State officials have come up with a creative way to address one of the challenges in West Virginia’ foster care system, with Gov. Patrick Morrisey and state Department of Human Services Secretary Alex Mayer proposing a revolving investment fund to renovate state-owned foster care facilities and improve treatment capacity.

Change is necessary because of the volume of West Virginia children in foster care who end up in out-of-state placement — 543 of the 5,960 children in state custody. For each of those children placed somewhere else, the cost is an average of $156,000.

“What we want to do is we want to create a new revolving investment fund in order to make sure we’re building out some of the existing state-owned facilities, and that those dollars are going to be used to renovate and repair existing state properties, by providing high acuity psychiatric, neural developmental, and trauma services for kids in West Virginia,” Morrisey said. “We’re also going to be furthering treatment programs that match the clinical profiles of our kids.”

As his department continues to make slow but steady progress in cleaning up the mess that was made of foster care and child welfare in this state, Mayer and his team are ready to build on those successes.

Legislation must be put in place before the revolving investment fund can be created, but if Morrisey is correct that it will actually save money in the long run AND it will keep more children closer to home, lawmakers will surely give the measure serious consideration.

After all, for ALL the children who find themselves in the care of the Department of Human Services, West Virginia is still the place where they belong.