Betsy and Tim Smith were empty-nesters, having successfully launched their adult daughter and son. Their days were full with jobs, friends, and the Maine outdoors, which they loved to explore through biking, sea kayaking and skiing. They might have talked about fostering as a distant possibility, but had no serious plans to become foster parents. So how did they end up parenting two Haitian girls?
The answer is, “not intentionally.” But three and a half years ago, a local teacher, who was a friend of a friend, needed to find immediate temporary housing for two Angolan teenage sisters whose mother had suddenly passed away from AIDS. Almost without thinking, Betsy and Tim offered to help. The Smiths got as far as a screening interview with Maine’s Office of Child and Family Services (OCFS), but less than 24 hours before the girls were supposed to arrive they learned the sisters had been placed with another family of African descent elsewhere in the state.
So, Betsy and Tim went back to their busy lives, seeing the “near-miss” of hosting these two sisters as one of life’s many twists and turns. About six months later, they received a call from an OCFS caseworker. A 16-year-old Haitian girl needed housing. She had been removed from an unsafe living situation with her birth mother and three half-siblings in one of the transitional housing hotels for asylum seekers six months earlier, and prior foster families hadn’t been a good fit. The caseworker wanted to know if Betsy and Tim might consider hosting this girl. Incredibly, they said yes, choosing a very different path than many of their friends, who were happily enjoying their empty nests and greater freedoms.
Now, three years later, the Smiths’ home and family life have changed dramatically. They are parenting a 17-year-old high schooler, Madeline, and her 19-year-old sister, Esther, now a high school graduate. Their 1200 sq. ft. house is now “a whole house full of girls.” Within their family, some differences are clear: Betsy and Tim would be happy to “live all of the time outdoors,” and sometimes it felt like the girls “would be happy if they never had to go outside.” It was a steep learning curve Betsy told Amjambo Africa. “They like beauty products, and fake nails and eyelashes, the beauty regimens and the hair care products.” But they have successfully introduced the girls to some of their favorite adventures, even skiing.
Beyond navigating the challenges of parenting teenage girls, fostering Esther and Madeline threw the Smiths onto the front lines of the U.S. war on immigration. Although both were born in Haiti, the girls are not part of the 500,000 Haitians living in the U.S. under Temporary Protected Status (TPS).
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Instead, Esther has protected status under the Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SJIS) designation. According to the Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC), SJIS is a pathway to a green card for young people who have been “abandoned, abused, or neglected” by a parent. Youth must be unmarried, under 21, and be in some type of state juvenile court proceeding in order to be considered for SJIS.
Esther’s status changed when she turned 18. In many states and for many children, foster care ends at age 18. Some states, such as Maine, offer an extended foster care system until age 23. Fortunately, the Smiths were able to arrange this extended foster care for Esther.
Her younger sister Madeline has status as an asylum seeker. After a childhood in Haiti spent with extended family, their mother moved them to Brazil before coming to the U.S. in 2022 via the Darien Gap, along with two younger half-siblings. Esther and Madeline lived in Portland, Maine with their mother until 2023, when social services first removed Esther and then Madeline, over a year later. Of course Betsy and Tim said yes when social services asked them to foster Madeline at that time.
But as certain as Tim and Betsy are that they are offering these two young women a brighter future, they are concerned and frustrated by the lack of clarity of the girls’ path to citizenship in the U.S. With the change in administration and the country’s tightening immigration policies, Betsy worries. She says everyday she “hears these things, and they pile on me. Sometimes I lie awake at night and think, oh my God, how are we ever gonna help them? There’s no solution. There’s no end goal. What are we even working towards?”
Not only has the family had to navigate high school academics, driving lessons, peer pressure, and cultural exchange (like learning why their daughters with textured Afro hair might not want to go to the beach) — now they navigate the immigration system with the help of an attorney, and spend hours trying to figure out a future for the two young women they’ve welcomed into their family. The Smiths’ experience has made clear to them that “the foster care system is not set up with immigrant kids in mind,” because it is focused on either reunification of children with their birth families or adoption into new ones. “It is not designed to have kids in limbo for 10 years,” Betsy said.
“The foster care system is a very frustrating system. It’s frustrating because they don’t really understand the immigration system, and the immigration system doesn’t have a clue, or care, about the foster care system. And so it’s just like these two huge behemoths, like huge bureaucracies that don’t talk to one another, and we’re stuck trying to translate between the two.”
As a result, the Smiths and the two girls live in a constant state of uncertainty. For example, they are required by state law to request permission each time Madeline, a minor, leaves Maine, regardless of the reason or the distance traveled. They have also been advised that Esther could lose her eligibility for a green card if she works “under the table.” Esther wants to go to beauty school, but is waiting to hear from the state how much of her educational expenses will be covered. Until she does, she can’t enroll in school and she can’t work. She does not qualify for aid through the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) because she is not a U.S. citizen.
Despite the legal turmoil and the uncertainty around the girls’ future in the U.S., the Smiths have no doubt that Esther and Madeline will always be members of their family, even if the worst happens and they are deported. The Smiths find comfort in knowing they will always advocate for the girls’ safety, no matter where in the world they may be. “They know they can always contact us and we’ll be here to help. No matter what the situation — they’re family, and we’re not going to abandon them.”
Maine’s Office of Child and Family Safety is always in need of loving and supportive foster and adoptive homes for children in all Maine communities in order to enhance the safety and wellbeing of children in State custody. If you or someone you know might be interested in fostering, please contact OCFS toll-free at 1-877-680-5866. Community members can help keep Maine’s children and families safe by calling the OCFS Intake Line at 1-800-452-1999 to report suspected child abuse or neglect 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
*For the safety and security of the family, pseudonyms are used and all identifying information has been changed.
