Adoption Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

House Members Advance Foster Care Parent Information System

Foster parents and kinship caregivers will have access to a new information portal if a House bill becomes law.

House Bill 4975 would incorporate a foster and kinship parent information system into the existing Child Welfare Information Technology System.

Many delegates rose on the House floor Wednesday to speak to the ongoing problems in West Virginia’s foster care system, insisting this bill does not do enough to help the state’s more than 6,000 children in foster care.

Del. Larry Rowe, D-Kanawha, spoke in support of the bill, but said it fell short by not helping families before children are removed from the home.

“This bill will help make sure that once a child is removed from the home, that the information is provided, and that services can be provided that are particular to the child,” Rowe said. “So the bill itself is very good. But it’s only one step. We need to take the other step and help these families before they’re split up in court and abuse and neglect proceedings.”

Del. Brandon Steele, R-Raleigh, agreed with Rowe and added that attorney’s costs for child abuse and neglect cases could be used in different ways to keep families together.

“If we’re going to see real change in CPS, we need to start doing exactly what the gentleman from the 52nd brought up pre-petition services,” Steele said. “Actually getting into the houses and helping folks out. You got a dirty house case, one hearing with seven private attorneys costs more money than it costs to call Serve Pro to go over and clean that house up and try to keep that family together.”

Del. Adam Vance, a R-Wyoming, shared his experience as a foster and adoptive parent and called the bill a step in the right direction.

“We’ve had placements, foster placements in my house from the state, and from one of the agencies,” Vance said. “And the agencies when they come in, they are very good. They give you all the information that you could ask for. Plus, they give it to you, they hand it to you. They’ll sit there and answer any questions and talk to you about it or anything. The state when they come in, they said here’s the kid, five minutes later, they’re outta there.”

Daniel Linville, R-Cabell, spoke in favor of the bill but cautioned his fellow lawmakers about making sure the law is enacted.

“I would ask that, should we enact this into law, that you take a close look at this fiscal note, and you see exactly what and why and how this is supposed to happen,” Linville said. “Supposedly, they’ve reached out to the vendor for the PATH system, you know, a system that’s been utilized, supposedly for eight years and never been fully implemented at a cost of $400 million.”

House Bill 4975 passed the House unanimously and will now be considered by the Senate.

Senate Moves To Close Adoption Loophole, Upholding Parental Rights

A bill passed by the West Virginia Senate on Friday would close a loophole in the state’s adoption process and uphold parental rights.

A loophole in West Virginia law allows prospective parents to adopt children whose biological parents still have custody claims. But a bill passed by the West Virginia Senate Friday aims to remove this discrepancy before wrongful adoptions occur.

West Virginia parents who lose custody of their children in a circuit court can appeal the decision in the Supreme Court.

However, as the law currently stands, prospective parents can adopt a child while their biological parents are still waiting on a response to their custody appeal.

So far, the state has discovered no instances of wrongful adoption in this manner. Senate Bill 318, which was passed unanimously on Friday, would ensure the custody appeal process has closed before the adoption process begins.

Sen. Charles Trump, R-Morgan, who sponsored the bill, said it would reduce risk for the state and West Virginia families.

Under this bill, adoptive parents must confirm “that the parental rights of one or more of the child’s birth parents have been terminated by final order,” he said. That means the loss of custody was “affirmed on appeal and the time for reconsideration of the decision on appeal has expired,” or that “the decision was not appealed and the time for filing an appeal of the order or orders terminating parental rights of the child’s birth parents has expired.”

“If the Supreme Court, upon review of one of these cases, said it was an error — that the circuit court made an error in terminating parental rights — and the children have already been adopted by another family, that would be a disaster,” he said on the Senate floor Friday.

The bill will now be sent to the House of Delegates for further deliberation.

Adoptive Parents Charged With Felony Neglect After 3 Children Found Alone In Dangerous Conditions

Two adoptive parents have been charged with felony neglect after two children were found locked inside a small barn and a third child was located in an unprotected loft inside an adjacent home.

Two adoptive parents in West Virginia were charged with felony neglect after two children were found locked inside a small barn and a third child was located in an unprotected loft inside an adjacent home, police said Tuesday.

The parents were arraigned Tuesday on charges of gross child neglect creating a substantial risk of injury.

Authorities began investigating after they received a call Monday from someone expressing concern about the children’s welfare. Kanawha County sheriff’s deputies forced their way into the barn, where a boy and a girl were locked inside a small room. The children had been deprived of adequate food and hygienic care, and the room had no running water or bathroom facilities, the sheriff’s department said in a news release.

Inside the main residence, a small child was found alone in a loft about 15 feet (4.6 meters) high with no protection from falling, the statement said.

No adults were present at the home. The adoptive parents were arrested when they returned, and each was being held in jail on a $200,000 cash bond. An Oct. 12 preliminary hearing is scheduled. Jail records didn’t indicate whether the parents have attorneys who could comment on the charges.

The Associated Press is not naming the parents in order to protect the identity of the children, who have been placed with Child Protective Services.

Form Energy Project Funding, Bus Drivers, Adoption Tax Credits Approved By House Finance Committee

The House Finance Committee debated a wide variety of bills on Monday that were recommended for passage.

