SPEAKERS CONTENTS INSERTS
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44–585 CC
1998
H.R. 867, THE ''ADOPTION PROMOTION ACT OF 1997''
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RESOURCES
of the
COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
APRIL 8, 1997
Serial 105–10
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Ways and Means
COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
BILL ARCHER, Texas, Chairman
PHILIP M. CRANE, Illinois
BILL THOMAS, California
E. CLAY SHAW, Jr., Florida
NANCY L. JOHNSON, Connecticut
JIM BUNNING, Kentucky
AMO HOUGHTON, New York
WALLY HERGER, California
JIM McCRERY, Louisiana
DAVE CAMP, Michigan
JIM RAMSTAD, Minnesota
JIM NUSSLE, Iowa
SAM JOHNSON, Texas
JENNIFER DUNN, Washington
MAC COLLINS, Georgia
ROB PORTMAN, Ohio
PHILIP S. ENGLISH, Pennsylvania
JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada
JON CHRISTENSEN, Nebraska
WES WATKINS, Oklahoma
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J.D. HAYWORTH, Arizona
JERRY WELLER, Illinois
KENNY HULSHOF, Missouri
CHARLES B. RANGEL, New York
FORTNEY PETE STARK, California
ROBERT T. MATSUI, California
BARBARA B. KENNELLY, Connecticut
WILLIAM J. COYNE, Pennsylvania
SANDER M. LEVIN, Michigan
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland
JIM McDERMOTT, Washington
GERALD D. KLECZKA, Wisconsin
JOHN LEWIS, Georgia
RICHARD E. NEAL, Massachusetts
MICHAEL R. McNULTY, New York
WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, Louisiana
JOHN S. TANNER, Tennessee
XAVIER BECERRA, California
KAREN L. THURMAN, Florida
A.L. Singleton, Chief of Staff
Janice Mays, Minority Chief Counsel
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Subcommittee on Human Resources
E. CLAY SHAW, Jr., Florida, Chairman
DAVE CAMP, Michigan
JIM McCRERY, Louisiana
MAC COLLINS, Georgia
PHILIP S. ENGLISH, Pennsylvania
JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada
J.D. HAYWORTH, Arizona
WES WATKINS, Oklahoma
SANDER M. LEVIN, Michigan
FORTNEY PETE STARK, California
ROBERT T. MATSUI, California
WILLIAM J. COYNE, Pennsylvania
JIM McDERMOTT, Washington
Pursuant to clause 2(e)(4) of Rule XI of the Rules of the House, public hearing records of the Committee on Ways and Means are published in electronic form. The printed hearing record remains the official version. Because electronic submissions are used to prepare both printed and electronic versions of the hearing record, the process of converting between various electronic formats may introduce unintentional errors or omissions. Such occurrences are inherent in the current publication process and should diminish as the process is further refined. The electronic version of the hearing record does not include materials which were not submitted in an electronic format. These materials are kept on file in the official Committee records.
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C O N T E N T S
Text of H.R. 867
Advisory of March 31, 1997, announcing the hearing
WITNESSES
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Hon. Olivia A. Golden, Ph.D., Acting Assistant Secretary, Children and Families
American Public Welfare Association, Jess McDonald
Camp, Hon. Dave, a Representative in Congress from the State of Michigan
Children's Defense Fund, MaryLee Allen
Children's Rights Council, Ronald K. Henry, Esq
Consortium for Child Welfare, Robert M. Guttman, Esq
DeWine, Hon. Mike, a U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio
Hear My Voice, Janice Mink
Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, Jess McDonald
Kennelly, Hon. Barbara B., a Representative in Congress from the State of Connecticut
National Council For Adoption, William L. Pierce
SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD
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Child Welfare League of America, Inc., statement
National Association of Homes and Services for Children, statement
National Black Child Development Institute, Inc., Clarice Dibble Walker, statement
INSERT OFFSET FOLIOS 1 TO 19 HERE
[The official Committee record contains the text of H.R. 867 which can be viewed at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin//bdquery/z?d105:h.r.867:]
H.R. 867, THE ''ADOPTION PROMOTION ACT OF 1997''
TUESDAY, APRIL 8, 1997
House of Representatives,
Committee on Ways and Means,
Subcommittee on Human Resources,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 3:10 p.m., in room B–318, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. E. Clay Shaw, Jr. (Chairman of the Subcommittee), presiding.
[The advisory announcing the hearing follows:]
ADVISORY
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FROM THE COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RESOURCES
CONTACT: (202) 225–1025
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 31, 1997
No. HR–5
Shaw Announces Hearing on
H.R. 867, the ''Adoption Promotion Act of 1997''
Congressman E. Clay Shaw, Jr., (R–FL), Chairman, Subcommittee on Human Resources of the Committee on Ways and Means, today announced that the Subcommittee will hold a hearing on H.R. 867, the ''Adoption Promotion Act of 1997.'' The hearing will take place on Tuesday, April 8, 1997, in room B–318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, beginning at 3:00 p.m.
Oral testimony at this hearing will be heard from invited witnesses only. Witnesses will include the Administration and representatives of child welfare and adoption organizations. However, any individual or organization not scheduled for an oral appearance may submit a written statement for consideration by the Committee and for inclusion in the printed record of the hearing.
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BACKGROUND:
On February 27, 1997, Rep. Dave Camp (R–MI), Rep. Barbara Kennelly (D–CT), and Chairman Shaw, introduced H.R. 867, the ''Adoption Promotion Act of 1997.''
The major provisions of the legislation would promote adoption by: allowing States to define cases of severe abuse or neglect in which States could move more quickly to adoption; providing for earlier permanency hearings; allowing foster parents to be heard at hearings and reviews; requiring States to move toward adoption in many cases in which children have been in foster care for 18 months; allowing States to use a large federal data base to locate fathers for purposes of notifying them of an impending proceeding to terminate parental rights; providing funds to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to help States implement the new procedures to promote adoption; and providing cash bonuses to States that increase the number of adoptions of children in foster care. In announcing the hearing on the Camp-Kennelly legislation, Chairman Shaw noted: ''The purpose of this bipartisan legislation is to help States do a better job of protecting maltreated children, while moving these children toward adoption, when appropriate, in a more timely fashion. Both Representatives Camp and Kennelly have worked for many months on this legislation, and have met tirelessly with a wide range of advocates, interested parties, and child welfare administrators to perfect their proposal.''
''When children are in danger of continued abuse, safety must be the paramount concern of social workers, judges, and all who come into contact with the child and family. This means there are some circumstances where efforts to keep the child with the family will endanger the child's life,'' Camp said. Camp further stated: ''The legislation would require States to initiate proceedings to move young children who have spent 75 percent of the past two years in the foster care system into suitable families. This provision is intended to ensure that children do not languish in foster care having neither a rehabilitated family nor a chance for a permanent adoptive home.''
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Kennelly added: ''Of the half a million children in foster care, HHS estimates that 100,000 will not return to their biological families. Yet only about 20,000 children a year are adopted. Our legislation will move us toward the President's goal of doubling the number of adoptions out of foster care by the year 2002 by providing for a per child adoption bonus to each State that increases its annual number of finalized adoptions from the foster care system. States that qualify will be eligible to receive $4,000 for each foster child and $6,000 for a child with special needs. This provision will help move increasing numbers of children into safe, loving and permanent homes.''
DETAILS FOR SUBMISSION OF WRITTEN COMMENTS:
Any person or organization wishing to submit a written statement for the printed record of the hearing should submit at least six (6) copies of their statement and a 3.5-inch diskette in WordPerfect or ASCII format, with their address and date of hearing noted, by the close of business, Tuesday, April 15, 1997, to A.L. Singleton, Chief of Staff, Committee on Ways and Means, U.S. House of Representatives, 1102 Longworth House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515. If those filing written statements wish to have their statements distributed to the press and interested public at the hearing, they may deliver 200 additional copies for this purpose to the Subcommittee on Human Resources office, room B–317 Rayburn House Office Building, at least one hour before the hearing begins.
FORMATTING REQUIREMENTS:
Each statement presented for printing to the Committee by a witness, any written statement or exhibit submitted for the printed record or any written comments in response to a request for written comments must conform to the guidelines listed below. Any statement or exhibit not in compliance with these guidelines will not be printed, but will be maintained in the Committee files for review and use by the Committee.
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1. All statements and any accompanying exhibits for printing must be typed in single space on legal-size paper and may not exceed a total of 10 pages including attachments. At the same time written statements are submitted to the Committee, witnesses are now requested to submit their statements on a 3.5-inch diskette in WordPerfect or ASCII format.
2. Copies of whole documents submitted as exhibit material will not be accepted for printing. Instead, exhibit material should be referenced and quoted or paraphrased. All exhibit material not meeting these specifications will be maintained in the Committee files for review and use by the Committee.
3. A witness appearing at a public hearing, or submitting a statement for the record of a public hearing, or submitting written comments in response to a published request for comments by the Committee, must include on his statement or submission a list of all clients, persons, or organizations on whose behalf the witness appears.
4. A supplemental sheet must accompany each statement listing the name, full address, a telephone number where the witness or the designated representative may be reached and a topical outline or summary of the comments and recommendations in the full statement. This supplemental sheet will not be included in the printed record.
The above restrictions and limitations apply only to material being submitted for printing. Statements and exhibits or supplementary material submitted solely for distribution to the Members, the press and the public during the course of a public hearing may be submitted in other forms.
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Note: All Committee advisories and news releases are available on the World Wide Web at 'HTTP://WWW.HOUSE.GOV/WAYS_MEANS/'.
The Committee seeks to make its facilities accessible to persons with disabilities. If you are in need of special accommodations, please call 202–225–1721 or 202–225–1904 TTD/TTY in advance of the event (four business days notice is requested). Questions with regard to special accommodation needs in general (including availability of Committee materials in alternative formats) may be directed to the Committee as noted above.
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Chairman SHAW. Excuse me for starting 2 minutes late. I know that I, along with many of the Members, have just gotten back into town, and that always seems to delay things somewhat.
It is not often that any of us have the opportunity to do something that is universally regarded as good, particularly here in Washington. Today we take the first step toward increasing the number of adoptions in America. Throughout history, communities have found that adoption is an exceptionally effective way to ensure that children are reared in loving and attentive families.
