Grant Stories
Pegasus Legal Services for Children
In New Mexico, 25,000 grandparents have primary care of 40,000 grandchildren.
The vast majority of these children have parents who are unable or unwilling to care for their children due to substance abuse, mental illness and/or incarceration. Without legal authority, grandparents are often unable to access resources including education, healthcare and public benefits.
Without legal guardianship, a grandparent could be forced to return a grandchild to a dangerous, unhealthy environment provided by their parent.
The Kinship Caregiver Support Program provided through Pegasus Legal Services for children targets the most at-risk caregiver families, those where the parents refuse to transfer guardianship to a grandparent(s). Each year Pegasus handles over one hundred such cases.
A grant through the Sandia Foundation (managed by the Albuquerque Community Foundation) provides funding for legal services for families whose income is far below the Federal Poverty Guidelines.
