Les Gara & Amanda Metivier: Audit of the Office of Children's Services

The third part of a legislative audit of the Alaska Office of Children's Services (OCS) was made public on June 30, 2025. In 2018 an omnibus bill was signed into law that completely overhauled the way foster care in Alaska should work. That bill -- House Bill 151 -- passed the Alaska State House and the Alaska State Senate unanimously. The completed audit shows that OCS failed to implement most of the required reforms.

Les Gara was the 2022 democratic candidate for governor of Alaska. He is a former legislator who served in the Alaska state house from 2003 to 2019. Throughout his time in the legislature he advocated for foster care reform and in 2018 achieved it with House Bill 151. 

Amanda Metivier is the director of the Alaska Child Welfare Academy at UAA and is the executive director and co-founder of Facing Foster Care in Alaska. She and her husband are foster parents who have provided homes for many youth over the past 15 years.

Alaska faces a severe shortage of  licensed foster care parents. To learn more about how to be a foster parent, click here.

To volunteer for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Alaska, click here.

Link to Part 3 of the audit of OCS.

HB 151 SUMMARY

Link to previous podcast episode featuring Les Gara & Amanda Metivier