For many good and complex reasons, our Nation has come to place great value on the rights of biological parents. Though we often claim that our family courts and social work professions are organized to protect the best interests of the children, many professional experts and policymakers have come to believe that our child protection system tilts somewhat in favor of the right of biological parents over the rights of the children. This imbalance shows up especially in the difficulty in terminating the right of parents who have abused and neglected their children. Our child protection system takes extraordinary steps to protect these parents.
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I believe every Member of this Subcommittee agrees that we should provide such help, but in providing help to troubled families, we must also acknowledge that some families will not be improved by services. In these cases, we must move toward adoption or other permanent placement in a much more expeditious fashion than we have in the past. When some States keep children in foster care for an average of well over 3 years, and when black children in some States have average foster care stays that are twice as long as those of white children, we know something is wrong, and something must be done.
The solutions to these dilemmas are our topic today. By freeing States from Federal redtape, by encouraging States to place time limits on family rehabilitation and providing cash bonuses for States that increase adoption, the Camp-Kennelly legislation will lead to a substantial increase in the number of children adopted each year, which in turn means a substantial decrease in the number of children languishing in foster care.
In my view, the Camp-Kennelly adoption bill is one of the finest and most important pieces of legislation the Congress will consider this year.
Representatives Camp and Kennelly and their staffs have met tirelessly with nearly every group that has an interest in child protection and adoption. They started with a list of proposals last fall, and they circulated widely to initiate a concrete discussion about specific policy proposals. Through a time-consuming process of meetings and discussions that has lasted for 6 months, Representatives Camp and Kennelly created the excellent bill they have introduced on February 27. Further improvements are expected to be included in a bipartisan amendment offered at the beginning of next week's markup. Thus, today's hearing on the Camp-Kennelly legislation comes at the perfect moment.
We are anxious to hear from the excellent witnesses we have invited to comment on the bill. At the outset, I want to thank our witnesses for their excellent testimony and to assure them we will carefully consider their recommendations as we develop the bipartisan amendment.
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[The opening statement follows:]
INSERT OFFSET FOLIO 01 HERE
[The official Committee record contains additional material here.]
Chairman SHAW. Mr. Levin, I now recognize you for any opening statement you might wish to make.
Mr. LEVIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We all appreciate your calling this hearing.
Let me join you first in congratulating Dave Camp and Barbara Kennelly and their staffs for all the work you have put into this bill, and we are also glad to see our former colleague who moved on to the lower House. I tell that to one of your colleagues all the time, and get the same chuckle from him.
But we are very glad to see you, Senator, and also, again, thanks to our colleagues Barbara Kennelly and David Camp for all their work.
Mr. Chairman, like you, on this Subcommittee we have been through a number of discussions and considerations of this issue, and we have been looking for legislation that will help to bring some clarity and certainty for these children out of the confusion that often exists. Our aim is that every child in foster care have a safe, loving, permanent home. What this bill will do is to remove some of the barriers that stand in the way of achieving that.
I would ask, Mr. Chairman, that my full statement be placed in the record. Like you and our other colleagues, I am anxious to get on to the testimony so that we will be in a position to mark this bill up next week.
[The opening statement follows:]
INSERT OFFSET FOLIOS 20 TO 21 HERE
[The official Committee record contains additional material here.]
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Chairman SHAW. Thank you, Sandy.
Our House has often been called the people's House, where, Senator DeWine, I will call it the House of real people. We are glad to welcome you back. I don't think anybody knows more about children than you do, having watched so many of yours grow up. You have certainly done your part in populating the Earth.
With that, I would like to welcome you and our colleague, a former Member of this Subcommittee, Ms. Kennelly, as well as Mr. Camp, who sits next to me on this panel. All of you take your seats.
I would at this point like to remind all the witnesses, I know this panel doesn't need to be reminded, that we do have the 5-minute rule. Your full statements will be made a part of the record, and you are invited to summarize and proceed as you see fit.
Mr. DeWine.
STATEMENT OF HON. MIKE DeWINE, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OHIO
Senator DEWINE. Mr. Chairman, thanks very much. I am glad to be back testifying in front of the Subcommittee and glad to be back in the people's House.
I come here today to strongly support legislation that has been introduced by Representatives Camp and Kennelly. I believe this legislation would begin to solve a major national problem, a national problem you referenced in your opening statement, and that is to find safe and permanent homes for children who are caught up in the foster care system.
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Mr. Chairman, the last time I testified before this Subcommittee, I talked about that problem, the fact that far too many children are spending their most important, most formative years, really, in a legal limbo, a legal limbo that denies them their chance to be adopted.
These children are being denied what all children should have, the chance to be loved and cared for by parents. Nearly half a million children are in this country's foster care system. One hundred thousand of these children are available at any time for adoption, but too few of the children who are available for adoption are actually being adopted. In 1995, only 20,000 foster care children were adopted nationwide. Mr. Chairman, in my view it is very important for Congress to act soon so that more of these children can be placed in good homes with permanent, stable, loving families.
Representatives Camp and Kennelly are leading this bipartisan effort in the House of Representatives. Their efforts have been outstanding. They propose taking important steps, such as limiting the amount of time the youngest children spend in foster care. Under this bill, if a child is under the age of 10 and has spent 18 of the last 24 months in State foster care, this bill would require States to initiate proceedings to terminate parental rights, unless the judge, unless the court, determines that adoption is not in the child's best interest.
This, frankly, just makes good common sense. To all of us, 2 years is just a small percentage of our lives, or to most of us our age anyway it is, but to an 8-year-old child, 2 years is one-fourth of that child's life, 2 vital years that young children can never get back. Children simply do not get a second chance to grow up.
The Camp-Kennelly legislation also would require that foster parents be given notice of court reviews and hearings and an opportunity to be heard at these hearings, and who better to testify to the court about that particular child than the man and woman who are taking care of that child?
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Mr. Chairman, it is right that these foster parents be heard. To exclude the foster parents from the court proceedings may mean silencing the child's most forceful and most informed advocates.
Furthermore, this bill does something extremely important that I am also working to do in the U.S. Senate. It will clarify the meaning of ''reasonable efforts,'' reasonable efforts having to do with family reunification, so that it is absolutely clear that when it comes to determining what reunification efforts are reasonable, the child's health and safety will always be the paramount concern.
The Camp-Kennelly bill would also permit States to identify certain aggravated circumstances where reasonable efforts to reunify would simply not be required, such as in the case of abandonment, torture, chronic abuse, sexual abuse, murder of sibling, felony assault.
Mr. Chairman, while I applaud this effort to illustrate the sort of heinous circumstances where reunification would not be in the child's best interests, I would urge my colleagues to consider going one step further. I believe States should be required to adopt these examples as a bare minimum.
Let me conclude, Mr. Chairman, by once again commending my colleagues, Representatives Camp and Kennelly, for leading these efforts in the House of Representatives. I believe this bill raises hopes that this Congress will send to the President legislation increasing the prospects that foster children will find a home that is both permanent and safe.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Hon. Mike DeWine, a U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio
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Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm very glad to have this opportunity to testify in support of legislation introduced by Representatives Camp and Kennelly, that would, in my view, begin to solve a major national problem—finding safe and permanent homes for children caught up in the foster care system.
The last time I testified before this Subcommittee, I talked about that problem—the fact that far too many children are spending their most important, formative years in a legal limbo that denies them their chance to be adopted. These children are being denied what all children should have—the chance to be loved and cared for by parents.
Nearly 500,000 children are in this country's foster care system. One hundred thousand of these children are available for adoption—but too few of the children who are available for adoption are actually being adopted. In 1995, only 20,000 foster children were adopted nationwide.
In my view, it is very important for Congress to act soon—so that more of these children can be placed in good homes with permanent, stable, loving families.
Representatives Camp and Kennelly are leading this bipartisan effort in the House of Representatives. Their efforts have been outstanding. They propose taking important steps such as limiting the amount of time that the youngest children spend in foster care. If a child is under the age of 10, and has spent 18 of the last 24 months in state foster care, this bill requires states to initiate proceedings to terminate parental rights—unless the court determines that adoption is not in the child's best interests. This is just simple common sense. To all of us, two years is just a small percentage of our lives, but to an eight year old child, two years is a fourth of his life—two vital years that young children can never get back. Children don't get a second chance to grow up.
The Camp-Kennelly legislation also would require that foster parents be given notice of court reviews and hearings, and an opportunity to be heard at these hearings. Mr. Chairman, it is right that these foster parents be heard! To exclude the foster parents from the court proceedings may mean silencing the child's most forceful and informed advocates.
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Furthermore, the Camp-Kennelly bill does something extremely important that I am also working to do in the Senate. It would clarify the meaning of ''reasonable efforts''—so that it is absolutely clear that when it comes to determining what reunification efforts are reasonable, the child's health and safety are the paramount concern.
The Camp-Kennelly bill would also permit states to identify certain ''aggravated circumstances'' where reasonable efforts to reunify would not be required—such as in the case of abandonment, torture, chronic abuse, sexual abuse, murder of a sibling, and felony assault.
While I applaud this effort to illustrate the sort of heinous circumstances where reunification would not be in the child's best interests, I urge my colleagues to consider going one step further. I believe that states should be required to adopt these examples as a minimum.
Let me conclude by once again commending Representatives Camp and Kennelly for leading these efforts. It raises hopes that this Congress will send to the President legislation increasing the prospects that foster children will find a home that is permanent and safe.
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Chairman SHAW. Thank you, Senator.
Mr. Camp.
STATEMENT OF HON. DAVE CAMP, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN
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Mr. CAMP. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Subcommittee today, and thank you for your very kind remarks. And I want to thank Mr. Levin for his remarks. I also want to mention how much I appreciate Senator DeWine's comments and his efforts, and I want to thank him and Congresswoman Kennelly for their outstanding efforts on behalf of children.
