In 1978 American Indian people of the United States won a major victory in the area of self-determination with the passage of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). This Act outlines placement preferences for American Indian children. Children who are enrolled or eligible for enrollment with a federally recognized tribe must first be placed with a member of their extended family; secondly, with a member of their tribe; and lastly, with a licensed American Indian foster home. It is well documented by the Minnesota Department of Human Services that a disproportionate number of American Indian children are in out-of-home placements (11%) when compared to the racial composition of the State of Minnesota.

American Indian Family and Children's Services (AIFACS) was the first organization in the State of Minnesota to address this need. The American Indian Family and Children's Services (AIFACS) ensures that ICWA is followed, when out-of-home placement is necessary, by licensing family members and tribal members for foster care. The St. Paul American Indian Center organized AIFACS in the 1985. In 1993 AIFACS became an independent, self-governing organization, separating from the St. Paul American Indian Center. Today we have AIFACS licensed homes spread across the state of Minnesota, such as Bemidji, Deer Wood, Milaca, Tamarack. AIFACS provides foster care services to American Indian children from birth to eighteen years of age who are involved in the child protection system and the corrections system through the counties in Minnesota. AIFACS recruits American adults over the age of 21 who would like to share their lives, culture and homes with American Indian children in need of out-of-home placement. AIFACS provides training and support services to those families that decide to become part of our agency.

Foster homes licensed through AIFACS are licensed as Special Services homes. This category of houses, as defined by Minnesota DHS, are homes that are able to provide extraordinary care or services by virtue of experience, training, special skills and understanding. The fact that AIFACS foster parents are American Indian who are successful in their own lives, have the essential knowledge and understanding of their culture and appreciate the unique needs of the American Indian children in care qualifies them for this license category.

AIFACS, on the average, has 55-60 foster homes with approximately 90-100 children in placement. AIFACS foster homes provide the following: respite care (short-term care for children that are in foster care or in their biological homes), permanent or long-term foster care, emergency care, foster family group homes and rites of passage homes (independent living skills).

The make-up of AIFACS homes vary from single parent families, two parent families, families who work with just one child, families who have sibling placements of up to six children, families who work only with teenage boys, families who are trained to work with medically fragile infants, and families who work with children who have developmental disabilities.

In the last three years AIFACS has provided care for over 250 American Indian children. These children have primarily been placed by Hennepin County, but AIFACS also had placements from the counties of Ramsey, Dakota, Anoka, Redwood, Mille Lacs, Aitkin, Beltrami, Becker, Crow Wing, LeSeuer, St. Louis, Goodhue, Olmstead and Scott. These children come to placement from all the tribal communities within the state of Minnesota. AIFACS also serves American Indian children affiliated with tribes outside of the state such as San Carlos Apache, Lakota and Dakota from Rosebud, Standing Rock, Sisseton, and Pine Ridge, HoChunk from Black River Falls and Ojibwe from Turtle Mountain.

AIFACS has provided quality foster care for American Indian children since 1985. It has been the goal of AIFACS to work closely with tribes and counties throughout the state of Minnesota to provide quality American Indian homes for American Indian children in need of out-of-home placement.