Stay Tuned for Future Blog Entry On Adoption Dissolution

Permanency Or Independent Living? It's NOT an Either/Or Situation

As a former foster child, I've been saying this for years:

"The child welfare system tends to focus on where to place youth.

"But regardless of placement, whether a young person ends up being adopted, reuniting with biological parents, being connected with family members or staying in a group home, foster home, institution or juvenile facility...

"They still need to have the tools necessary to build relationships and to ensure their long-term physical and emotional survival."

Glad that the experts are catching up!

Pieces of Me: Voices For & By Adopted Teens

Pieces of Me, Who do I Want to Be? is a collection of stories, poems, art, music, quotes, activities, and provocative questions for an adopted teen or young adult who wants to put the pieces of their adoption story together - but doesn’t know where to begin.

It is a book of voices, from ages 11 to 63, speaking honestly and authentically about what it means to be adopted. Most are adoptees from around the world – some are transracial, some are international, some are from foster care, some are young, some are old.

The book is separated into five sections:

• Gathering the Pieces
• Stolen Pieces
• Fitting the Pieces
• Sharing the Pieces
• Where do These Pieces Go?

Each chapter offers hope, encouragement, empowerment, and a sense of not being alone.

ISBN 9780972624442
www.emkpress.com/teenbook.html
info@emkpress.com

Filling Family Portraits: An Ohio Adoption Advocacy Event

Who: Adoption advocates, adoptive families, adoptees When: Friday, November 6th, 2009, from Noon - 1:00 p.m.
Where: The Ohio Statehouse, West Lawn, Statehouse Steps
Sponsored by: OACCA, PCSAO, Ohio Adoption Planning Group, Adoption Network Cleveland, OFCA, Ohio CASA, ODJFS, Children's Defense Fund, National Center for Adoption Law and Policy, IHS, and Voices for Ohio's Children.


Agenda:

• Pledge of Allegiance led by Rebecka and Moriah Miller
• Greg Kapcar, Public Children's Services Association of Ohio
• Penny Wyman, Ohio Association of Child Caring Agencies
• Senator Eric Kearney
• Representative Marian Harris
• Peter Schoepflin, Adoptive Parent
• Christine Johnson, Adoptee
• Call to Action from Lisa Dickson, Foster Care Alumni of America Ohio chapter

Did You Know?
One in five children who are waiting in foster care to be adopted will have to leave the system without a family at age 18 or 21. As many as 26,000 children will "age out" in the U.S. alone. (AFCARS Report, U.S. Dept. HHS)

Lisa Dickson's Call to Action:
"I aged out of foster care in 1989 - but it wasn't until over a decade later, in the year 2000, that my picture frame was finally filled." (At this point Lisa held up her wedding photo). "I was 27 years old when I married my husband, and finally became a legal member of a forever family.”

“Our children shouldn't have to wait that long. We can do so much better for the young people in and from foster care today. Every year, over a thousand Ohio youth "age out" of the foster care system without being connected with forever families.”

"When I married my husband, I became a stepmother to his two beautiful daughters. We've been married for ten years now, and I learn more every day about what it's like to love two children who are not biologically my daughters - but whom I love more than anything.”

"As I watch my stepdaughters enter their teenage years, and young adulthood, I know that my husband and I will be there for them no matter what. They won't face the uncertainty that I faced as a child.”

"They will know that they are loved. They will know that they are safe. They will know that they have a place to belong to.”

"If they make a mistake while budgeting in college, they won't be homeless. If the road is difficult, I won't pull over the car, and tell them to get out. They will know that, even during the hard times, my love will still be there.”

"There are more than 3,000 children in Ohio who are waiting for that kind of assurance and certainty today.”

"Right now, at this moment, is an opportunity to fill their picture frames with our love. Our consistency. Our perseverance.”

"We who are here today have the strength to love, and the confidence to let adoptees tell us their story. We can build pictures of the future, and face pictures of the past. We can open our hearts and our homes, and provide FOREVER.”

Lisa Dickson, Communications Chair of Foster Care Alumni of America's Ohio chapter, speaks from the heart at the Nov. 6th Adoption Rally “Filling Family Portraits” on the Statehouse Steps. OACCA Weekly, Nov. 9, 2009.

Things That Weigh Heavy on My Heart

These are the things that weigh heavily on my heart as I ponder how we might address them.