Mr. Chairman, children are forced into foster care for a variety of reasons, and in my former life as a child advocate in Michigan, I have seen the abuse and neglect that often brings these children into the system. While foster care is an important temporary answer to a child's needs, it has often become a permanent solution. With nearly half a million children currently residing in foster care, and thousands more joining them each year, that in itself is a tragedy. But many of these children spend several years, up to 3 years, in foster care, and as Senator DeWine mentioned, that can be a lifetime in the life of a young child. So in a temporary setting, children don't often know if and when they will have to pack their bags and go home or move to another temporary home.
The bill that Congresswoman Kennelly and I have introduced seeks to address these problems by working to give children a loving, permanent home. In the bill before us, it represents much bipartisan consultation with each other and with child welfare groups and advocates. The Subcommittee has worked diligently to ensure that their concerns were addressed, and we now have an opportunity to act.
As Senator DeWine mentioned, attempts to define ''reasonable efforts'' have left many of us dazed and confused. What constitutes reasonable efforts for one may be unreasonable to another. Everyone agrees we need to address this issue.
Our legislation will help accomplish several goals. First, it will allow us to, in some cases, allow courts to abandon the reasonable effort standard or language in some extreme instances. It also provides for concurrent planning so that when a child enters foster care, a social worker can plan to reunite the family, but may also plan to locate a permanent adoptive family if reunification efforts fail. Then last, the legislation provides incentive payments to States for successful adoptions. States should be rewarded for moving children into permanent homes, not leaving them in temporary placements. The bill also does a number of other things that Senator DeWine mentioned.
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I would conclude my remarks now and have my formal statement be a part of the record.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Hon. Dave Camp, a Representative in Congress from the State of Michigan
Thank you Mr. Chairman and thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee today.
I appreciate the comments of Senator DeWine and want to commend both him and Congresswoman Kennelly for their outstanding efforts on behalf of children.
As you know, Congresswoman Kennelly and I have been working on this issue for nearly a year. We have drafted and redrafted our proposal and have developed sound legislation that enjoys bipartisan support.
Mr. Chairman, as you know, children are forced into foster care for a variety of reasons. As a child advocate in Michigan, I have seen the abuse and neglect that bring these children into the system.
Foster care, while being an important temporary answer to a child's needs, has all too often become a permanent solution to a child's problems.
Nearly 500,000 children currently reside in foster care and thousands more join them each year. This in itself is a tragedy but many of these children spend up to three years in foster care. For a young child, three years can be a lifetime—and this is the real tragedy. A child can spend much of his or her life in a temporary setting—not knowing if and when they will have to pack their bags and move to another temporary home.
The Camp/Kennelly bill seeks to addresses these problems by working to give the child a permanent home. The bill before us represents months of bipartisan consultation with child welfare groups and advocates. The subcommittee has worked diligently to ensure that their concerns were addressed and we now have the opportunity to act.
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The ''reasonable efforts'' provision has become a cumbersome albatross around the necks of social workers and judges. Attempts to define reasonable efforts have left everyone dazed and confused. What may constitute a reasonable effort for one person may be wholly unreasonable to another.
I met a gentleman this past week—Mr. Jim Williams, who wanted to be here today but his adopted son is ill. He described to me the efforts of social workers to reunite his foster child with her mother. Despite abandoning her three little boys, the social services agency flew her to be with her family, paying for the air fare and hotel stay on several separate occasions. The case was finally resolved when the mother voluntarily gave up her children. They now have a safe and happy home with loving parents.
Everyone agrees that the best thing for a child is a loving family and this bill seeks to place more children in these homes.
Our legislation accomplishes this goal in three simple ways. First, it allows states to abandon reasonable efforts in instances such as, when the child has been abused, or a sibling has been killed.
Second, it provides for concurrent planning so that when a child enters the foster care system, the social worker can plan to reunite the family, but may also locate a potential adoptive family so that if reunification efforts fail—the child can immediately be adopted.
Third, the legislation provides incentive payments to states for successful adoptions. States should be rewarded for moving children into permanent homes, not leaving them in temporary placements.
At this time I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.
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Chairman SHAW. Thank you, Mr. Camp.
Mrs. Kennelly, welcome back to the finest Subcommittee.
STATEMENT OF HON. BARBARA B. KENNELLY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT
Mrs. KENNELLY. I miss you, Mr. Shaw. But you are in good hands with Mr. Levin.
Mr. Chairman, let me also start off by saying thank you for holding these hearings. I do appreciate it. Mr. Camp and I are excited about this legislation and thank the Senator for coming over and joining with us today. I think we have a good piece of legislation to promote adoption and protect children. I think and hope this will be a first step in a bipartisan effort to find safe, loving, and permanent homes for children.
It goes without saying that in the best of all possible worlds, every child belongs with their parents. But we must also recognize there are times when a child's safety is threatened by living at home, and sometimes we have to do something about it. There is no doubt there are many good services out there that can be provided to a family to make it possible for a child to stay at home or return to a home in trying times. But at other times, family reunification risks the life of children. We believe that is not a risk worth taking.
To prevent children from being returned to unsafe homes, our legislation revises the current Federal requirement, and we all know we thought we were doing the right thing with ''reasonable effort,'' but that term wasn't clear enough for some individuals who wanted to do their job but didn't know quite when reasonable efforts ended. So, in short, we are clarifying when reunifying a family is not reasonable. You have to say it out loud. It is not reasonable when a child has been tortured or a sibling has been murdered by a parent. Those things are not reasonable to try to reestablish the home in most cases.
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But it is not enough to merely prevent children from returning to a dangerous situation. We must also do more to find permanent homes for children who cannot return to their birth family. Our foster care system is an extremely valuable safety net, but it should not be a way of life. Unfortunately, we have all heard the statistics about children remaining too long without foster care homes, or having too many foster care homes, or too young children being too long without a permanent home. These last 12 years the figures have doubled.
So the lack of permanency has a lasting and often negative effect on a child, and this is what we are trying to address today. To address this problem, we are asking the agencies, asking those working with children, to also have reasonable efforts to find a permanent home. We are saying expedite the time from 18 to 12 months for a hearing. We are saying younger children, when they have been in foster care for 18 months, start looking at permanency for that child, fully realizing that the courts have the last word.
And then the other situation, which we will find down the line we have been talking about, and that is funding. Mr. Camp has set forth a series of bonuses, $4,000 additional for any adopted child over last year's levels, $2,000 additional bonus for hard-to-place children. And we are hoping—in fact, we are feeling rather good about this, because CBO has told us these bonuses will actually save the Federal Government $10 million by reducing foster care expenditures. We can make the bill, I would think now—I haven't discussed this fully with David, but we could at least say maybe this is mandatory spending and not an authorization.
But I think we have a unique opportunity, as we have said, and I think you realize, to have protection and permanency for children. I really—when David asked me to join him on this, I had to give this a great deal of thought, because I was involved with the preservation of the family. I was involved with historically looking at this whole question, reading about it when I came to Congress, understanding that years ago in the history of the country, children were chattel. Nothing was done for them. They were owned by their parents. Of course, we came forth and became a country that understood children had to be protected. But maybe we didn't get quite clear enough that the life of the child is the main thing, the protection and safety of that child. So we are going into new territory here. We are saying things that have to be said.
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But let me end by saying, Mr. Chairman, at this break when we were in our district work period, I was 1 day on the east coast, and the last newspaper—we are all addicted to newspapers—the last newspaper I read before I got on the plane had a front page headline about a child who died at the hands of a parent. We all know the cases, we know how hard people work, but we know these things happen. And I flew to the other coast to visit my daughter and grandchild, got off the plane, and there was the headline in her paper, in California, different case, same situation.
So that is why we come forth at the beginning with some trepidation, but now feeling very comfortable with this legislation, that children have to be protected when the situation with their parents is untenable.
I thank you very much for this hearing.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Hon. Barbara B. Kennelly, a Representative in Congress from the State of Connecticut
Mr. Chairman, let me start by thanking you for holding this hearing on legislation that Mr. Camp and I have introduced to protect children and promote adoption. I hope today marks the first of many steps we will take on a bipartisan path towards finding safe, loving and permanent homes for children.
In the best of all worlds, we all agree the best place for a child is with his or her parents. But we must also recognize there are times when a child's safety is threatened by living at home. Sometimes services can be provided to a family to make it possible for a child to stay in or return home, and our legislation would require those services to continue. But at other times family reunification risks the lives of children, and we believe that's not a risk worth taking.
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To prevent children from being returned to unsafe homes, our legislation revises the current federal requirement that states make ''reasonable efforts'' to reunify abused children with their families. In short, we are clarifying that reunifying a family is not reasonable when it presents a clear and undeniable danger to the child. The legislation provides states with examples of situations when ''reasonable efforts'' are unreasonable, such as when a child has been tortured or a sibling has been murdered by a parent.
But it is not enough to merely prevent children from returning to dangerous homes. We must also do more to find permanent homes for children who cannot return to their birth families. Our foster care system is an extremely valuable safety net, but it should not be a way of life for children. Unfortunately, this temporary safe harbor has become permanent for far too many children. In fact, the number of children in foster care almost doubled over the last 12 years, going from 276,000 in 1984 to 494,000 in 1995. Furthermore, more than 40% of foster children stay in the system for more than two years, and almost one-third of foster children were placed in at least three different settings while in foster care. This lack of permanency has a lasting and often negative impact on the emotional stability and intellectual growth of young children.
To address this problem, we propose four solutions. First, we call on states to pursue ''reasonable efforts'' to place children for adoption when reunifying families is not possible. Second, we propose expediting the reviews of foster children by requiring a permanency hearing after 12 months, rather than after 18 months. Third, for younger children who have spent more than 18 months in foster care, we suggest requiring states to consider terminating parental rights so a child can be freed for adoption. Of course, the courts would still have the final word on whether termination is in the best interest of the child. And finally, we advocate giving states financial bonuses if they increase the number of children leaving foster care for adoption. Our legislation would provide states with $4000 for every additional child that is adopted from the foster care system compared to the prior year, plus an additional $2000 for every ''special needs'' child adopted. And now that CBO has told us these bonuses will actually save the federal government $10 million by reducing foster care expenditures, we can make the bill's adoption bonuses mandatory spending, rather than an authorization.
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Mr. Chairman, I believe that we have a unique opportunity to bring Democrats and Republicans together under a common goal—protection and permanency for children. Under your able leadership, and under the skillful leadership of the ranking member, Mr. Levin, I believe we can make that goal a reality. I look forward to continuing our work together, and I would be happy to answer any questions.
