaker 2: No, I don't know the rules of cricket. It took
Speaker 2: this day. I like I but like billions of people
Speaker 2: play cricket.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a cricket ball.
Speaker 2: With this story, all right, how would we learn to
Speaker 2: play cricket?
Speaker 1: Well, you gotta have a ball.
Speaker 2: You gotta have a ball with other people who play.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I get it. And to me that you're trying
Speaker 1: to get the one person that church to hang out
Speaker 1: with people who do it and just learn.
Speaker 2: And just learn. You're you're not going to be the
Speaker 2: best cricket player or talk player the first time yet, Tacra.
Speaker 2: I think it's I think it's how you say it, Tacra.
Speaker 2: Th you have plenty of people, yeah, yeah, and so
Speaker 2: I think it's that simple. But it's also that complex, right,
Speaker 2: Like if you look at professionals that we all fell
Speaker 2: stadiums to go watch and you try to compete with
Speaker 2: their athleticism, it's off the charts. But the games as
Speaker 2: simple as me and my daughter were in the backyard.
Speaker 2: They're on the football round all right, are we playing football?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I mean not football, but playing and there's a pathway there, right.
Speaker 2: So I think that's the work of mobilization. That's what
Speaker 2: we're trying to do, is to get more people in
Speaker 2: the game, and then a development league so that we've
Speaker 2: got enough folks with the experiences when they're facing the
Speaker 2: problem in the community that's that three hundred and fifty pounds,
Speaker 2: you know, minement, they know what to do with it.
Speaker 1: I love it. We'll be right back.
Speaker 3: I think you travel around a lot and around the state,
Speaker 3: and it seems like you're just from your on your website,
Speaker 3: you have like a ton of community meetings. Yeah, Like
Speaker 3: what are those community meetings? Or like how are you
Speaker 3: talking to churches? Like what message actually gets them to move?
Speaker 3: Like what's your your pitch?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I actually assumed it was like the head
Speaker 1: pastor going yeah, I'll give you something if you promise
Speaker 1: you're gonna give me someone, if you're gonna leave me alone,
Speaker 1: I gotta I mean, honestly, that feels like that works. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean somebody comes to me at my company and says,
Speaker 1: this is a thing that you need to do, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, I do, but I'll have tim It's
Speaker 1: just give me somebody and I'll leave you alone. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm all over it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, if I'm self right, And so I think
Speaker 2: part of the part of the pitch with care Portal,
Speaker 2: what I love about care Portal is it's one of
Speaker 2: the easiest asks, so easy. So when and if and
Speaker 2: how you want to serve right, like what and what
Speaker 2: I also love is it's one of those opportunities that
Speaker 2: I can check some other boxes, like I can take
Speaker 2: my kids and my wife with me, right, Like we
Speaker 2: can do this with my group of guys from my
Speaker 2: small group, right, I can also mobilize people from the
Speaker 2: community because they get it. It's not just like, hey,
Speaker 2: go serve a youth camp where we're singing Kumbaya and well.
Speaker 1: I guess that's part of the pitch of the churches too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. So this is a tool that you
Speaker 2: can use to be relevant in your community, to partner
Speaker 2: with your community in a real way. And everybody gets it, right,
Speaker 2: everybody gets the work that's happening through this. It's important.
Speaker 2: And so I've seen folks that theologically probably would never
Speaker 2: do anything together, and they'll do care portal together. Right,
Speaker 2: They'll they'll they'll partner together. So then here's what's crazy
Speaker 2: is when we start playing together, we start talking and
Speaker 2: there's actually some relationship that's and then it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: how do we organize this, right, like, how do we
Speaker 2: invite more people? Well, then that that's the next level.
Speaker 2: It's no longer playing catch. It's hey, we're gonna have
Speaker 2: a game. And that game requires some date and some
Speaker 2: time and some rules and some structure and some systems.
Speaker 2: And so for us, that turns into what we call
Speaker 2: a community gathering, our community coalition or service club. Right,
Speaker 2: there's some organization that begins to happen because what we
Speaker 2: recognize is, man, if we could combine our efforts and
Speaker 2: our skills, which are all unique and different, we could
Speaker 2: do more together than what we could do on our own.