Ohio is in serious economic trouble right now. Our state unemployment compensation funds have been completely depleted. Ohio is one of 17 states that are now borrowing from the national trust fund to cover unemployment benefits. We are currently $1 billion in debt, and the shortfall is expected to top $3 billion by the end of 2010.

One of our counties is in a fiscal emergency: Auditor of State Mary Taylor recently placed Scioto County in fiscal emergency -- the first Ohio county ever so designated. She said the county has a combined county fund deficit of more than $3.5 million as of June 30, 2009.

Did you know that, according to CBS News, child abuse spikes during a recession?

Liquor sales are up: The Ohio Department of Commerce said Wednesday that sales of liquor continued to set records, rising to $729.9 million for FY09. When times are tough, it can seem easier to add up change to buy liquor than to face the pain, and try to be a part of a positive solution.

Have you visited the website for the National Center on Substance Abuse and Child Welfare? That organization exists because there is a strong correlation between substance abuse and the neglect and abuse of children.

Gambling is being promoted by our Governor as some sort of magic elixir to fix the budget problems. And it seems that Ohio’s children are last on his list.

At a time when the needs of foster care youth transitioning to adulthood are being recognized on federal level through the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act, Governor Strickland chose to cut the Ohio’s state independent living allocation by 100%.

This was after Ohio foster care youth, alumni and allies successfully advocated to retain that funding allocation. Can you imagine how difficult it was to look into the faces of the young people who testified and tell them about the Governor's veto?

Now, unless Ohio complies with National Youth in Transition Database requirements, our state stands to lose up to $250,000/yr. in federal funding to help transitioning youth as well. That is $250K of Chafee funding that could be spent supporting foster care youth before, during and after transition to adulthood.

Last week, Gov. Ted Strickland issued an Executive Order to cut funding for the state's adoption assistance programs. These cuts will affect the funds that provide financial assistance for adoptive families to provide services for children with special needs (PASS, SAMS, state match for IV-E and nonrecurring adoption expenses).

All this, in addition to massive cuts regarding child protection, which have led to laying off caseworkers and increasing caseloads.

I am deeply concerned.

But I also believe that the tougher things get in our state, so far as foster care and adoption advocacy is concerned, the more important it is for us to band together and press forward. We can't give up -- because there is too much at stake. And we need to formulate a shared vision of how we can make things better.

There’s a team-building exercise in which each person uses one finger to lift something (like a table), and their combined strength makes it possible to lift that table off the ground.

I can’t lift the weight that’s on my heart all by myself.

It’s the weight of a state, and all of us who care about Ohio youth and their welfare need to come together and take collective action.

When Foster Care or Adoption Separates Siblings

Diagram created by Lisa Dickson

It has been estimated that 80% of people living in the United States today have siblings.

The sibling bond may be the longest lasting relationship most people have; outlasting relationships with parents, spouses or children.

Siblings play a crucial role in the development personal identity and self-esteem. Brothers and sisters can provide emotional support, comfort, and a sense of stability, belonging, and continuity.

During Foster Care Month 2008, a statewide panel of young adults with foster care and adoption histories all agreed that the Family Tree Assignment was the most painful assignment that they had to do in school.

When families break down, relationships become complex and complicated.

Sibling relationships might include biological siblings who were relinquished or removed at birth, half-siblings, step-siblings or current/former foster siblings. Not all couples are married, so a sibling could include: "Mom's ex-boyfriend's daughter."

This postcard is part of Foster Care Alumni of America's ongoing national Culture of Foster Care Project.

Research demonstrates that the sibling bond is stronger between brothers and sister from dysfunctional families.

When parents are neglectful or abusive, older siblings often voluntarily take on a quasi-parental role. In such circumstances, it is common for siblings to nurture and protect one another.

75% of children in foster care in the United States have a sibling who is also in foster care. As a former foster child myself, I might worry more about the sibling who is still at home with the bio-parents.

Some social workers opt in favor of separating siblings who take on a parental role. I strongly disagree with this practice.

Entry into foster care is often accompanied by grief, pain, anxiety and guilt. Many foster children report feeling that "they have lost a part of themselves."

Casey Family Programs National Center for Resource Family Support argues that "informed practice tells us that separating a child who has taken on the role of parent from younger siblings hurts all of the children involved."

The younger children not only lose their parents, but also the older sibling with whom they have developed a strong bond. The older child experiences guilt and anxiety upon separation because he/she feels responsible for the younger siblings.