Thank you.
—————
Chairman SHAW. Thank you, Barbara. I very much appreciate the work that you and David have done on this legislation.
Mr. McCrery.
Mr. MCCRERY. Mr. Chairman, I don't have any questions. I appreciate very much the witnesses and the work that Mr. Camp and Ms. Kennelly have done, and, Senator DeWine, it is always a pleasure to have you here.
Thank you for your comments.
Chairman SHAW. Mr. Levin.
Mr. LEVIN. Mr. Chairman, just a comment. I think all of us have some detailed questions, and maybe we will burden the next panel with them, because we are all going to come back to them. You might want to look at these from this side instead of the witness table.
We have commented on the bipartisanship of this effort, but listening to our three distinguished colleagues and the substance of their testimony, it strikes me that in addition to a bipartisanship flavor, there is also something else embedded in your proposal that we have talked about, and I think sometimes been overpolarized about, and that is the relative roles of the Federal and the State governments.
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I think as we bring this to the floor, we will need to be able to answer the question, What is the Federal interest? Why aren't we just leaving this issue to the States? And it seems to me your testimony responds to it, and essentially what you are suggesting is a recognition that there is a Federal interest, but all the answers are not here, and that what we need to do is find a creative Federal/State partnership to address this set of problems.
For example, you have proposed an incentive system so that we want administration to basically remain within the States, but within certain standards, and in this case you are proposing some incentives so that the States indeed carry out their responsibilities.
I just suggest that your presentation should give us all some pause before we stand up and recite what is perhaps a standard doctrine on State versus Federal responsibility.
So I applaud you for it. I think there is a national interest. I think, Mrs. Kennelly, talking about a headline in one State reflecting an action in another, it is an indication that there is a national interest, and we need to find creative ways to implement a national interest without all the answers or all the administration coming from here, but within some pretty clear standards that have to apply, because in a sense I think we are saying that kids in one State are kids of that State, but they are also American kids.
Mrs. KENNELLY. Mr. Chairman, may I just respond?
Mr. LEVIN. I just applaud you for this.
Mrs. KENNELLY. I would once more say, reasonable effort, Sandy, I think what happened was by leaving it open or not clarifying it, and that is a Federal standard, that people working at home within the States trying to carry out their jobs didn't know when reasonable effort ended and where unreasonable effort began. So I think there is something federally that we have done and that we have to clarify.
Mr. LEVIN. We did not do that very well, right. When we express a national interest and there are standards, we had better make them reasonably clear.
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Anyway, listening to you, I was struck by the implications that this has for kids and, I think, the implications it may well have for other programs in addition to this effort to try to approach this in a bipartisan way. This is not only a bipartisan effort, but it is a partnership, national-State partnership effort, that I think we realize has to exist. If not, what Senator Mike DeWine has said, We are going to continue to have these hundreds of thousands of kids who are just in between, who are kind of out there nowhere.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman SHAW. Mr. Collins.
Mr. COLLINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I commend my colleagues for this effort that they have put forth. This is just one small cog in the wheel, though, of dealing with children and families and responsibilities that are neglected by families.
We look forward to working with you on this one particular area, but there are many other areas we will be covering throughout this Congress through many other pieces of legislation. A lot of it will pertain to the Ways and Means Committee that will also help stabilize families, we hope. We can't legislate that responsibility, but we sure can give them incentives to live up to the opportunity.
We thank you.
Chairman SHAW. Mr. English.
Mr. ENGLISH. No questions.
Chairman SHAW. Mr. Watkins.
Mr. WATKINS. Mr. Chairman, Members and distinguished panel, I would just like to express my personal thanks for your concern, compassion, and willingness to try to tackle this issue. From personal experience, I am a father of an adopted daughter who came from a foster home that burned. She was basically homeless. And we had our home open, thanks to my wife, for a number of these young ladies over the years.
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We became involved when my wife realized girls were being put in jail by no fault of their own. They had no place to go. So my wife went out to the police station and said, ''Don't ever do that. Bring them to our home.'' So we housed a lot of young ladies for a number of years because of something at their own home, or some other problems they were having.
One of the great, beautiful experiences that I have now, I have a granddaughter from that adopted daughter, and she is part Native American and full of love and life. I might say my adopted daughter is going to become a very professional lady with a college degree. I just think if we could get more of these children into homes where they could maybe see a different way of life, how important it would be.
We had difficulty getting through the legal system. One of the things we ran into, and we are not affluent people, but one of the things was that the DHS officials were wanting to put the girls in a similar economic atmosphere, and so forth. That was something I disagreed with. I think we need to encourage families that have had some type of success to adopt less fortunate children.
We are making real inroads by trying to pass this and other legislation through, with your backing and support. I wanted you to know that I personally appreciate this effort and all you are doing. I can go home and tell my daughter there will be a lot more daughters being helped like her.
Thank you.
Chairman SHAW. Senator DeWine, you made the points as to the length of time 2 years can be. Of course, running in 2-year segments here, we know to us it seems to be very swift. Now that you are off to 6 years——
Senator DEWINE. It is all relative.
Chairman SHAW. But it does, when you start thinking about, and all of us can think back to our childhood, how long 1 hour was, particularly if you were sent to your room or something of that nature, and how long 2 years was. It just seemed to go on forever.
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The strongest statement I have ever heard in any Committee meeting I have been in since I have been in Washington was made in four words by a witness before this Subcommittee just a few weeks ago, and she was quoting a child who was meeting her mother and father for the first time, adoptive mother and father. And those words were, ''Where have you been?''
When you think about that, it almost makes you shiver, when you think that these kids want to be loved. They want to be brought into a family, they want a family environment so badly, and they are kicked from foster home to foster home just in the hopes that parents can be rehabilitated. There is a time when you have to give up on the natural parent. Obviously, all of us want to do everything we can to keep the natural parents' bond alive, but in some instances the system is just out of whack.
I think, as Barbara correctly pointed out a few minutes ago, a lot of the problems are—in response to Sandy's questioning, a lot of the problems we have are made by us here in Washington in the way the good intended legislation was interpreted and has been an impediment to adoption. Hopefully, this will correct a lot of that, and we will have fewer kids saying, ''Where have you been,'' and we can bring them together in the family environment.
I would like to invite all the witnesses, who have time to stay to sit with us at this hearing, if you care to, and I think, David, you are required, but the other two are merely invited to participate as their time would allow. I would like to thank all three of you for being here today.
The next witness is no stranger to this Subcommittee, Dr. Olivia Golden, the Acting Assistant Secretary for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Dr. Golden, welcome back to the Subcommittee. We look forward to your testimony.
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STATEMENT OF HON. OLIVIA A. GOLDEN, PH.D., ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY, CHILDREN AND FAMILIES, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
Ms. GOLDEN. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, you have my long testimony for the record.
Chairman SHAW. It will be made a part of the record. Feel free to summarize as you see fit.
Thank you.
Ms. GOLDEN. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, I am delighted to appear before you today to discuss the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997. This legislation would further our efforts to ensure the safety, permanency, and well-being of children in the child welfare system, and it closely mirrors the goals set forth in our Adoption 2002 proposal. On behalf of the administration, I would like to commend the Members of this Subcommittee and the bill's chief sponsors, Representatives Camp and Kennelly, and also, of course, Senator DeWine, for your interest in and dedication to improving child welfare services.
President Clinton is committed to giving the children waiting in our Nation's foster care system what every child in America deserves, loving parents and a healthy, stable home. In his December directive on adoption to Federal agencies, the President directed HHS to conduct wide consultations and report to him with specific recommendations. In response to the directive, the Department developed the report Adoption 2002.
The report outlines an agenda to help overcome barriers and accelerate the path to permanency for all waiting children in the public child welfare system. The guiding principles of the report include that every child deserves a safe, permanent family; that the child's health and safety should be the paramount consideration in all placement decisions; and that foster care is a temporary situation. It is not a place for children to grow up.
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The report presents strategies to establish, track, and meet State-by-State annual, numerical targets for adoptions and other permanent placements, targets that will bring us to a national doubling of adoptions and permanent placements in the year 2002. Perhaps most important, the report also addresses the need to clarify the reasonable efforts provision to make it clear that in determining whether and when to remove a child from the family and whether and when to reunify the family, Federal law requires the child's health and safety shall be the paramount concern.
We are extremely pleased that H.R. 867, the Adoption Promotion Act, proposes many of these same critical actions, including clarifying reasonable efforts, earlier dispositional hearings, performance targets, technical assistance, and adoption bonuses.
The Adoption Promotion Act would unequivocally establish that the child's health and safety be of paramount concern in making placement and permanency decisions. We strongly support the legislation's goal of providing greater clarity about what is meant by ''reasonable efforts.''
We also strongly support two other provisions of H.R. 867 recommended in the Adoption 2002 report that would help children who cannot go home move quickly to permanent homes. First, we support the inclusion of statutory language requiring States to make reasonable efforts to secure a permanent home for children in foster care when adoption or another permanent placement, rather than reunification, is the goal. Second, we support language that will clarify that States may concurrently work toward reunification and develop another permanency plan in the event the child cannot safely be returned home. We would be interested in working with the Subcommittee to refine the legislative language used to achieve these objectives.
We applaud and endorse provisions recommended in the Adoption 2002 report that would change the timing and name of the initial dispositional hearing. Renaming the hearing a permanency hearing will send a clear signal that the purpose of these judicial reviews is to establish a definitive plan for permanency for children, and requiring that these hearings be held within 12 months of a child's placement in foster care, rather than the current 18 months, will help to ensure more timely decisionmaking.
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As reflected in Adoption 2002, the administration believes that providing effective technical assistance to the States in a range of areas, including those mentioned in section 10 of the bill, is critical to ensuring the success of our efforts. The President's budget for fiscal year 1998 requests $10 million for technical assistance directed toward the goals of the adoption initiative. We appreciate the sponsors' support of this request.