Speaker 2: And so it starts with people learning, getting excited about playing,
Speaker 2: and then then connecting those people together. And we call
Speaker 2: it the connection of getter Donners. You know, like we
Speaker 2: you know, like we don't want the pastors, right, we
Speaker 2: don't want the talkers visionaries. We want the getter donners.
Speaker 2: Because the getner donners, when you put them the normal folks,
Speaker 2: when you put them in a room, gets done right.
Speaker 2: Like it's so beautiful to watch, you know. I have
Speaker 2: a woman named Kay Leslie that's one of our church leaders.
Speaker 2: And Kay is a retired former foster parent, but she
Speaker 2: has some autoimmune different medical challenges that sometimes keep her
Speaker 2: from even going to church. And she's our primary care
Speaker 2: portal person at her church faith Unit Methodist and Tulsa.
Speaker 2: And she doesn't use all the bells and whistles of
Speaker 2: the technology, but she literally I think I think even
Speaker 2: literally Kay would probably hate me for even say this,
Speaker 2: but like a rolodex. Right, Like she sees a need
Speaker 2: and she calls up a church member and says, hey,
Speaker 2: I think you'd be really good at this. Right. She
Speaker 2: is quarterbacking, calling the plays of mobilization, and she's getting
Speaker 2: people involved through an invitation.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: It's the lost art is the invitation of hey, come
Speaker 2: with me, right. I mean, church leaders just say hey, come,
Speaker 2: come come with me to church. That's the best way
Speaker 2: you get somebody to come to your church is and
Speaker 2: invite him to come with you.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: In the same way for service, it's an invitation to
Speaker 2: say come see this, come do this, come play. Right.
Speaker 2: And so one of our big strategies is community gatherings.
Speaker 2: And then again we got to have some point leadership.
Speaker 2: We've got to develop some structure so that they're you know,
Speaker 2: going the right direction. And that's work because people are
Speaker 2: work right. People are always complicated. But that's also what
Speaker 2: brings the greatest joy to this work is relationships. A
Speaker 2: young man named Michael Whitzman that I've got to be
Speaker 2: a small part of his life, came to my life
Speaker 2: at nineteen, and Michael's got a complicated story where he
Speaker 2: was and foster care was adopted, has a broken relationship
Speaker 2: with his adoptive family. But Michael would say, it's relationships
Speaker 2: that brought brokenness in his life, and it's only relationships
Speaker 2: that are going to bring healing and restoration. And so, Michael,
Speaker 2: one of the beautiful things about Michael is he has
Speaker 2: sought out intentionally relationships as a kid that had a
Speaker 2: lot of brokenness in his history. And now he doesn't
Speaker 2: have one family, He's got dozens of families and multiple
Speaker 2: cities that I've loved him and supported him. And titles
Speaker 2: are complicated, right, But yet what I hope Michael knows,
Speaker 2: and I think what Michael would say today is I've
Speaker 2: got the backing of people of relationships because of that connection.
Speaker 2: And Michael just got a job working in DC as
Speaker 2: a policy advisor for one of our government agencies. And
Speaker 2: he has been super resilient now as a late twenty
Speaker 2: something that you know, fractured and broken relationships, but yet
Speaker 2: he continued to show up and he continued at the
Speaker 2: opportunity to learn and participate connect and that's what really matters.
Speaker 2: And so it's got to happen in communities. Connection and
Speaker 2: relationships got to happen. It can't just be a platform
Speaker 2: or a system or a tool. It's got to happen
Speaker 2: through people.
Speaker 1: It's that that's kind of a good segue to what
Speaker 1: I was kind of asking, which is, you know, care
Speaker 1: portal obviously beats tangible needs, but it can also enable
Speaker 1: these relationships. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so every we call it meaningful connections that happen
Speaker 2: on care portal. So I got a picture from one
Speaker 2: of our very first sweet ladies that jumped in on
Speaker 2: care portal ten years ago, and she met a family
Speaker 2: through delivering a bus pass to them at a gas station.
Speaker 2: That bus pass turned into a friendship. And I just
Speaker 2: got a picture of this last week for it this
Speaker 2: kid's graduation, right, like ten years of relationship that happened
Speaker 2: originally through an email.
Speaker 1: For a tangible bus pass that led to a decade
Speaker 1: of a relationship.
Speaker 2: Right, And I don't know the full story, right, there's
Speaker 2: there's not yours, rich, He's got another person who cares
Speaker 2: about him in his life.
