Foster care nonprofit moving to larger Naperville space

A Naperville-based nonprofit organization that helps find foster homes for older children with behavior challenges is planning a move in May to a larger space where it can expand its staff and offer more support services.

Our Children's Homestead is set to move to 280 Shuman Blvd. in Naperville - a location two buildings down from its current site at 387 Shuman Blvd., but much larger, CEO Marissa Allen said.

The new office, in a building dubbed "The Atrium," is a 12,599-square-foot space where Our Children's Homestead can house up to 30 new hires. Allen said the staffing increase is planned as the organization negotiates the details of a potential contract with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services to run a new therapeutic foster care program.

Our Children's Homestead is proposing the new program as a way to better assist children as they leave behavioral hospitals or group homes and return to foster homes. Allen said the transition can be challenging for children the nonprofit serves, who are 10 or older and have mental or behavioral health challenges.

"There just wasn't really good support for those kids," Allen said. "They weren't successful in foster homes coming from such a restrictive environment going into a foster setting."

The services Our Children's Homestead wants to add would provide more structure and clinical help to the children from case workers, therapists, mentors and other support personnel. The proposed program also would provide more support, education and respite for the people who serve as foster parents.

"We created a program where we feel like kids could be more successful in foster homes that felt more supported and had more knowledge about how to support these kids," Allen said.

Our Children's Homestead has 40 full-time employees, so the planned staffing increase if the new program is created could greatly expand its operations - and its office size. That's why the organization worked with real estate firm NAI Hiffman to find a new spot for its headquarters.

To celebrate 25 years of providing foster care to roughly 2,000 children total, Our Children's Homestead is planning a Foster Fundraising Fiesta for Friday, March 15, at its new space. Details including sponsorship opportunities are available at ochkids.org.

Allen said the organization also is recruiting more foster parents to add to the network of 130 families who are willing to care for wards of the state with behavior challenges. She said about 80 foster families are active through Our Children's Homestead now as the organization works to place children into homes that can support their development.

"Our population is challenging, so we really need people who are up for that," Allen said. "All kids need families. That's where kids thrive."