Taking a project contracted out by the Social Affairs Bureau of Taipei City Government as an example, this article tries to discuss how an emergency/short-term residential care for adolescents faces challenges, such as family-like residential services, regulation, and running away. The agency can never escape the tension between care and control. The most important, some structural barriers, such as residents of both sexes, from underage sex trade as well as child abuse, and temporary placement of Mainland China girls, have made the mission almost impossible to accomplish. Beside the balance between regulation and control, reasonable work conditions, the succession of supervision expertise, and advanced professional training, the outside systems also count for whether or not the treatment impact will sustain.