Speaker 1: That's it.
Speaker 2: That's a win, right, And she cheering from mom, not
Speaker 2: just kid.
Speaker 1: How about the woman who gave the bus pass, who
Speaker 1: was invited to the Skits graduation for her?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Right, And that's what I would say about my
Speaker 2: relationship with Michael, My life has been so enrich And
Speaker 2: I'd say you would say the same thing about these
Speaker 2: young men that you've invested in. We're encouraged by we're challenged,
Speaker 2: challenged by their resiliency, their progress. Like your life gets
Speaker 2: better from being in the game.
Speaker 1: It does, it does.
Speaker 3: You were also telling me the other day you can
Speaker 3: also upload a relationship need on the platform too. Can
Speaker 3: you talk about that because I was completely clueless about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so care portal, we believe in a reality that
Speaker 2: we can advocate for things other than stuff on care Portal.
Speaker 2: But what we also know is getting people to give
Speaker 2: up their time as actually the hottest commodity. We all
Speaker 2: have a limited supply of time, so stuff we can
Speaker 2: get more of time. We can't asking somebody to give
Speaker 2: up their family as like the golden ticket. But this
Speaker 2: in between time mobilization is really really hard. To ask
Speaker 2: somebody to be a coach of a football team, that's
Speaker 2: a that's a freaking big ask, right, But even to
Speaker 2: get somebody to commit to mentoring a kid an hour
Speaker 2: a week some for some families, that's that's a huge
Speaker 2: ask when they're already overwhelmed. So what we recognize is
Speaker 2: you've got to have a bigger pool of people to
Speaker 2: pull from to be successful in pulling people in for
Speaker 2: time mobilization. But careful has an option for that. So
Speaker 2: in Oklahoma we actually recruit mentors for schools, mentors for
Speaker 2: foster youth. We also have a couple of statewide entities
Speaker 2: that review child welfare cases, so for the people that
Speaker 2: don't like kids, there's actually an opportunity for them to
Speaker 2: jump in and be helpful to mediators. You know, there's
Speaker 2: lots of ways to even events. You know, one time
Speaker 2: event is an easy place to invite somebody to initially participate.
Speaker 2: But we know the life chain happens for all of
Speaker 2: us when we have quantity of time, because it's in
Speaker 2: quantity of time that the beautiful thing of quality time
Speaker 2: takes place. And so if we're not willing to give
Speaker 2: some quantity, very rarely do we ever get to experience
Speaker 2: those light bulb moments because they're typically not fabricated, manufactured right.
Speaker 2: They happen organically, and they happen organically through other organic
Speaker 2: things like trust and friendship. You know that only happens time,
Speaker 2: and so we're all constantly advocating for people to because
Speaker 2: we recognize that until they meet somebody with skin on,
Speaker 2: it's a number, it's a statistic, it's this you know,
Speaker 2: not real thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that also leads to people having empathy for
Speaker 1: a situation and thinking that, wow, you know, I'll really
Speaker 1: feel bad for that for them, somebody should do something
Speaker 1: as if that sentiment yeah matters and cinement yeah doesn't.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Is there is a way to mobilize businesses as you
Speaker 1: do churches?
Speaker 2: Yeah, how's that look?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: So, I mean I think business are the greatest resource.
Speaker 2: They are the resource hub, right, they are the economic generator.
Speaker 1: Well just about everybody who's in church has been involved
Speaker 1: in any businesses.
Speaker 2: So we we love to raise We call them in
Speaker 2: Careportal land champions. So there's a there's a role actually
Speaker 2: on care Portal for businesses, but there's a role in
Speaker 2: the community for businesses as employers. You know, I think
Speaker 2: giving opportunities to folks that maybe aren't quite job ready
Speaker 2: to find pathways again. Development League is really really a
Speaker 2: big deal, especially kids from our places and families that
Speaker 2: have maybe difficult situations, whether they be a foster family,
Speaker 2: you're giving them a little bit of extra leave when
Speaker 2: they take in a new placement. Like that's I mean,
Speaker 2: some companies have policies not just for when somebody has
Speaker 2: a new child, but when somebody brings in a foster
Speaker 2: family that they get some PTO for that, right, Like
Speaker 2: that's an approved at least an approved PTO thing. So
Speaker 2: that's one way that your business can be more friendly
Speaker 2: to folks that are really trying to make a difference
Speaker 2: in your community.