Research has demonstrated that siblings who are placed together in foster care tend to have fewer emotional and behavioral problems than those who are placed apart. "I relaxed," said one foster child when asked what he did after finding out that he was to be placed for adoption with his older brothers.

Siblings As Survival Unit:

Diagram created by Lisa Dickson

Quote from Time Magazine article; The New Science of Siblings: “From the time they are born, our brothers and sisters are our collaborators and co-conspirators, our role models and cautionary tales, our protective barrier against family upheaval. They are our scolds, protectors, goads, tormentors, playmates, counselors, sources of envy, objects of pride. They teach us how to resolve conflicts and how not to; how to conduct friendships and when to walk away from them. Sisters teach brothers about the mysteries of girls; brothers teach sisters about the puzzle of boys.

"Our spouses arrive comparatively late in our lives; our parents eventually leave us. Our siblings may be the only people we'll ever know who truly qualify as partners for life.”

Diagram created by Lisa Dickson

This diagram was created to illustrate the experience of an adoptee who is separated from his/her siblings.

This adoptee is: Grateful to have found a family. Grief-stricken over loss of the sibling connection(s). Guiltridden over not being able to express this grief to the adoptive family. All these things add up to feeling conflicted.

Disrupted adoption from the adoptee's point of view

Currently in the United States, adoptions are being promoted as the “cure” for foster care, and a panacea to all permanency issues. And yet, across America, there are a growing number of adoptions that dissolve after finalization.

The highest disruption rate is for children who are adopted as teenagers.

Also at higher risk are:
- Children who are separated from their siblings.
- Children who have been sexually abused
- Children who have been adopted before and that adoption failed

The term ‘disrupted adoption’ sounds like it was coined in order to minimize the emotional impact. It brings to mind phrases like: “The television program was disrupted by a commercial break,” or a teacher saying to her class, “Be quiet. I will tolerate no more disruptions!”

Perhaps it’s a subtle way to assign blame to the child. Could it be a lingering accusation of insubordination? Does it imply that the child is an intruder, disrupting the customary order of their adoptive parents’ household?

A friend of mine who was adopted from foster care was recently reading a blog entry from an adoptive parent whose complaint was: “I guess we just thought that we would love him sooner. He is obviously crazy about us, but I just find myself coming home from a long day at work, and wishing he would calm down.”

My friend looked up from the article and commented, “It sounds like they were looking for a puppy.”

Prelude to a Loss
A series of stages have been identified by the University of South Maine that often lead to adoption disruption. First, the adoptive parents become frustrated with the child’s behavior and begin questioning their choice to adopt. They start complaining about the child to other people.

Hopefully the adoptive parents have surrounded themselves with a support group to both comfort and challenge them regarding their parenting skills. It is normal to feel overwhelmed after an adoption, just as many parents go through an adjustment after their child’s birth.

When I became a stepmother, I remember that the transition to ‘instant parent’ wasn’t easy. It took time to define the roles in our relationship, to build trust and to set limits. I knew that it wouldn’t always be easy, and it wasn’t. But I also knew that when I chose to marry my husband, I was making a lifelong commitment to his daughters as well.

Adoption needs to be perceived as a serious commitment. A child is not a defective product. A child cannot be taken out on a trial run. You can’t have buyers’ remorse, and then take that child back for a refund.

And yet, prior to adoption disruption, adoptive parents allow themselves to fantasize about what it would be like if this child were no longer a part of their family. Finally, they issue an ultimatum to the child.

The Aftermath
Most articles about disrupted adoption focus primarily on the emotions of the adoptive parent. But what does it feel like to be the child, undergoing that level of rejection?

For children and teenagers who have experienced disrupted adoptions, this experience impacts both their personal identity and long-term survival.

They often wind up in limbo:
1.) Their birth certificate has been permanently changed. It is now inaccurate, because it has been rewritten to state that their adoptive mother gave birth to them. They aren’t allowed to have a copy of their original birth certificate without approval from both parents. In fact, they aren’t allowed to have personal documents, such as their (doctored) birth certificate, until they are 21 years old.

2.) Not only can they not rely on their former adoptive families, they are no longer legally related to their biological siblings. An adoptee explained it to me like this: “We are brother and sister, but on paper, it looks like we aren’t even related. I can’t even be his next of kin.”

3.) As they transition to adulthood, they are often unsure of how to fill out their taxes or the federal student aid application for school. They are asked to “prove” that their adoption was legally disrupted. If their adoptive parents have simply abandoned them, as happens all too often with teenagers, they can’t.

