"Adoption was created to provide homes for orphans. These by definition are children without parents. Car crashes, war, natural disasters. It was never created to provide children to 'poor infertile couples'. When did the wires get crossed? I guess when someone started making money. Children are not a commodity!!!! Get a puppy."
- An adoptee
"Follow the money" - Deep Throat
A NATURAL FAMILY*!
*ie. a family created by God and Nature (not by
the adoption industry and state adoption laws)
I did not write this article. Cheryl Barnes of CPSWatch.com did.
I give her full faith and credit for it.
Thanks, Karissa
Getting Paid
the Full Story on Adoption Incentive Payments
by Cheryl Barnes
Weve all heard about the adoption incentive payments states receive under the Adoption and Safe Families Act for each child that is adopted out. But exactly how do they work? What must states do in order to earn these payments? And, what do states do with the money?
In general, states earn $4,000 for each child that is adopted from foster care and an additional $2,000 for each special needs child. These payments are capped at $20,000,000 per state, which equals 5,000 adoptions.
In order for states to be eligible to earn incentive payments, they must increase the number of adoptions each year. If adoptions for the fiscal year are less than the average of the last three years, the state gets nothing.
Further, states only receive incentive payments on the portion of adoptions that exceeds the average of the previous three years. Example: the average number of adoptions for the previous three years is 1,000; the number of adoptions for this year is 1,200; the state only receives incentive payments for 200 adoptions.
In order for states to take full advantage of this gold mine, they must increase the number of adoptions by 5,000 each year.
States are required to spend their incentive payments on Child Welfare programs. Family Preservation and Reunification services have a federal cap so the only area left in which to spend the excess of funds is on creating more terminations and adoptions.
It stands to reason that states would use the money to create more adoptions so that they will be entitled to a hefty bonus check again next year.
Incentive payments were supposed to move unadoptable children out of foster care and into permanent homes. Yet two years after passing, the number of children in foster care has greatly increased. While adoptions have also increased, they have not been enough to counteract the rising foster care rates. The so-called unadoptable children remain in foster care while infant and toddler adoptions increase.
In short, states are taking more young children from families needlessly in order to raise their adoption numbers and get paid. Rising adoption numbers have created a false illusion of success when in reality, there are more unadoptable children in foster care today than there were two years ago, prior to the passing of this law.