The centerpiece of the President's adoption initiative is a proposal to provide States with a financial bonus when they succeed in increasing the number of children who are adopted each year. We believe this is an example of commonsense government as it not only provides an incentive to States for increasing the number of adoptions, but pays for itself, because the cost of the bonuses is offset by savings in foster care. We are very pleased that H.R. 867 includes provisions similar to the administration's proposal.
Finally, I would like to turn to two provisions in H.R. 867 which raise concerns. The first in section 5 establishes certain circumstances under which State agencies would be required to seek the termination of parental rights of a child in foster care. We support the goal of ensuring that timely permanency decisions are made for children who cannot return home. However, if a goal other than adoption has been set for a child, then requiring termination of parental rights might not be in the best interests of the child. So we would like to explore with you an alternative proposal that would require States to move expeditiously to terminate parental rights once a judicial determination has been made that adoption is the goal for the child.
Finally, our other concern is with the provision requiring foster parents be given notification and an opportunity to be heard in reviews and hearings. Foster parents play a key role in providing for the safety, permanency, and well-being of children. However, the provision could place foster parents in a position that is uncomfortable in the context of their role as temporary care givers of children and result in the creation of unnecessary adversarial relationships. So the Department proposes to address through policy guidance, rather than legislation, the importance of assuring input from foster parents in case planning, administrative reviews, and judicial hearings.
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In closing, I want to express our enthusiasm about the opportunity to enact bipartisan child welfare legislation during this Congress. We believe we can work with the sponsors and the Subcommittee to achieve our shared goal of permanency and health and safety for the child.
I want to thank you again for your leadership, and I would be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Hon. Olivia A. Golden, Ph.D., Acting Assistant Secretary, Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee,
I am pleased to appear before you today to discuss the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997. This legislation would further our efforts to ensure the safety, permanency and well-being of children in the child welfare system and closely mirrors the goals set forth in our Adoption 2002 proposal. On behalf of the Administration, I would like to commend the members of this Subcommittee and the bill's chief sponsors, Representatives Camp and Kennelly, for your interest in and dedication to improving child welfare services. The bipartisan Congressional attention and support being given to these issues in both the House and the Senate, coupled with the reforms and innovative practices being undertaken around the country, present us with an unprecedented opportunity to make a real difference in the lives of some of America's most vulnerable children.
The President's Adoption Initiative
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President Clinton is committed to ''giving the children waiting in our Nation's foster care system what every child in America deserves—loving parents and a healthy, stable home.'' In his December directive on adoption to federal agencies, the President directed HHS to conduct wide consultations and report to him with specific recommendations on strategies to move children more quickly from foster care to permanent homes and to double the annual number of adoptions and other permanent placements over the next five years.
In response to the directive, the Department developed the report Adoption 2002, which reflects the bipartisan interest in and commitment to promoting adoption and strengthening permanency planning for children in the public child welfare system. To prepare this report, the Department consulted with state and local government officials, child welfare professionals, policy experts, advocates, and foster and adoptive parents at the national, State and local levels.
Through this process of consultation, we heard about many of the barriers to expediting permanency for children in foster care. Delays in making timely permanency decisions result from high caseloads for judges and caseworkers; incorrect beliefs and outdated assumptions about the adoptability of children; the limited pool of permanent families for children with special needs; and the varied interpretation of the ''reasonable efforts'' requirement to reunify a child in foster care with his or her birth family before another goal, such as adoption, can be pursued for the child.
Our report outlines an agenda to help overcome these barriers and to accelerate the path to permanency for all waiting children in the public child welfare system. First, the report articulates a guiding set of principles centered on the needs of the child in order to give direction to the overall agenda. These principles include: that every child deserves a safe, permanent family; that the child's health and safety should be the paramount considerations in all placement and permanency planning decisions; and that foster care is a temporary situation—it is not an appropriate place for children to grow up. It establishes unequivocally that the Federal goals for children in the child welfare system are safety, permanency, and well-being.
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Our proposed agenda is multifaceted in order to address the broad range of barriers and challenges that exist in the child welfare system. The report presents strategies to establish, track, and meet State-by-State annual, numerical targets for adoptions and other permanent placements—targets that will bring us to a national doubling of adoptions and permanent placements in the year 2002. To help States reach their targets, the Department commits to providing expanded technical assistance, rewarding States for incremental increases in adoption levels with per-child financial bonuses, and otherwise recognizing successful performance.
Perhaps most important, the report also addresses the need to clarify the ''reasonable efforts'' provision to make it clear that in determining whether and when to remove a child from his or her family and whether and when to reunify the family, Federal law requires that the child's health and safety shall be the paramount concern. It also calls for providing guidance to the States to emphasize that child health and safety must also be of primary concern when making decisions to terminate parental rights. Furthermore, the Adoption 2002 report supports the passage of legislation that shortens the time before a child's first dispositional hearing—the hearing in which a permanency decision is first made—from 18 months to 12 months, and changes its name to ''permanency planning hearing'' to emphasize that the purpose of the hearing is to establish a definitive plan for permanent placement.
Provisions in H.R. 867
We are extremely pleased that H.R. 867, the Adoption Promotion Act, proposes many of these critical actions, including clarifying reasonable efforts, earlier dispositional hearings, performance targets, technical assistance and adoption bonuses.
Reasonable Efforts
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Current Federal statute language requires that ''reasonable efforts'' be made both: (1) to prevent the unnecessary removal of children from their families; and (2) to reunify children, when possible, who have been placed in foster care with their families. The goal of the reasonable efforts provision is to prevent children from languishing unnecessarily in foster care and to avoid the unnecessary disruption of families.
The Adoption Promotion Act would unequivocally establish that the child's health and safety be of paramount concern in making placement and permanency decisions. We strongly support the legislation's goal of providing greater clarity about what is meant by ''reasonable efforts.'' This change is critical because it has become clear that there is wide variation in how the current ''reasonable efforts'' law is interpreted by caseworkers, agencies, and judges around the country. We also believe it is necessary to provide illustrations of the circumstances in which concerns about a child's health and safety take precedence over family preservation or reunification.
We also strongly support two other provisions of H.R. 867, recommended in the Adoption 2002 report, that would help children who cannot go home move more quickly towards permanent homes. First, we support the inclusion of statutory language requiring States to make ''reasonable efforts'' to secure a permanent home for children in foster care when adoption or another permanent placement, rather than reunification, is established as a goal. Likewise, we support language that will clarify that States may concurrently work toward reunification and develop an alternative permanency plan, in the event that the child cannot safely be returned home.
We would, however, be interested in working with the Subcommittee to refine the legislative language used to achieve these objectives. In particular, we want to ensure that any list of circumstances be adequately described or defined and be considered illustrative, rather than all inclusive. We want to ensure that States retain the ability to make individualized case-by-case determinations. We also would want to ensure that the language provides the flexibility for states to protect the rights of non-offending parents in those cases where only one parent has harmed a child.
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Earlier Dispositional Hearings
We applaud and endorse provisions that would change the timing and name of the initial dispositional hearings. We believe that renaming the hearings ''permanency'' hearings will send a signal that the purpose of these judicial reviews is to establish a definitive plan for permanency for children in foster care. Requiring that these hearings be held within 12 months of the placement of a child in foster care, rather than the current 18 months, will help to ensure more timely decision-making for all children in foster care. Implicit in this move to more timely decision-making, however, is the expectation that services be provided from the moment that the child enters care.
Performance Targets
Section 8 of the bill reflects an interest in moving forward with the development of outcome measures and the broad dissemination of State-level data on key indicators. This interest in outcomes supports implementation of the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) and builds on work we have already undertaken in this area.
Consistent with the President's Executive Memorandum, the Department has committed to issue an annual State-by-State report, beginning in the Spring of 1999, on the Nation's progress in meeting the adoption goals. The annual report will provide State-by-State figures on key measures of success including not only the number of children in foster care who are adopted or placed in guardianship, but measures that reflect the experience of children in the child welfare system, such as the length of time in care and the timeliness of permanency decisions.
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In addition, through the revised child and family services monitoring strategy that we have been piloting with States, we are asking States to use data submitted to the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting system (AFCARS), as well as to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS), to help assess their performance in achieving safety and permanency for children. Our approach is to help States assess their own performance, including strengths as well as deficiencies; to provide technical assistance; and to assist States to make ongoing changes and improvements. We believe that this approach, focusing on continuous improvement and tracking State performance over time, will prove more effective in achieving improved outcomes for children than a State ranking or rating system.
Technical Assistance
As reflected in Adoption 2002, the Administration believes that providing effective technical assistance to the States in a range of areas, including those mentioned in Section 10 of the bill, is critical to ensuring the success of our efforts to double the number of children who are adopted annually by the year 2002 and to improve the quality and timeliness of decision-making for all children in foster care. The President's budget for fiscal year 1998 requests $10 million for technical assistance directed toward meeting the goals of the Adoption initiative. We appreciate the sponsors' support of this request.
Adoption Bonus
The centerpiece of the President's Adoption Initiative is a proposal to provide States with a financial bonus when they succeed in increasing the number of children who are adopted each year. We believe that this is an example of common-sense government, as it not only provides a concrete incentive to States for increasing the number of adoptions, but also pays for itself, with the cost of the bonuses offset by savings in foster care costs. We are very pleased that H.R. 867 includes provisions similar to the Administration's proposal for this adoption bonus.
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However, we are very concerned about the funding authority for this provision. H.R. 867 would authorize Congress to appropriate funds for paying the bonuses each year. We believe that it is important to assure the States that the funds will be available to them throughout the five years during which the bonuses will be paid, since we are asking them to make long-term commitments to increasing the number of adoptions. We are in agreement with CBO that the bonus program will be cost neutral or will even save funds. We also support providing States with discretion to use the bonus funds in a manner that they determine best supports the needs of children in the child welfare system. We hope to work with you to develop language to assure funding to the States for this key provision to be used for a broad range of purposes.
There are only two provisions in H.R. 867 which raise concerns. We believe that we can work with the sponsors and the Subcommittee to modify these provisions to achieve our shared goal of permanency and health and safety for the child.