These transitioning young adults are unable to receive benefits such as ETV funds, because they were adopted and the assumption is that their adoptive parents – who have been receiving adoption subsidies for their care – are financially providing for them.

This is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the "limbo" that adoptees whose adoption has been "disrupted" can experience... Think about international adoptees who wind up in the United States foster care system.

Recommended Policy Changes
Adoption agencies should be held to the standard of full disclosure. Research has demonstrated that parents who understand beforehand about a child’s previous physical or sexual abuse are less likely to disrupt the adoption. Sometimes, such as in the case of international adoption, there might not be a lot of information available. However, inasmuch as it is possible for an agency to fully inform adoptive parents about a child’s background, they should do so.

Screen adoptive parents’ motivations and expectations. Is the adoption based primarily on the needs of the child or the adoptive parent? Many people adopt due to their inability to conceive. Sometimes disruptions occur because parents feel entitled to some wonder-child that they’ve been imagining and the child doesn’t meet those expectations.

Training for adoptive parents should include the “what if” scenarios. What if you adopt a child, and discover that child has been sexually abused? Adoptive parents should be prepared in advance, and encouraged to create a financial and emotion safety net in the event that a child might need residential care.

Facilitate an atmosphere of trust, by allowing the child contact with loved ones. An adoptee shared with me her experiences on the day of her “Goodbye Visits” prior to her adoption.

During the course of one day, she had to say goodbye to her birth family, the foster family with whom she had been staying for years and her brother. That day was the most horrific day of her life.

Three months later, her new adoptive parents were upset that she didn’t want to call them “Mom” and “Dad.”

The term Reactive Attachment Disorder makes me nervous because I believe it is a diagnosis that is given too quickly. This label makes it easier to underestimate the resilience of an adoptee and to magnify their problems. It makes it easier to blame the adoptee when things go wrong.

Imagine if someone came to you and said, “You are going to enter the witness protection program. You need to go and say goodbye to all the people that you have ever loved. You can no longer have any contact with them. It is for their safety.”

In a witness protection scenario, national security might be at stake. But whose needs are being met when an adopted child is denied contact with loved ones from their past?

When I asked my friend why her adoption meant that she was denied contact with every person that she had ever loved, her explanation was, “Adoptive parents are insecure, especially with older kids. That’s why the government allows them to cut all ties.”

I believe that if her former foster family was safe enough to place her with during the interim, she should have been allowed to maintain contact with them. If she was allowed sibling visits prior to the adoption, they should have been continued afterwards as well.

I would like to invite readers to weigh in on this issue…

Celebrate National Adoption Awareness Month

Postcard from www.fostercarealumni.org

November is National Adoption Awareness Month, reminding us all to be aware of the 114,000 children in the United States who are waiting to be connected with adoptive families.

This year's theme is Adopting Teenagers from Foster Care. Teens in the foster care system are statistically the least likely to be adopted - yet they need love and stability as much as children.

As a former foster child and current stepmom to two teenage girls, I can testify on many levels that the teenage years are challenging, and that providing emotional support and physically stability is vitally important.

How can you make the most out of National Adoption Awareness Month?

- Learn more about the Adoption Incentives Program and the Promoting Safe and Stable Families Program.

- Participate in Local Events.

- Contact your State Adoption Specialist.

Additional activity options are listed on the Adoption Month Calendar.

Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption

During the month of October, Wendy's will be selling Trick or Treat Gift Books as part of an annual fundraising effort to support the Wendy's Wonderful Kids program, via the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.

For just a dollar, each Wendy's Gift Book contains coupons for ten Junior Frosty's ($8.90 value). That's less than nine cents per coupon, which makes this a good deal for you -- and an opportunity to help some of the 513,000 children who are waiting for families within the United States foster care system.

One example of how funds are spent:
The North Carolina Children's Home Society received two Wendy's Wonderful Kids grants this year, each funding a staff position focused on finding permanent families for an identified group of children awaiting adoption.

As a result, 15 children were linked with adoptive homes.

Collector families committing child abuse

Photograph of Michael and Sharen Gravelle from msnbc.com

"Collector families" is a term referring to adoptive (or foster) families who take in large numbers of hard-to-place children and receive financial subsidies.


Three questions to consider regarding large adoptive families:

1.) How large are they?
2.) How much individual attention are the children getting?
3.) Are the parents motivated by compassion, or financial gain?

