Emergency housing program for at-risk youth gets overhaul

Manitoba is overhauling itsemergency housingprogram for at-riskchildren and youth, adding 71 new foster home spaces.

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• Manitoba's foster care system needs overhaul, says social worker

It's part of the province's plan to reduce reliance on hotels as shelters,Family Services Minister Kerri Irvin-Ross announced on Tuesday.

The government will also reduce its use ofcontract workers by hiring 210 highly trained permanent child-care workers over the next two years, she said.

But for the woman who raised Tina Fontaine, the 15-year-old girl whose deathsparked public discussions about Manitoba's child welfaresystem and its use of hotels to temporarily house at-risk youth, the planned overhaul is too little, too late.

"It should have happened long ago. Like, maybe I still would have had my baby here," Thelma Favel, Fontaine's great-aunt, told CBC News on Tuesday night.

Fontaine's body was recovered fromthe Red River on Aug. 17. Her death is being treated as a homicide, but no arrests have been announced.

• Tina Fontaine, 15, found in bag in Red River
• Tina Fontaine died because police, CFS failed her, family says

Residential facility for at-risk girls announced

As part of the overhaul announced on Tuesday, the province says a former nuns' residence near the Marymound building on Scotia Street will be converted into anew residential care unit for girls, ages 12 to 17, who have complex needs.

"At Marymound, we are part of a network of service providers that strive to create the best short- and longer-term care possible for our children.We welcome the changes announced today and very much look forward to working in partnership with the province," saidJay Rodgers, CEO of Marymound, a non-profit agency that works with youth.

Irvin-Ross also repeated an announcement made in early October thatasecure facility to shelter at-risk girls will soon be opened as well.

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Most of the changes should be implemented by spring 2015, Irvin-Ross said, adding the goal is to have no children in hotels.

There are currently eight children in care living in hotels as of Tuesday, she said, noting that the numberfluctuates daily based on where there is room to put them in thechild welfare system.

Manitoba's children's advocate, Darlene MacDonald, saidshe hopes the province's plan will go beyond getting at-risk youth out of hotels.

"I think sometimes we're too concerned about safety of the child for the day, and not looking at the overall needs of children and what a total plan needs to encompass," she said.

MacDonald added that the child welfare system needs to devote more resources to mental-health supports and early intervention programs for children and youth in care.

As well, she said social workers need to be trained to work specifically with sexually exploited youth.

System under scrutiny

Manitoba's Child and Family Services (CFS) system has comeunder scrutiny over the past couple of months,as CBC News revealed thatdozens of teenagers were being placed in Winnipeg hotels every day, with some saying they have witnessed prostitution and been introduced to drug use during their stays.

• Teens in CFS care in Winnipeg hotels say they've seen prostitution, drugs
• Boy inCFScare catches support worker sleeping on the job

In many cases at the hotels, no CFS social workers were on handand care wasleft to contracted workers from privatecompanies.

But that care often came under question. One support worker was caught sleeping 20 minutes after arriving attheTravelodgeWinnipeg East hotel last May to supervise a teenage boy.

The boy took a videoof the sleeping man, who was later fired.

A former worker for another one ofthe privatecompanies, Complete Care, told CBC News thatstaff received minimal training and had no control over the children they were supposed to watch.

VivianKetchum told CBC News in September that she quit because she was frustrated that the needs of teens were being unmet. Her responsibility was to sit with children and youth in their hotel rooms, but said she had no power to stop those who wanted to leave.

Despite that, Complete Carewas paid $8,368,207 in 2013 and$5,925,854 in 2012 by the government.

Ketchum, who worked for the companybetween 2009 and 2011,saidgovernment officials have no idea how dangerous it is to place children and teens in hotel rooms with minimally trained staff.

• Complete Care ex-worker speaks out onCFSyouth placed in hotels
• Manitoba orders probe into companies hired to watch kids in care

Irvin-Ross has ordered aninternal probe by the accountability unit in her department into the contracts and what the companies do.

Tina Fontainehad run away from her home in theSagkeengFirst Nation on July 1 and travelledto Winnipeg. She was later placed in CFScare.

WhileFontainewasin care, aComplete Care worker checked herinto the Best WesternCharterhouseHotel in downtown Winnipeg, but the teen walked away.

A little more than a week later, herbody was found in the Red River.

"There's hundreds of kids out there. Like, this should have been addressed long before this happened to Tina,"Favelsaid of the government's new plan.

"Tina had to die for people to open their eyes to the problem that was happening in Winnipeg."