Speaker 1: Two.
Speaker 2: You know, one of our partners in Oklahoma City is
Speaker 2: Pizza Hut. They give pizzas and food is great gifts
Speaker 2: in every scenario, the welcome gift in every scenario. And
Speaker 2: so they put pizzas into the office because in the
Speaker 2: state of Oklahoma, stipends and reimbursements and gift cards and
Speaker 2: all that are so complicated to manage that if a
Speaker 2: worker can just say, Hey, I got a kid in
Speaker 2: the office and they've just come from a meth lab
Speaker 2: bust and they're traumatized and we're traumatized, and I can
Speaker 2: have a pizza delivered here, hot fresh to the office
Speaker 2: for this kid. Game changer, right, So Pizza hu'ts donated
Speaker 2: pizzas there and our shelter even also when a new
Speaker 2: foster family welcomes a kid. We've we've been able to
Speaker 2: give out some food coupons so that that foster family
Speaker 2: could order a pizza when that kid comes home.
Speaker 1: Right, show you out soliciting businesses.
Speaker 2: And yeah, trying is with the time that we got.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah I understand, but yeah same.
Speaker 2: Yeah, come on how and we're we would love to
Speaker 2: be creative with them, like what do you have that
Speaker 2: you want to leverage and let's leverage that together. And
Speaker 2: if it's not with one one one, who can we
Speaker 2: partner you with? Right now, we have a company called
Speaker 2: bug Bros. That does termination services. So we have a
Speaker 2: lot of situations that we run into in child welfare
Speaker 2: where there's roaches or there's bed bugs, and especially beg
Speaker 2: bug treatment is that's a big one. It's a big one.
Speaker 2: It's so expensive, it's so prevalent with families that are
Speaker 2: at risk, and it impacts everybody that's involved. It becomes
Speaker 2: a really challenge. So what's awesome? I think every business
Speaker 2: owner wants to give back. I just I'm just going
Speaker 2: to believe that inherently about business owners. It's not all
Speaker 2: about profit, right, It's not until you know some business owners,
Speaker 2: you don't recognize that all of us have things that
Speaker 2: we want to give back, We want to be a
Speaker 2: part of making things better. But I think the challenge
Speaker 2: is we recognize we can't give everything away. And so
Speaker 2: I think one of the cool opportunities through care Portal
Speaker 2: is again the business can choose when and if they
Speaker 2: give versus just Carplank, you know, give all the time.
Speaker 2: And so I think jumping in and being intentional about
Speaker 2: their generosity or partner intentionally with one of those nonprofit
Speaker 2: epicenters of need is a great way for businesses to Alina.
Speaker 1: There's this resource on your website titled twenty ways to
Speaker 1: support foster families Small things to large things. Mention a
Speaker 1: few of them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my favorite. I mean there's some foster families that
Speaker 2: are a little particular about this, but go mother lawn.
Speaker 1: Really yeah, that's a big don't like.
Speaker 2: Don't like if you think you can get away with
Speaker 2: you in relationship, like we don't even ask, just show up,
Speaker 2: Just show up, right, Like, just show up, take care
Speaker 2: of it. Like I think for a lot of times
Speaker 2: all of us feel weird about asking for stuff.
Speaker 1: I think that is you know, that's that's a really
Speaker 1: good point. I think a lot of people, just even
Speaker 1: when they're in the most dire circumstances heat asking for
Speaker 1: a credit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I would I would say the same thing
Speaker 2: about your neighbor that just had a baby. Yeah, right,
Speaker 2: Like we like you don't need to be weird about
Speaker 2: this servant foster. It's what we should be doing with
Speaker 2: our neighbors. The same way. It's like, hey, you got
Speaker 2: some extra eggs, Drop some eggs off, got a cast
Speaker 2: roll and you can make a little extra drop it
Speaker 2: Like as you go, what are the acts of kindness
Speaker 2: through your extra that you can kind of extend your
Speaker 2: tent sticks out and say, you know what, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: give a little bit. I have extra right, And so
Speaker 2: if you've got extra time, or you've got an extra
Speaker 2: seat in your van to take a kid to the
Speaker 2: park or to the playground, to give that foster family
Speaker 2: a break.