Requiring Initiation of Proceedings to Terminate Parental Rights
Section 5 of H.R. 867 establishes certain circumstances under which State agencies would be required to seek the termination of parental rights of a child who is in foster care. The Administration supports the goal of ensuring that timely permanency decisions are made for children who cannot return home. For those children for whom adoption has been established as a goal, filing for termination of parental rights or securing voluntary relinquishment of rights from the parents, is a key step in freeing children for adoption. However, if a goal other than adoption has been set, requiring termination of parental rights might not be in the best interest of the child.
Because it is the permanency goal for a child that should drive the decision to seek termination of parental rights, we would like to explore with you the development of an alternative proposal that would require States to move expeditiously to terminate parental rights once a judicial (permanency planning) determination has been made that adoption is the goal for a child. The Administration believes that this framework will serve children better than one that ties states' decisions to terminate parental rights to Federal standards regarding either the age of the child or the length of time that the child has spent in foster care.
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Notifying Foster Parent of Reviews and Hearings
We also have concerns with the provision in section 4, requiring that foster parents be given notification and an opportunity to be heard in reviews and hearings. We agree that foster parents play a key role in providing for the safety, permanency and well-being of children who have been removed from home. As the primary caregivers of children in out-of-home care, they have valuable firsthand knowledge that can help inform decisions made at administrative reviews and judicial hearings. However, we are concerned that the provision, by providing foster parents legal standing as a party to the case, places these parents in a position incongruent with their role as temporary caregivers of children. This provision could result in the creation of unnecessary adversarial relationships between foster parents and biological parents and/or between foster parents and the State child welfare agency. The Department proposes to address through policy guidance, rather than legislation, the importance of assuring input from foster parents in case planning, administrative reviews and judicial hearings.
Finally, we wanted to share some additional information with the Subcommittee as you consider two other provisions in the bill.
Report and Recommendations on Kinship Care
Section 6 of the bill calls for the establishment of an advisory panel and the collection of additional information on relative or kinship care. As you know, relatives, other than parents, increasingly play a role in caring for children, both in informal caretaking relationships and in kinship foster care arrangements. In 1990, it is estimated that just over 2 percent of U.S. children (about 1.4 million) lived in a relative's household without a parent present. However, only a small fraction of those children were in formal kinship foster care settings.
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Congress recognized the important role of relatives when in the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 it included a provision requiring the States to consider giving preference to relatives as caretakers for children eligible to receive foster care maintenance payments and adoption assistance subsidies under Title IV–E of the Social Security Act. Given the increasing role that relatives are likely to play in caring for children in the future, it is critical that we improve our understanding of the role of kin in providing either a temporary or permanent home for children.
The Department has already begun important work in this area that will address some of your issues and may help guide future policy development. We will soon release the findings of a study that examined several national and State-level data sources to describe the characteristics of both informal kinship care arrangements and kinship foster care. Later this year, we will release the findings of a descriptive study of children placed in foster care with relatives. This study used interviews with State and county staff and reviews of case records in seven States to gather information on children in both kinship foster care and non-kinship foster care.
In addition, the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) is now being implemented and has just begun to yield data improving our knowledge of children in foster care. While currently many States are not able to distinguish between relative and non-relative foster parents in their data, we do expect the data to improve over the next several years as States complete development of new automated child welfare information systems.
Finally, the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act authorized funding demonstration projects in the area of kinship care. We expect to fund demonstration grants in this area in the future to improve our knowledge of the role of relatives in ensuring children's safety and permanency. Possible areas of exploration include issues around licensing and training kinship care providers.
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We hope you find this information useful as you explore ways to address this critical area. We will share with the Subcommittee the findings of these studies just as soon as they are finalized.
Expanding Use of the Federal Parent Locator Service
Section 7 of the bill addresses another proposal discussed in the Adoption 2002 report, expanding the use of the Federal Parent Locator Service (FPLS). Currently, the FPLS is used by State child support enforcement officials. We propose to work with State child welfare and child support enforcement agencies to facilitate use of the FPLS to identify and locate absent parents of children in foster care. In this way, child welfare agencies may locate parents or other relatives who may be interested in providing a permanent home for a child in foster care. Even if an absent parent is unable to provide a home for the child, ruling out this alternative early in a child's placement will allow the agency and court to move expeditiously towards adoption or another permanent alternative. We believe that a legislative change in this area is not necessary because there is sufficient statutory authority to allow use of FPLS in child welfare cases.
Conclusion
On behalf of the Administration, I want to express our enthusiasm about the opportunity to enact bipartisan child welfare legislation during this Congress. Together we can work to improve significantly the lives of hundreds of thousands of children in our Nation's foster care system. Again, I commend the members of this Subcommittee for your leadership and I would be pleased to answer any questions you might have.
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Mr. CAMP [presiding]. Thank you very much, Dr. Golden.
Mr. McCrery.
Mr. MCCRERY. Dr. Golden, I am unclear on your objection, I understand your objection to the provision you mentioned in section 5, but I am unclear as to your alternative for that. It was a little murky. Would you try to enlighten me on that?
Ms. GOLDEN. Surely. You are referring to the provision regarding termination of parental rights. The provision in the bill, as you know, proposes that for children under 10, when they have been in foster care for 18 of the last 24 months, the State would be required to move to termination of parental rights.
We share the goal that States need to be moving fast to termination of parental rights when the goal is adoption. Our alternative proposal is that, as soon as there has been a judicial determination that the goal is adoption, which could have been earlier than 18 months, at that point the State should move on termination of parental rights.
Let me give you a couple of reasons why we prefer that. The first is that where a child's goal isn't adoption, say, it is guardianship, or, say, after 18 months, a child has severe medical or psychological issues, and you need to have services for the child and family, and you aren't quite ready to put the family together again, you wouldn't want to move to terminate parental rights at a point when the child needs the connection to that family. You would be creating legal orphans.
So we want to make sure what we are focused on is the goal of adoption and that we move with termination of parental rights for that goal.
A second thing that is important to us is our perspective that, for children over 10, we also wouldn't want to give up on the goal of adoption. There are many young men and women who, if they could not return home safely, we would want to move to adoption. Our sense is this is an area where we share a goal, and that working toward the best way to accomplish that goal is something we can do together.
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Mr. MCCRERY. I appreciate that explanation. Maybe I am in error, and I will defer to the author if I am, but it is my understanding that under the provisions of the bill, you must have a determination that this particular child is a candidate for adoption. So your example really doesn't apply to this bill. If the child is not determined to be a candidate for adoption, then this time determination does not kick in.
Ms. GOLDEN. If the statute moved in that direction, I think that would be helpful. I think in the initial drafting it did not have that wording.
Mr. CAMP. If the gentleman would yield, the language now says that if the child is being cared for by a relative, the proceedings to terminate parental rights would not occur, or if the State court has determined that doing so would not be in the best interests of the child. So there is a judicial check there.
So I think you may be working off earlier discussions, because it is very important that there be that determination by the State court regarding the best interests of the child. So it is not as if the timeline is not met and the child immediately is pushed into a process where the parental rights are terminated without any regard for the situation or what is in the best interests of the child. I just wanted to make that clear. It is on page 6 of the bill.
Ms. GOLDEN. The concern we have, and as I say, I think we are close and could work on it, is having the situation be that the State is required to move to termination of parental rights unless the State court makes an alternative decision. That is different from requiring that you only move if the goal is adoption.
I was very struck by the Congressman's comment about the child who went to jail because there was nowhere else for her. We would want to make sure that we don't create children who are in a sense legal orphans; that we terminate the parental rights, but don't have another family there for them. So that is what we would like to work on with you.
Mr. CAMP. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
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Mr. MCCRERY. Surely. I appreciate the gentleman helping me clarify that.
I don't know, frankly, that the difference in opinion can be resolved. It seems to me kind of a chicken and egg situation. In the way the bill is stated now, it would force the State to act. Under your proposal, as I understand it, there would be no mechanism there to force the State to act. So you could have the situation we have now in many cases where you have children not being put in the pipeline that should be because the State simply, for any number of reasons—too large a workload, laziness, whatever it might be—does not take the step to get that child into the pipeline. So this legislation forces the State to take that step.
Ms. GOLDEN. I think the struggle, and I know we are both experiencing it, is that it is important to push the State, and it is important also to protect the child. We are both struggling for a way to do both things.
Mr. MCCRERY. It seems to me this legislation tries to strike that balance, by giving the State court the option to determine, once they have been pressed to make that decision, that it is not in the best interest of the child, to put him up for adoption right there at that moment. So I think we have built in that protection in the bill. But I see your concern, and I think it is legitimate. I think it is taken care of in the bill.
Ms. GOLDEN. It may just be an issue that will require some further conversation. Hearing about the particular cases which I am sure States and others will want to put before you may be a helpful way of thinking about the right way to strike that balance.
Mr. MCCRERY. Thank you.
Mr. CAMP. Mr. Levin.
Mr. LEVIN. Thank you very much.
We have been going over the reasonable effort provision, and the bill has a list of when it would be required that the States forgo these efforts. We were just chatting about an idea the States have of requiring the States to spell this out in legislation instead of it being done in this form.
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Do you have any thoughts about that?
Ms. GOLDEN. I think our overall view is that spelling out some examples in the legislation is very helpful in clarifying reasonable efforts, that the process needs to be one that makes sure we have protections for children's safety, and also makes sure States are engaging in reasonable efforts in those cases where a family can keep a child safe. So we are not disrupting families lightly.
I think there are probably several ways of getting that balance. One approach I have also heard conversations about is an approach where the State legislature makes a decision about situations where reasonable efforts are not required and then a State court makes a determination that a child, that a particular case, fits into one of those categories. Another approach is an approach where there is secretarial review of State lists of situations where reasonable efforts are not required.
So I think there are a variety of mechanisms. That is the approach in the bill. Our perspective is that there are several mechanisms that would get you to that right balance and make sure the choices were considered choices. The approach you described, the State legislature and State court decision, would be an approach that would work.
Mr. LEVIN. Well, if anybody has any further thoughts in the next days, let's hear them.
Thank you.
Mr. MCCRERY [presiding]. Mr. English.
Mr. ENGLISH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Secretary Golden, I was curious, going over your testimony, you raise concerns about section 4, specifically the notification of foster parents and an opportunity to be heard in previous reviews and hearings. I wonder if you could amplify on those concerns. You are concerned about creating an adversarial relationship. I wonder though if it isn't appropriate to have that notice, because clearly the foster parents are a party here.
