West Virginia Code 49-2-201 – Findings and purpose
The Legislature finds that there exists a need in this state to assist dysfunctional families by providing nurture and care to those families' children as an alternative to removing children from the families.
Terms Used In West Virginia Code 49-2-201
- child: means an individual who meets one of the following conditions:
(A) Is under thirteen years of age. See West Virginia Code 49-1-202
- Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
- Placement: means any temporary or permanent placement of a child who is in the custody of the state in any foster home, kinship parent home, group home, or other facility or residence. See West Virginia Code 49-1-206
- State: when applied to a part of the United States and not restricted by the context, includes the District of Columbia and the several territories, and the words "United States" also include the said district and territories. See West Virginia Code 2-2-10
The Legislature also finds that the family is the primary social institution responsible for meeting the needs of children and that the state has an obligation to assist families in this regard.
The Legislature further finds that children have significant emotional and social ties to the natural or surrogate family beyond basic care and nurture for which the family is responsible.
The purpose of this article is to establish a pilot program to evaluate the utility of providing intensive intervention with the families of children that are at risk of being removed from the home. For these limited purposes, the department is authorized to use available appropriate funds for that intervention service, but only to the extent that moneys would normally be available for the removal and placement of the particular child at risk.