Speaker 1: That's the one the one that I think about the
Speaker 1: most in supporting foster family. Certainly food and gifts and
Speaker 1: everything else, but for a mother and a father to
Speaker 1: be able to go to dinner and a movie for
Speaker 1: four hours without some kids screaming at them over something
Speaker 1: that Lisa and I had four kids in four years
Speaker 1: and when, and we didn't have any money, so we
Speaker 1: couldn't even afford a babysitter because a babysitter for four kids, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was expensive that we wouldn't have any money to
Speaker 1: go eat. And on occasion one of our parents would
Speaker 1: buck up and give us a night.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 1: I can't tell you how refreshed our relationship was and
Speaker 1: our pro strong children was with just a little respite.
Speaker 1: Do you not think that's a huge sea foster family,
Speaker 1: Just give them a break and education wise, go tock
Speaker 1: Applebee's and catch a foot.
Speaker 2: Every every state has a thing called the pre Parenting
Speaker 2: Act that they interpret in some way. And what that
Speaker 2: means is for a certain amount of time, you can
Speaker 2: watch somebody else's foster children because they know you and
Speaker 2: you know them, and there's trust for a period of
Speaker 2: time without any certification because we're friends, like a night,
Speaker 2: like a night or a day, right. Oklahoma's actually interpreted
Speaker 2: it for up to seventy two hours, right, so like
Speaker 2: a weekend. So and the goal of that was to
Speaker 2: make things normal for kids. So if I've got a
Speaker 2: young teen that wants to go spend the night or
Speaker 2: go to a camp, everybody doesn't have to be foster family. Rightly,
Speaker 2: I trust that youth pastor, I trust this church and
Speaker 2: their policies, or I trust this friend with my biological kids.
Speaker 2: So why can't I trust them. I'm the one liable
Speaker 2: as a foster parent. Why can't I trust them with
Speaker 2: my foster children? So that is huge. And then the
Speaker 2: other thing I'd say is really huge is you know
Speaker 2: some families that have some gumption that would say, hey,
Speaker 2: even when your kid is sick and you're gonna have
Speaker 2: to miss another day of work, set up to us,
Speaker 2: right like, you can call us like you, We'll do
Speaker 2: the harder things even with you, right like when when
Speaker 2: there's a blow up, blowout, like please call us or
Speaker 2: send them over or right like like at times that's
Speaker 2: the really heavy lifting.
Speaker 1: You mean, being a neighbor, that's crazy.
Speaker 2: What is wrong with but especially especially post COVID right like,
Speaker 2: oh he's got the sniffles, we're out, I know, but
Speaker 2: I just know like he's running one hundred fever. Yeah,
Speaker 2: bring them over.
Speaker 1: I just think back to when I grew up, literally
Speaker 1: the neighbors around we didn't come up with anything, and
Speaker 1: our neighbors didn't have anything. But if my mom was
Speaker 1: gone or needed something or whatever.
Speaker 2: It's right, Can I go unto the store? Yeah, they wouldn't,
Speaker 2: they wouldn't ask, they just do.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was it was that way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's what we're all dreaming about. And that's
Speaker 2: actually I think the secret sauce. And and here's the
Speaker 2: other thing I would say too, is whatever we can
Speaker 2: do to decouple institutionalization. And here's what I mean by that.
Speaker 2: Our way that we solve problems is we stick all
Speaker 2: the poor people in one part of town, right, and
Speaker 2: it makes things really complicated instead of spreading it out right.
Speaker 2: And so I think in the same deal is how
Speaker 2: do we how do we micro enterprise service where it's okay,
Speaker 2: if you serve two families this month, great, We're going
Speaker 2: to celebrate that just as much as the fifty thousand
Speaker 2: backpacks delivered, right, because everybody doing something is actually what
Speaker 2: makes it easy. Right.
Speaker 1: You just basically stated in a different way the entire
Speaker 1: purpose of an army and normal folks, that's it. Do
Speaker 1: what you can where you can, and you don't have
Speaker 1: to be part of some massive thing.
Speaker 2: And it's actually better that way.
Speaker 1: It actually is right because it goes back to the relationships.