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Ms. GOLDEN. My sense is that this is also an area where a lot of progress has been made in discussions, because we are all working toward the same goal. Foster parents play an enormously important role for the child, and they often have a great deal of knowledge about the child. At the same time, we would not want to put foster parents in a situation where their role of caring for the child on a temporary basis—perhaps while the agency is moving toward a plan of reunification or adoption—we wouldn't want to put them in a situation where in a legal sense they were in an adversarial role related to parents or to the agency.
There are a variety of ways of ensuring that the knowledge and the wisdom they have can be part of the decisionmaking without putting them in that situation.
Mr. ENGLISH. Can you amplify on how you would envision, as an alternative, that input could be received?
Ms. GOLDEN. I know there has been some work that involved looking at State laws to identify some model wording. I believe there was some State legislation in Rhode Island that was helpful. I don't remember the particulars of that legislation, but it focused on opportunities for them to provide the information rather than on legal standing.
Mr. ENGLISH. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. MCCRERY. Mr. Collins.
Mr. COLLINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I just want to pick up on what Mr. English was referring to. You say you have been reviewing policies in different States. Is that what I understood you to say?
Ms. GOLDEN. I believe my staff are doing that work in an effort to come up with something that would meet all of our goals.
Mr. COLLINS. But you don't have any particular policy in mind today?
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Ms. GOLDEN. I don't personally have with me now, but we could certainly provide you right away with what the staff have come up with.
Mr. COLLINS. But you do have an objection to section 4?
Ms. GOLDEN. Yes.
Mr. COLLINS. The notification to foster parents?
Ms. GOLDEN. We have a concern, but we think it is one that can be worked out.
Mr. COLLINS. You do understand it is just an opportunity for them to voice their concerns on behalf of the child. It is not a Band-Aid.
Ms. GOLDEN. I think several weeks ago when you held a hearing and heard from a range of people who were doing model programs, I think among those programs were ones that are really working to build teams in the neighborhood, where the foster parents and biological parents are working together. I think we just want to make sure the knowledge that has been gained about how you make sure that that works, that the way foster parents are involved doesn't get in the way of that effectiveness on behalf of the child.
Mr. COLLINS. That is all I have.
Thank you.
Mr. CAMP [presiding]. Thank you.
Dr. Golden, I want to thank you for all of your efforts on getting this bill together. I know if Mrs. Kennelly were here, she would echo the comments as well.
I was out of the room for part of your testimony, I am sorry, but looking at your written testimony, I just wanted to mention that the legislation does not give legal standing to foster parents, but simply allows them to be notified and to be heard. They do not become in any legal way litigants in the case or respondents, whichever term the courts use.
I think this provision has been applauded by many in the child welfare field as a way of ensuring that the child's perspective is brought into these formal hearings. When I was a child advocate in these matters, I would often visit the child in the foster home, and the foster parents were a wealth of information on what was really going on in the child's life. So it is an attempt to have better decisions made by the court.
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Senator DeWine mentioned in his testimony, in his written statement, that he felt it was right that these foster parents be heard, and to exclude foster parents from the court proceedings could silence the child's most forceful advocates. That is the purpose of that provision.
I just wanted to clarify that there is no attempt to give them legal standing, but to give them an ability to be heard and to have an understanding. Oftentimes the foster parents would say, What is going on? No one will talk to me. They can't get information. And here they are, the primary care givers of the child, sometimes for years, and yet don't understand, Is this a review hearing? What is going to go on? It is a provision I think is pretty important.
I didn't know if you had any further comment on that. I just wanted to make sure we had that clarified.
Ms. GOLDEN. I was just highlighting for Mr. Collins and Mr. English that we think it is critical the information and knowledge that foster parents have become part of the process. We are looking for a way for that to happen that will not get in the way of the role of foster parents in providing temporary care for the child and supporting reunification when the family can come back together, and it is my understanding that staff have been working on some ideas, looking at some State legislation and some proposals that are out there.
So if it would be useful to you, we would be happy to share what ideas we come up with.
Mr. CAMP. Also that provision applies to any relative caring for the child. So if it is a relative foster parent, they would also get notice of the hearing.
Thank you.
I think everyone has had an opportunity to ask questions. Thank you very much, Dr. Golden, for being here. We appreciate your efforts.
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The fourth panel includes Janice Mink, Hear My Voice, from Ann Arbor, Michigan; Jess McDonald, director, Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, Springfield, Illinois; Robert Guttman, director, Pro Bono Adoption Project, Consortium for Child Welfare, Washington, DC; MaryLee Allen, director, Child Welfare Division, Children's Defense Fund, Washington, DC; Ronald K. Henry, Children's Rights Council, Washington, DC; and William Pierce, president, National Council For Adoption, Washington, DC.
Before we begin, why don't I mention that there is a 5-minute rule. I believe an amber light will go on when you get close to the end of your 5 minutes. If you could conclude your remarks, your written statements can be made part of the record, so we will have your full, complete written testimony.
Why don't we begin with Janice Mink from Hear My Voice. Thank you for being here, Janice.
STATEMENT OF JANICE MINK, HEAR MY VOICE, ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN
Ms. MINK. Thank you for having me. My name is Janice Mink, and I am here as a representative from Hear My Voice, protecting our Nation's children. We are a nationwide, nonprofit, grassroots organization whose mission is to promote the right of all children to have safe, permanent families.
I am here today to urge you to vote in favor of the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997.
As a member of Hear My Voice, I am exposed to truly horrendous situations involving children who do not have safe, permanent families. We have witnessed family preservation working, protecting families while parents make changes in their lives that enable them to reunite with their children successfully. These families deserve help, and Hear My Voice believes all reasonable efforts should be made to preserve and protect them.
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We have also witnessed children dying at the hands of family members because our current system of laws believes in family preservation at almost any and all costs.
I would like to tell you a story of a little boy named Dustin from my home State of Delaware. There are pictures right here of Dustin.
He was born to Donna and Richie in September 1993. Donna and Richie split up when Dustin was 2 months old. He lived with his biological dad until he was 4 months old. Richie was then incarcerated, and Dustin went into foster care at 4 months of age with the Brainard family, where he still resides more than 3 years later.
To give you some background history on this family, Donna had lost her older son, Joshua, when he was 2 years old in 1993 due to neglect. Donna had and still has a longstanding substance abuse problem. During 1994 and 1995, DFS, the Division of Family Services of Delaware, worked very hard at reunifying Dustin with Donna.
Meanwhile, Dustin was growing and bonding every day with his family, the Brainards. Donna was given numerous chances to comply with case plans, plans that did not seem difficult, especially when you consider that she could have had her baby back had she complied. She did not. As a matter of fact, Donna was found by four different judges and one commissioner of family court to have a ''. . . substantial abuse problem so serious that she has no ability to do or intention of doing what is in the best interest of the child.''
At this point my story should end, Donna's parental rights should have been terminated, and Dustin should have been able to be adopted by his family, the Brainards. Of course, this didn't happen. DFS insisted on reuniting Dustin with Donna and preserving a family that did not exist.
In the summer of 1995, Donna gave birth to her third child John. In December 1995, when Dustin was over 2 years old, DFS attempted to give Donna residential care of Dustin. Remember, she still had not complied with any of the case plans, and she was still active in her drug and alcohol abuse.
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Only because Dustin's maternal aunt and the foster parents brought DFS' plan to the attention of family court was the presiding judge able to say no. He ordered supervised visits between Donna and Dustin, ordered Dustin to remain with the Brainards, and he had baby John removed from Donna's care.
In the summer of 1996, when Dustin was almost 3 years old, Richie was released from prison, and he decided he wanted custody of Dustin. DFS agreed and ordered extended overnight, unsupervised visits. Shortly after this began, Dustin began having erratic behavior. His knowledge of sexual acts greatly increased as his visits with Richie increased. DFS sent two different social workers to speak with Dustin. Of course, Dustin hid behind his mom, he wouldn't talk. DFS stamped the allegations as inconclusive, and unsupervised visits are still continuing.
Dustin is now 3 1/2 years old. He has spent 90 percent of his life in foster care. The older he grows, the higher that percentage grows.
There have been numerous unreasonable efforts made time and time again to reunite Dustin with a family that never existed in the first place. Dustin already has a family. If the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997 were in place when Dustin was born, chances are he would be permanently safe with his family, the Brainards.
Under section 3, a permanency hearing would have taken place when Dustin was 16 months old. Chances are it would have been clear that neither Donna nor Richie could care for this baby. Under section 5, DFS would have been initiating adoption proceedings when Dustin was 2 years old, because he had spent the last 18 out of 24 months in foster care. But even this seems too long for the child to have to wait for permanency.
If Dustin wasn't protected under section 3 or 5, then section 10 would have surely saved him, because family preservation and adoption proceedings can be pursued simultaneously.
It is not Dustin's fault that his biological mother is a drug addict and currently in prison, nor is it his fault that his father was incarcerated for the first 3 years of his life. Yet he is paying for these crimes dearly. Legally, he belongs to a family that does not exist. Emotionally, he belongs to a family that legally he cannot belong to.
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There are thousands upon thousands of children in situations just like Dustin's. These children deserve a chance at life. We must focus on the best interests of the children instead of putting our focus on families that do not exist.
Hear My Voice urges you to support H.R. 867, the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997. Dustin depends on it, along with countless others.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Janice Mink, Hear My Voice, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Hello. My name is Janice Mink and I am here as a representative from Hear My Voice, Protecting Our Nation's Children. We are a nationwide, non-profit, grassroots organization whose mission is to promote the right of all children to have safe, permanent families. I am so happy to have the opportunity to share our views with you.
I am here today to urge you to vote in favor of the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997, H.R. 867.
As a member of HMV, I am exposed to truly horrendous situations involving children who do not have safe, permanent families. We have witnessed Family Preservation working, protecting families that need support while parents make changes in their lives that enable them to reunite with their children successfully. These families deserve help. HMV believes all reasonable efforts should be made to preserve and protect them.
We have also witnessed children dying at the hands of family members because our current system of laws believes in family preservation at almost any and all costs.