House Bill 2882 makes supplemental appropriations to the state Economic Development Fund. The highlight of the bill is subsidizing $105 million to support the Form Energy project, bringing a new age battery plant with 750 jobs to the old Weirton Steel plant site.

Some delegates and a committee member voiced concerns about the risk involved with a state ownership stake in the buildings and land.

Del. Doug Skaff, D-Kanawha, was among a committee majority supporting the state funding.

”Other states are doing this, they are spending, they are investing and I’m just blessed that we’re having an opportunity to compete now,” Skaff said. “I got a chance to meet the people from Form Energy. They are committed and did their due diligence. They looked all around the country to find the right location. We have an opportunity today to send the message that West Virginia is open for business.”

The total public support by the State of West Virginia for the project is $300 million, including this piece being advanced. Form Energy has pledged to put up at least $350 million.The bill now goes to the House floor for approval.

Also on the Finance Committee agenda,

House Bill 2346, declaring a crisis shortage of qualified bus drivers. The bill allows retired bus drivers to accept employment and keep their benefits. It passed unanimously.

House Bill 2002 relates to providing support for families. The measure raises the income tax credit for adoptive parents from $4,000 to $5,000 and establishes a pregnancy support program. This bill was also sent to the House floor.

House Bill 3036 uncaps the number of districts from three, and increases the limit on approved costs to $150 million under the BUILD WV Act. The goal is to incentivize building housing neighborhoods in communities around the state to supply lodging for West Virginia’s growing economic development projects. The bill was sent to the house floor for approval.

Becoming A Father: Adopting A Foster Child

I knew I would be a father someday. I just assumed it would happen the normal way. My wife Whitney had other ideas. She suggested that, instead of going the traditional biological route, we should become foster parents. After some long conversations, she had me onboard, too.

I wrote the following essay for the Father’s Day episode of Inside Appalachia.

Zack Harold takes a walk in the forest with his new daughter.

We began 10 weeks of classes, where we learned all the rules and got advice on how to deal with issues kids in foster care might experience. We started turning our home office into a kid’s room, too. This was tricky since we didn’t know how many kids we’d be getting, what their genders would be, or how old they would be, so we got a set of bunk beds, some gender-neutral bedding, a few toys — and figured we’d sort out the rest later.

After that, we had someone out to our house to do a home inspection. And just like that, the day after Easter 2019, our home was “open,” as they say in the foster care world. By that Wednesday, we got a call to see if we’d take a 5-year-old girl. By Friday night, Whitney and I were parents.

It was a strange thing to have a kid in the house at first. It’s a little bit like getting a roommate who can’t cook her own food, do her own laundry, or reliably groom herself without prompting.

Somehow we figured out how to take care of her and she seemed to enjoy living with us.

I felt a deep responsibility to take care of our little girl, and I liked spending time with her, but there was no spark.

For me, fatherly love came like a slow-rising tide. I was developing a bond; I just didn’t notice it as it was happening. Then I looked at her one day, I think I was following her up a trail in Kanawha State Forest, and realized I felt this brand-new kind of love in my heart — one that wasn’t ever going to go away.

Eventually it became clear our girl wasn’t going anywhere, either. It is a complicated thing, adopting a foster child. A lot of bonds have been broken in their lives for them to become eligible for adoption. The first priority of foster care is to reconnect kids with their biological families. If that fails, the goal is to find a safe, loving forever home for children. A few months after our little girl came to live with us, our foster care agency asked if we’d be willing to adopt her. This time, Whitney and I didn’t have to talk about it. The answer was, without hesitation: “Yes.”

So began months of paperwork and anxious waiting. Until you get your day in court, it feels like a trap door could open, and she could be gone. We’d had that experience before. About six months after welcoming our first foster daughter, a second little girl was placed in our home. Then one day Whitney called me at work. DHHR decided to move her to a biological family member, who would pick her up from school that day.

She lived with us for two weeks. I’d helped her with her homework. I’d fixed her breakfast. I’d hugged her goodnight. She was becoming part of her family. Now I wouldn’t get to say goodbye.

What if that had happened with this little girl, too? Luckily, I didn’t have to find out. Courtrooms are still closed because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. But last Thursday, we got our day in court via Skype.

As the hour approached, we all got dressed up. Whitney bought special dresses for the occasion. I put on a tie for the first time in three months. Then I propped my laptop on the coffee table and logged on. There was the judge, the court reporter, our lawyer, and the adoption specialist from Necco, our foster care agency.

The whole thing took about 15 minutes. Our lawyer asked us a few simple questions: Where we live, what is our wedding date, and whether we believed this adoption was in the best interest of our family. And then, it happened.

Throughout the Skype call, our girl had been motionless and expressionless. I worried what was going through her mind, but once it was over, she said she didn’t want to speak up because she didn’t know any of the people on the screen. Fair enough, kid. I think it was a strange experience for all of us.

The rest of the day was a party. The grandparents all came over — and stayed six feet apart, of course. But we ate hotdogs, hamburgers, and sheet cake. Our girl devoured about two dozen chocolate covered strawberries one of Whitney’s aunts made. And while we usually try to watch her sweets intake, we told her all bets were off that day.

After all, we missed out on five years of her life. We’ve got a lot of celebrating to catch up on.