Berry Street Web Docs Annual Report 2016 | Page 27

Providing Safe Homes

RESIDENTIAL

CARE
Berry Street is known as the
organisation that chooses to focus
on the children, young people and
families with the most complex
needs and has the knowledge, skills
and infrastructure to manage this
extremely challenging work.
While ideally we would want all
children and young people to be
living in a family, this simply isn’t
possible for most of the young
people we work with through our
residential care program.
We share the Government’s desire
to create more ‘family like’ options
for these young people, but also
believe a form of residential care
will continue to be needed for
some young people.
Last year, we provided care for
266 children and young people
through 28 permanent houses
and six temporary ones
Ideally, no child under 13 should
be placed in residential care.
However, because there aren't
enough foster carers and because
of the complexity of some of these
children, we cared for 37 children
under 13

ANNUAL REPORT 2016

Less than half of our permanent
houses have the extra funding
to be designated as ‘therapeutic
houses’. However, we train all
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supplement additional clinical
input where we can

In Ballarat, we engaged an art
therapist who helped the young
people decorate their bedrooms
and the common spaces, and
a nurse who assists the young
people to access appropriate
health services.

We welcomed the additional
investment announced by Minister
Mikakos, which enabled us to
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processes also improved our
ability to get maintenance done
on our homes in a timely way,
which is so important for the
young people whose home it is

In the North, we are piloting
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Developing Independence. While
early days, there have already
been improvements in school
attendance, fa