I would like to tell you a story of a little boy named Dustin who lives in my home state of Delaware.
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Dustin was born to Donna and Richie in September, 1993. Donna and Richie split up and Dustin lived with Richie from age 2 months. In January 1994, when Dustin was 4 months old, Richie went to prison and Dustin went to live in foster care with the Brainard family, where he still resides more than three years later.
To give you some background history on this family, Donna lost custody of her first son, Josh (Dustin's half-brother) in March 1993 when he was 2 years old, due to neglect. Donna had, and still has, a long standing substance abuse problem.
During 1994 and 1995, the Division of Family Services of Delaware worked very hard at reunifying Dustin with Donna. Meanwhile, Dustin was growing and bonding every day with his family, the Brainards. Donna was given numerous chances to comply with case plans ordered by a Commissioner of Family Court and the Division of Family Services, outlining what she needed to do in order to be reunified with Dustin. The plan did not seem difficult. Donna had to, among other things, undergo psychiatric and psychological evaluations and comply with recommendations made as a result of the evaluation; attend AA meetings and cooperate with random drug screens. This plan did not seem difficult when you consider the positive outcome that would have occurred if Donna had completed the plan. She did not. As a matter of fact, Donna was found by four different Judges and one Commissioner of Family Court to have a ''...substance abuse problem so serious that she has no ability to do or intention of doing what is in the best interest of the child.''
At this point, my story should end, Donna's parental rights should be terminated and Dustin should be able to be adopted by his family, the Brainards. This, however, did not happen. The Division of Family Services insisted on reuniting Dustin with Donna and preserving a family that did not exist to begin with. In the summer of 1995, Donna gave birth to her third child, John. At this time, the Division of Family Services was still attempting to reunify Dustin with Donna.
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At a hearing in December, 1995 when Dustin was over 2 years old, the Division of Family Services attempted to give Donna residential care of Dustin. (Remember that Donna still had not complied with any of the case plans ordered by judges or case workers and still had a long standing active drug and alcohol addiction.) The presiding judge refused DFS's recommendation. He ordered Dustin to remain with the Brainards and have supervised visits with Donna. He also advised DFS to remove Baby John from Donna's care.
Flash forward to the summer of 1996. Dustin is now almost 3 years old. Richie is released from prison and decides he wants custody of Dustin. The Division of Family Services agrees and orders Dustin into extended, unsupervised, overnight visitations with Richie. Shortly after these visits began, Dustin made allegations in a 3 year old manner, that he had suffered sexual abuse in Richie's home. I am told that Dustin's behavior is erratic and that his knowledge of sexual acts has greatly increased as his visits with Richie have increased.
These allegations of sexual abuse were reported to the Division of Family Services who sent Dustin to speak with two different social workers. Dustin refused to talk with these strangers while he clung to his foster mom. (Is it any wonder? How many people in this room would be willing to share a sexual secret with a stranger?) DFS stamped the allegations as inconclusive and unsupervised visits are continuing.
Dustin is now 3 1/2 years old and has spent 90% of his life in foster care. The older he grows, the higher that percentage grows. There have been numerous UNREASONABLE EFFORTS made time and time again to reunite Dustin with a family that never existed in the first place. Dustin already has a family. He has lived with them for the last 38 months of his life. He is now a confused, scared little boy, not knowing when he will be forced to leave his mom and dad for long visits away. If these sexual allegations are true, the message Dustin is getting is that it is okay for him to be hurt. What do you think this will do to this little boy's soul? What kind of man will he grow up to be?
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If the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997 were in place when Dustin was born, chances are that he would be permanently safe with his family, the Brainards. Under Section 3, a permanency hearing would have taken place when Dustin was 16 months old. Chances are that it would have been clear that neither Donna nor Richie were able to care for Dustin. Under Section 5, DFS would have been initiating adoption proceedings when Dustin was 2 years old because he would have spent the last 18 months out of 24 months in foster care. Even this seems too long for a child to have to wait for permanency. If Dustin wasn't protected under sections 3 or 5, then Section 10 would have surely saved him because family preservation and adoption proceedings can be pursued simultaneously. It was clear early on in this case that Donna was in no position to care for her children.
It was not, and is not, Dustin's fault that his biological mother is a drug addict and is currently in prison, or that his biological father was incarcerated for the first couple of years of Dustin's life. Yet Dustin is paying for the crimes dearly. Legally he belongs to a family that does not exist. Emotionally, he belongs to a family that legally he cannot belong to.
It is hard being a child in today's world, but being a child today that doesn't really belong to any one family must be torturous. There are thousands upon thousands of children in situations just like Dustin s. These children deserve a chance at life. We must focus on the best interest of the child instead of putting our focus on families that do not exist. Family preservation has a place in our society and that is to give short term help to the functional families that can truly benefit from help. Family preservation is not for preserving biological families like Dustin's.
Hear My Voice urges you to support H.R. 867, the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997. Dustin depends on it, along with countless others. Thank you.
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Mr. CAMP. Thank you very much for your testimony.
Jess McDonald, director, Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, Springfield, Illinois.
STATEMENT OF JESS McDONALD, DIRECTOR, ILLINOIS DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN AND FAMILY SERVICES, SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS; ON BEHALF OF AMERICAN PUBLIC WELFARE ASSOCIATION
Mr. MCDONALD. Mr. Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I am the director of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. I am here today on behalf of APWA, the American Public Welfare Association. It is a bipartisan organization representing Cabinet-level officials in 50 States responsible for child welfare and human services programs.
We want to commend the sponsors of this legislation and the Subcommittee for advancing the issues of safety and permanency for children in the child welfare system.
We also want to thank the Majority and Minority staff for their efforts working with people in the field and with APWA. This legislation sends a clear message that child safety should be the paramount consideration in all placement and permanency decisions. We strongly support these principles and the overall goal of the legislation of safety and permanency. This is the primary mission of child welfare. Every State knows that, every county knows that, it is getting the work done. That is the problem.
While we support many, if not most of the provisions in the legislation, we do have some recommendations for changes and they are included in our written testimony. I wanted to highlight five things about the bill we like, one being clear that reasonable, reasonable efforts is what is intended. Not unreasonable reasonable efforts, and that concurrent planning can proceed. This is a major breakthrough. Concurrent planning is absolutely critical for local jurisdictions, for courts and States attorneys and workers to understand that you can begin the work of backup planning if, in fact, a family will not address their problems. It is critical and it is a significant improvement.
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We think on the issues of moving to 12 months, that most States are moving in this direction. We are at 16 months in Illinois, considering moving to 12 months. We think you should be aware of, on the other hand, that many of the court systems are not going to be prepared for this kind of work and the Subcommittee should look carefully at the courts around the country and consider the availability of IV–E to help courts get prepared for this kind of effort and change. Right now it is not available to them and it is not just the courts, it is States attorneys, public defenders' offices, and others that need the help if you are going to respond. Child welfare is part of this picture and only part.
Consider alternatives to including subsidized guardianship, not just adoption, for kinship care. We have a lot of families in the system that are really private guardianship opportunities, and you could unclog the courts in many of your States by offering subsidized guardianships.
Considering timely termination of parental rights, absolutely critical. I just wanted to suggest that the 18-month clock makes sense, but you may want to consider giving the States the option to have the State make an administrative decision about whether or not they should proceed with terminating parental rights and have the court justify that decision in court rather than requiring a separate hearing. You may want to look at the timing of court hearings. It may be an issue.
If you are familiar with the Keystone case, the 19 children that were found in Chicago 3 years ago, we have 6 mothers, 21 fathers, 23 children. We have terminated rights on 14. We have seven scheduled for termination of parental rights coming up soon, and we have two more in an adoption pipeline. There were more lawyers involved than anything else. There were continuances all over the place.
We are 3 years into this, and this was a fast track, high-profile case. So understand, it will never move as fast as you want it to move, and everyone wants to make it move. But talk to your States and find out what is realistic, but the notion of early termination is critical.
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A fourth point: Waivers. This is a system, the child welfare system that needs innovation. This is a system that you know is not working well. You might say it is broken. If that is the case, take innovation everywhere in this country. Don't hold back. If it is cost neutral, who is to lose? The issue here is get innovation out in the field, and innovation that supports the principles in this legislation would be vital at making changes.
On the adoption bonuses, makes sense, but understand right now adoption is a priority for all States. Every adoption we get, and we have more than tripled our adoptions in Illinois over the last 3 years, it saves everybody money and it saves a life. Do not assume that States are opposed to adoption and courts are opposed to adoption and will not move quickly. There is no silver bullet on this one, and consider looking at the incentives for the court system.
Last, we would urge you to support the funding of reunification services for 1 year. It is in the Senate bill, Chafee-Rockefeller bill. It helps courts make a quick decision about whether or not to terminate parental rights. Every court is going to be reluctant to move quickly unless you can demonstrate a good faith effort. Demonstrate the effort, tie it to quick terminations, and you will start to see some movement.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Jess McDonald, Director, Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, Springfield, Illinois; on Behalf of American Public Welfare Association
Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to testify before you today. I am Jess McDonald, Director of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. I am here on behalf of the American Public Welfare Association (APWA) where I serve as Chair of the Children and Family Services Committee of APWA's National Council of State Human Service Administrators. APWA is a bipartisan organization that represents the cabinet-level officials in 50 states responsible for administering publicly-funded human service programs, including child welfare, foster care, adoption assistance and independent living.
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We are pleased to have the opportunity to comment on H.R. 867, the Adoption Promotion Act of 1997. I commend the Subcommittee and the sponsors of the legislation—Representatives Camp, Kennelly, and Chairman Shaw—for their commitment to moving bipartisan legislation to promote safety and permanency for children in the child welfare system. I also want to thank both the majority and minority staff for giving APWA members the opportunity to meet with them as the legislation was being to developed.
As you know, APWA has a long standing interest in working with Congress to improve outcomes for children that come to the attention of the child welfare system. Public human service agencies are working diligently to ensure that every child has a safe, permanent family. We recognize that more needs to be done to improve and strengthen the child welfare system and that state agencies cannot do it alone.
In Illinois, we have just ended a decade of unparalleled growth in the number of children under the care and custody of the Department of Children and Family Services. Between June of 1986 and June of 1995, the si