States increasingly shift toward kin-first foster care

When Victoria Gray and her husband took in their grandchild in 1993, there wasn’t a catchall term to explain the difficult task ahead. They just did the work. But in the past decade, Gray, of Phoenix, has watched as states have worked steadily to recognize the roles of grandparents and other extended loved ones, now known collectively as kinship caregivers, in raising children who otherwise might be in foster care.