Speaker 1: We're army, normal folks. Every time we interview somebody, we're
Speaker 1: celebrating them and their story, and we want that story
Speaker 1: to be entertaining but inspiring, and hopefully somebody's in Oklahoma
Speaker 1: listening today and they join your army. Come on, right,
Speaker 1: So we're celebrating kind of your army. Right, tell me
Speaker 1: a couple of heroes. Tell me a couple of your
Speaker 1: heroes inside your organization. Let our listeners know about the
Speaker 1: normal folks who revealed themselves to be heroes inside the
Speaker 1: work that you're doing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I make a chance to take adopt to celebrate them.
Speaker 2: I mean to the thirty five hundred foster families that
Speaker 2: we have in our state. You know, we get the
Speaker 2: chance to get to know them and walk with them
Speaker 2: and encourage them their their heroes. But I mean some
Speaker 2: of my staff on my team, to those that you
Speaker 2: know work part time for us. You know, I've got
Speaker 2: several staff that are adoptive and foster parents, and they
Speaker 2: themselves at time to have some really really hard stuff
Speaker 2: as foster parents. But yet they're going out there and saying, hey,
Speaker 2: it's worth it. You know, it's worth it to jump in.
Speaker 2: And so and in the Misty Seals on my team
Speaker 2: to bree Cruise. You know, these these ladies, Genthalbert, are
Speaker 2: ladies that are champions like they are advocates, fierce advocates
Speaker 2: for the biological family. You know, that's trying to the
Speaker 2: kids that are in their care, to the kids that
Speaker 2: are in the community. To I would shout out our
Speaker 2: DHS leadership, our government leadership.
Speaker 1: I love that you ye have that relationship though.
Speaker 2: Man, Yeah, I mean our our new Director of Child Welfare,
Speaker 2: Michael Williams is an all star. I just tremendously respect
Speaker 2: his heart who he is to that leadership team, to
Speaker 2: the frontline case workers. You know, I think of people
Speaker 2: like Natalie Love and Beth pass More that are part
Speaker 2: of our government DHS team that are out there doing
Speaker 2: the work, and they're they're trying to get people to
Speaker 2: get involved, even though they know what they're asking them
Speaker 2: to do is going to be complicated, it's going to
Speaker 2: be difficult, it going to be hard. They're there. It's
Speaker 2: not a job for them, it's a calling for them.
Speaker 2: And our Michael Williams would even say that our director,
Speaker 2: he would say this is a sacred work. Getting to
Speaker 2: step into the lives of children and families maybe in
Speaker 2: some of their worst days. That's holy ground and and
Speaker 2: it's and it's uh something that should be approached with
Speaker 2: a sense of awe, not not trite answers and solutions.
Speaker 2: It's like, hey, God, what do you want to do here?
Speaker 2: And we recognize this as wholly and potentially restorative and
Speaker 2: transformational and generations of impact could come from that. That
Speaker 2: should make us kind of go okay, like turn our
Speaker 2: listening ears on before we just start, you know, rattling
Speaker 2: off what we think is the right answer.
Speaker 1: Alex says, we're thinking about doing some work together. I
Speaker 1: honestly have no idea what you guys are up to.
Speaker 1: You want to tell me what it is?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, like one, we want to mobilize more people,
Speaker 2: you know, together we you know, it's fun when you
Speaker 2: find people that are running the same direction as you.
Speaker 2: And so if you can figure out how to partner
Speaker 2: and collaborate together, and so as you guys rally folks
Speaker 2: in clubs, you know, in this army of noble normal
Speaker 2: folk life, we're of the same vein, right like, we
Speaker 2: we want to do that in Oklahoma. And the more
Speaker 2: the merrier, I think the more hands are helpful, and
Speaker 2: so as we can pull together some clubs, leverage the
Speaker 2: sandbox that's already been created.
Speaker 1: There's no reason there's not a club in Oklahoma City.
Speaker 1: I mean honestly, Oklahoma City is or Tulsa or both
Speaker 1: are perfect license for that.
Speaker 2: I hope y'all pull that you can figure that out.
Speaker 2: A million people in both of those metros, surely we
Speaker 2: can find some clubs.
Speaker 1: Right, and you know, part of what those clubs do
Speaker 1: as each club kind of choose its own thing, part
Speaker 1: of the project moment.
Speaker 2: That back to this idea that you kind of were
Speaker 2: even alluding to. These these things are all interconnected, they are, right,
Speaker 2: I mean family a family, to schools, to child welfare,
Speaker 2: to criminal justice reform, to mental health, the addiction right,
Speaker 2: like it's a job and economics, right, I mean, like
Speaker 2: there's so.