How many is too many?
Licensed day cares and special education facilities have a strict staff-child ratio.

Shouldn't foster care and adoptions pay more attention to how many children are living in the household? Particularly for treatment foster care, medically fragile children or children with special needs?

-Illinois licensing rules rule out placing more than six children in a foster home.
-In Michigan, it is not uncommon for foster families to house eight children at a time.
-In Ohio, the limit was previously set at ten children, although the Gravelle case prompted recommendations for lowering that number.

I'm not knocking all large adoptive families. In fact, my friend Johanna has a large adoptive family of her own. However, I do encourage caution.

The best case scenario for adoptive placements are storylines worthy of a Hallmark movie. But, the worst case scenarios are the stuff that nightmares are made of…

1.) Michelle and Jeffery Reid have been operating an unlicensed foster care home in North Carolina for years. Officials say the couple misrepresented themselves as experts in treating specific emotional disorders and were getting large sums of money from various agencies. Despite their lack of qualifications, they have housed up to 15 special-needs children in their home at one time.

The Reids accomplished this deception by adopting out of state, in Wisconsin, Kentucky, Illinois and Colorado. Allegations of abuse were made in June 2003, April 2004, December 2005 and June 2006.

2.) Michael and Sharen Gravelle were allowed to adopt 11 children with a host of health and behavioral problems. They couldn't handle the number and needs of the children in their care, so they made them sleep in wooden cages without pillows or mattresses.

The Gravelles were unqualified to care for special needs children. In fact, Michael Gravelle previously lost custody of his biological daughter after allegations of sexual abuse. And yet, they were entrusted with 11 children, and paid at least $500 per month in adoption subsidies for each child.

3.) Elizabeth Hazelbaker, a widow living in Butler County, Ohio, had 11 kids living in her home. Six were adopted. Five were Butler County foster children, ranging in age from 1 to 16.

A private agency in Kettering had placed five additional children with Hazelbaker after her husband died in 2003. State records show that the agency's caseworkers didn't check to see if they were more than Hazelbaker could handle alone.

Hazelbaker became abusive after her husband's death. She taped or leashed younger children into their chairs and spit into children's mouths as punishment for being too loud. Children were forced to forage into the garbage because they weren't given enough food to eat.

4.) Mercury Liggins adopted seven children and continued to collect $3,584 a month for their care during the ten months after she had abandoned them in Nigeria.

Before adopting her seven Texas children, Mercury had also adopted two other children from a man she was married to from 1979 to 1990.

5.) Thomas and Debra Schmitz, of Trenton, Tennesseee had 18 children in their house at the time of their arrest - including children whom they had adopted, foster children and children unofficially transferred to their care by other foster/adoptive parents who "needed a break."

The Schmitz proported themselves to others as experts, but their method of disciplining the children in their care was abusive and bizarre. They ordered one girl to eat her own vomit, made another girl sleep naked on the floor, forced a young boy wear soiled diapers on his head, sat on one girl and urinated on her, and pushed a wheelchair-bound girl into a swimming pool.

Police found evidence that the couple had wired a warning system to alert them when visitors came up the driveway.

Apparently, child welfare workers made visits to the house over the years and reported nothing amiss. Which really makes you wonder about the common sense factor...

Sources:
Eleven children taken from home after abuse allegations. WKYC, Oct. 5, 2005.
Garcia, Carmen. Elon couple face charges in foster care fraud. WMFR News, March 4, 2007.
Hewitt, Bill. Safe haven or house of horror? People Weekly, Feb. 13, 2006, pg. 1000.
Langford, Terri. 'Y'all are going to Nigeria.' Houston Chronicle, January 7, 2007.
McCain, Tracey. Foster Parents charged with child abuse: Alamance County deputies say an Elon couple abused 14 foster kids. WFMY, March 1, 2007.
Sheila McLaughlin. Agency overlooked foster care dangers. Cincinnati Enquirer, Sept. 24, 2006.
Police charge foster parents with abuse: Couple allegedly did not have license to care for the disabled children. Times-News, Feb. 28, 2007.
Warren, Jay. Five Butler Co. children involved in foster care case. WCPO, Oct. 25, 2005.

History behind my concerns about Kentucky

Sunshine Girl On A Rainy Day: From One Extreme to the Other

More on KY's quick-trigger adoptions

Definition of beaurocracy: An administrative system in which the need or inclination to follow rigid or complex procedures impedes effective action; e.g. innovative ideas that get bogged down in red tape and bureaucracy.

