PHOENIX — Nearly 20% of Arizona's foster kids are not living in family homes; instead, those hundreds of kids are living in congregate care settings, according to the Department of Child Safety’s most recent monthly data.
Congregate care includes group homes, behavioral health facilities, and even juvenile detention. Instead of foster parents, staff members care for these children.
Child welfare advocates say DCS needs to prioritize reducing the number of kids in these placements, especially after recent tragedies involving kids in group home care.
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Emily Pike, 14, and Zariah Dodd, 16, were living in DCS-licensed group homes on opposite sides of the Valley. Both were killed after they walked away.
Pike was from the San Carlos Apache tribe. Her body was found near Globe, AZ, about two weeks after her disappearance. Her killer had not been captured.
Zariah was about 22 weeks pregnant at the time of her death. Prosecutors say 36-year-old Jurrell Davis is the father of the baby. He is one of two men facing criminal charges in connection with the deadly shooting of the pregnant teen.
“It is something horrible that occurred that I believe could have been prevented,” said Anika Robinson, a foster child advocate, in an interview with the ABC15 Investigators last month. “I think everyone involved could have done more.”
Advocates for foster youth say DCS group homes fail too many children who were placed into state care because they were previously abused or neglected.
“Sometimes group homes are an environment where they feel disconnected from what they know,” said Leanne Murphy from Children's Action Alliance. “Sometimes it feels unsafe. Sometimes it can be a re-traumatizing experience.”
ABC15 has reported on several of these tragic outcomes in recent years.
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In January 2023, the bodies of group home runaways, Sitlalli Avelar and Kamryn Meyers, were found in a Mesa retention pond. The medical examiner determined they had been drinking before they drowned.
Just months earlier, in August 2022, 18-year-old T'revonsay Sales was killed in a shooting at a north-central Phoenix group home for teens in foster care. Police arrested a 17-year-old.
The ABC15 investigators learned it wasn't the first shooting in the facility. A few months after the shooting, North Star Independent Living Services, which owned the group home, voluntarily closed that location.
“The whole system is failing, and someone has to see that,” Kent Miller, a former North Star group home employee, told ABC15 in September 2022.
In May 2025, DCS denied renewal of group home contracts for We Care Homes, a company that operated five small homes in the south Phoenix area.
DCS provided ABC15 with documentation of 27 complaints received in less than a year involving We Care Homes. Four complaints were validated or listed as a concern. Those involved allegations of a lack of food, unsupervised children, injuries not reported properly, and substance abuse.
"Children complaining of being hungry; children complaining that they're being mistreated,” Jowharah Hall, a former We Care Homes consultant, told ABC15 in May. “They hate it there. That's heartbreaking."
"I have a high standard,” Veronica Johnson, CEO of We Care Homes, told ABC15 in June. “Am I pleased with my staff and what they gave me? Absolutely not."
DCS tells us it moved all 18 kids from We Care Homes to other placements.
“At what point is Arizona going to wake up and prioritize kids that we have removed from their home, and yet continue to be traumatized while they're in foster care?” Robinson said.
To settle a class action lawsuit five years ago, DCS agreed to create a long-term program to reduce the use of congregate care. The plan included identifying and recruiting foster parents to care for historically challenging-to-place subpopulations, including teenagers, large sibling groups, medically fragile youth, and LGBTQ+ youth.
The plan also involves reducing the utilization of congregate care to less than 10.5% of the kids in care. DCS is still trying to meet that benchmark.
“We are in desperate need of more folks to step up for the children in need in this state,” Murphy said.
Watch the exclusive interview with DCS Director Ptak on the ABC15 Streaming App and in the player below.