Speaker 1: Much data that if you pay attention to it, it
Speaker 1: all overlaps, it all connects, reading all of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and in the same the same way that like
Speaker 2: we used to talk about this at our church, like
Speaker 2: if there's a piece of trash in the hallway in
Speaker 2: the church, who's trash? Is it to be every members? Right? Like,
Speaker 2: how do we pass on ownership to recognize for all
Speaker 2: of us, Hey, I like I'm the closest one. It
Speaker 2: should be the first one to pick it up. Right.
Speaker 2: It's it's not rocket science to figure out where I
Speaker 2: should help when I should help. Start with your family,
Speaker 2: start with your neighborhood, Start in your community, and look
Speaker 2: for those pathways to jump in. But don't just walk
Speaker 2: by that be like, that's not my that's not my problem.
Speaker 1: You know, I was going to ask you, what would
Speaker 1: you tell our listeners about service? But I think you
Speaker 1: just said it it's it's all our problem because if
Speaker 1: it's you know, I envisioned what you were saying, And
Speaker 1: if I was walking around in church and there was
Speaker 1: a cup spilled over the floor, I would have absolutely
Speaker 1: been over pick it up. If it was in my house,
Speaker 1: I would have been over picked up. Yeah, it was
Speaker 1: in my yard. I've been over picked up. Why is
Speaker 1: my society not identify with that? We need to bend
Speaker 1: over and pick up the things that need picking up?
Speaker 1: All right, that's a really good metaphor. I hadn't heard
Speaker 1: that either album.
Speaker 2: And I think the biggest challenge to that is time. Right,
Speaker 2: There's been studies on this as we get so maxed out,
Speaker 2: we get so burned out that we don't leave any
Speaker 2: margin to be intentional, and so it takes some intentionality
Speaker 2: to say, Okay, you know what, I've seen that squeaky
Speaker 2: door on my neighbor's fence for a long time. She
Speaker 2: could use some hell with that.
Speaker 1: You know. One of my old coaches used to say,
Speaker 1: quit wine and complacencies for retirement, And now, at fifty
Speaker 1: eight years old, I'm starting to wonder about what is
Speaker 1: this retirement people talk about because I don't see that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's just more time to be intentional with it.
Speaker 1: Yes, that's exactly right. Or do I believe in it?
Speaker 3: I like the Ken Blanchard line that you don't retire,
Speaker 3: you refire into something else.
Speaker 1: There you you have a radical vision of wanting to
Speaker 1: see families waiting on children instead of children waiting on families,
Speaker 1: And you made a really good point. I would have
Speaker 1: never thought we would have started Project Oneman one. Why
Speaker 1: could not? Why would not dream of having to see
Speaker 1: families waiting on children instead of children waiting on families.
Speaker 1: I have no doubt that if your passion is indi
Speaker 1: indicator of your future success, maybe Oklahoma will be the
Speaker 1: first state to do that. Chris Campbell, Everybody's thatch a
Speaker 1: director of one one one Project, Broken Arrow, Klahoma, which
Speaker 1: is basically Tulsa. Dude, thanks for coming to spend an
Speaker 1: afternoon with me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks for your avsking your voice, and let's raise
Speaker 2: up some more people to get in the game.
Speaker 1: I love it. Let's get a club going in Oklahma
Speaker 1: City or Tulsa somewhere. All right, buddy, thank you and
Speaker 1: thank you for joining us this week. If Chris Campbell
Speaker 1: has inspired you in general, or better yet, to take
Speaker 1: action by getting involved with care Portal, the one one
Speaker 1: one Project, starting something like it in your community, or
Speaker 1: something else entirely, let me know. I really do want
Speaker 1: to hear about it. You can write me anytime at
Speaker 1: Bill at normal folks dot us, and I'm telling you guys,
Speaker 1: I'll respond. If you enjoyed this episode, share with friends,
Speaker 1: share it on social, subscribe to the podcast wherever you're
Speaker 1: watching or listening to it from Rate it, review it,
Speaker 1: and give us five stars. Join the Army at normalfolks
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Speaker 1: Take the ten level challenge by our merch any and
Speaker 1: all of these things that will help us grow an
Speaker 1: army of normal folks. I'm Bill Corney. Until next time,
Speaker 1: do what you can