As mentioned in previous blog entries, Kentucky social workers have alleged that the Cabinet inappropriately removes children from their homes and expedites state adoptions, motivated by federal funding, e.g. women who enter homless shelters due to domestic violence in Kentucky lose custody of their children.

Complaints have been levied by Kentucky Youth Advocates and the National Institute on Children, Youth and Families.

A 12-member adoption panel, chaired by Cabinet for Health and Family Services Commissioner Mark D. Birdwhistell... can you see a conflict of interest here? I can... has reviewed the process and practices leading to termination of parental rights and adoption in Kentucky's child welfare system.

Their goal was to identify areas of improvement and propose legislation for the 2007 General Assembly. Basically, there needs to be fairness and consistency in custody termination.

What proposals have they made?
1.) Take more efforts to locate family members (such as the biological father) before putting child up for adoption; something that is not being done now

2.) Give parents an attorney and let them know that their child's custody is at stake

3.) Give court-appointed attorneys and guardians ad litem a raise (this initiative has been unsuccessfully suggested in 10 other statewide panels over the past 30 years)

4.) Require that family judges and attorneys attend training specifically about foster care and custodial termination (I wholeheartedly agree that this training shold be mandated).

All of these improvements will need to be approved by the General Assembly. If they are not approved, they are basically 'dead in the water.'

Definition of 'dead in the water:' Not going anywhere or making any progress, e.g. The crippled ship was dead in the water. With no leadership, the project was dead in the water.

Meanwhile, Kentucky State Auditor Crit Luallen has released a performance audit of the states adoption process from foster care. The Cabinet for Health and Family Services... again, can you see the conflict of interest, it's difficult for a beaurocracy to audit itself... issued a news release saying the audit would offer "general recommendations" for improving the adoption process.

Conversely, Crit Luallen's audit indicated that "Kentucky should make adoption a higher priority." Here is a direct quote: "The Commonwealth has an interest in making adoptions a favorable choice for Kentucky families." A financial interest, yes.

I don't want children to languish in foster care. If their biological parents cannot and will not care for them, I have no problem with putting them up for adoption.

What troubles me is the financial interest that the Cabinet has in facilitating speedy custodial terminations. The state receives a bonus of $4,000 for each adopted child, and more if the child has special needs. I will link to my previous blog entry on May 7th for your convenience.

Sources
Honeycutt-Spears, Valarie. Auditor to report on adoption, foster care practices today - Quick-trigger adoptions alleged. Lexington Herald-Leader, Dec. 14, 2006, City & Region pg. C4.

Honeycutt-Spears, Valarie. Panel wants Kentucky's adoption laws changed: Focuses on parents' rights. Lexington Herald-Leader, Dec. 15, 2006, City & Region pg. C1.

Oh, Kentucky, when will you ever learn?

To the staff in the Cabinet for Health and Family Services,

You are just not getting it. Please let me spell this out to you in the simplest of terms.

Adoption = good.
Separating children from their biological families unnecessarily = bad.

This is not just about your quotas. Yes, we all know that Kentucky is under pressure to increase the number of children in adoption. We know that your goal is to increase the number of adoptions each year.

And, we also know that financial incentives are involved. After the number of statewide adoptions increased from 384 in 1999 to 902 in 2005, Kentucky received $1 million in bonus money.

And yet, putting as many babies as possible on the fast track to adoption isn't the point.

Step back for a moment and think about the purpose of adoption. Aren't we trying to avoid older children languishing for years in foster care? To keep foster teens from aging out of the system and facing the adult world completely on their own? I can't recall that getting babies and two-year-olds adopted has constituted a problem.

For a recent example, look at two-year-old Dae'Kuavion Perry. His mother died before his father could establish paternity. His father wants him. His aunt wants him.

You want to give Dae'Kuavion to strangers. Why? Because his father made a mistake four years ago and has been clean ever since? Court records and drug tests prove that father Tim Mabson has made every effort to turn his life around.

If you won't give Dae'Kuavion to his father, why not to his aunt? His aunt is a foster mother. She has adopted two foster children. How could she not be qualified to provide foster care to her own nephew?

Sources
Kentucky. Children's Voice. Washington: Sept. / Oct. 2006, Vol. 15, Issue 5, pg. 10.
Not family-friendly: State too quick to separate child from relatives. Lexington Herald-Leader, Editorial, Oct. 3, 2006.