Northstar Kinship Assistance Minnesota: Eligibility, Payments, and How It Works

What Northstar Kinship Assistance Is

Northstar Care for Children is Minnesota's consolidated support system for children in foster care, adoption assistance, and relative custody transfers. The kinship assistance piece — Northstar Kinship Assistance (NKA) — provides monthly cash payments and automatic Medical Assistance to relatives who take permanent legal and physical custody of a child through the child welfare system.

Originally established under Minnesota Statutes Chapter 256N, it's now codified under §§ 142A.60 through 142A.612 following Minnesota's agency restructuring under the Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF).

It replaced the older Relative Custody Assistance (RCA) program. No new RCA agreements have been signed since November 2014 — if you're starting the process now, Northstar is the only path.

The Five Steps to Qualify

Northstar Kinship Assistance has several sequential requirements, and the timing matters:

1. Child welfare placement: The child must be removed from home under a court order or voluntary placement agreement and placed in out-of-home care by a county or Tribal child welfare agency.
2. Foster care licensing: You must become a licensed foster parent under Minnesota rules.
3. Six-month placement, usually: The child must live with you as a licensed relative foster parent for at least six consecutive months. The commissioner may grant an exemption only when an expedited move to permanency is in the child's best interest, cannot be completed without Northstar assistance, you are uniquely qualified to meet the child's needs, and the other eligibility criteria are met; the agency must also have made six-month placement efforts or explain why they were not in the child's best interest.
4. Permanency findings: The legally responsible agency must determine that reunification and adoption are not appropriate permanency options and that the child has a strong attachment to you and you are committed to permanent care. A juvenile court, or the child's Tribal court, must determine that a TPLPC to you is in the child's best interest.
5. Agreement before court order: The Northstar Kinship Assistance Agreement must ordinarily be fully negotiated, signed, and executed before the court enters the final TPLPC order. A caregiver may request a fair hearing in limited extenuating circumstances under Minn. Stat. § 142A.612, subd. 4.

Step five is the one that catches families off guard. The written agreement must ordinarily be signed and in effect before the court enters the custody order. If extenuating circumstances prevented this, Minnesota law allows the caregiver to request a fair hearing; examples include an agency's failure to advise the caregiver about Northstar assistance (Minn. Stat. § 142A.612, subd. 4).

Monthly Payment Rates

Northstar pays a base monthly rate determined by the child's age, plus a supplemental Difficulty of Care (DOC) rate based on the child's individual needs:

• Ages 0–5: approximately $712/month base
• Ages 6–12: approximately $797/month base
• Ages 13–17: approximately $941/month base

The DOC supplement is assessed using the state's Minnesota Assessment of Needs and Resources (MANSR) tool. Children with medical, emotional, or behavioral needs can receive several hundred dollars more per month on top of the base rate. The average annual Northstar Kinship Assistance benefit per child in Minnesota is roughly $12,000.

Additional Benefits

Legal expense reimbursement: Up to $2,000 for reasonable, necessary expenses directly related to finalizing the TPLPC. You'll need agency preapproval and receipts, and must submit the request within 21 months after the custody transfer is finalized.

Automatic Medical Assistance: Children on Northstar are categorically eligible for MA without an independent income check. Zero copays, zero premiums.

Successor caregiver provision: You can name a successor caregiver in the original agreement. If you die or become incapacitated, eligibility can continue to a named successor who meets the background-study requirements, renegotiates the agreement, and is appointed by the court.

After the Child Turns 18

NKA payments normally end at 18. But if the TPLPC happened after the child's 16th birthday, benefits can extend to age 21 as long as the young person meets at least one condition: finishing high school or a GED, enrolled in post-secondary education, working at least 80 hours a month, participating in an employment program, or unable to do these due to a documented disability.

Contact your county Northstar worker at least 60 days before the youth's 18th birthday to start the extension paperwork.

What If You're an Informal Caregiver?

If there was no child protection case, no foster care licensing, and no court-ordered placement, Northstar is not available to you. This is the most common confusion — many informal relative caregivers assume Minnesota has a universal kinship stipend, but it doesn't.

Informal caregivers should look at the MFIP child-only grant, which provides cash assistance without court involvement and excludes the caregiver's income entirely.

Our Minnesota Kinship Financial Help Guide includes a side-by-side comparison of every legal arrangement and the benefits each one unlocks — so you can see exactly what you're eligible for based on your specific situation.

See more Minnesota guides →