Foster Care Payment Categories Based on a Child's Care Needs and the Responsibilities of the Foster Parents Must Inform the Negotiation of Adoption Assistance
Foster Care Should Identify and Address the Child's Level of Care and Serve as a Foundation for the Negotiation of Adoption Assistance
As ODJFS’ Ohio’s Adoption Assistance Negotiation Process Work Group explores ways of making the state’s Title IV-E Adoption Assistance program operate more consistently and fairly, the child’s pre-adoptive history and foster care experience appears to assume more and more importance. Or, at least that seems be the case to me. Let me try to explain.
I am not raising any special needs adoptive children and many of you are, so please consider the source. Conversations with adoptive parents over the years, however, have convinced me that Ohio county agencies’ insistence on agreements for adoption assistance that are too far below children’s foster care payments is regarded as a major problem by families across the state. Similarly, I think that most adoptive parents would agree that closing the gap between children’s foster care payments and their monthly adoption assistance should be a major priority in efforts to reform Ohio’s adoption assistance program.
I am relatively sure, if the state’s reform efforts do not end up closing the gap between foster care payments and adoption assistance by a substantial margin, after devoting so much time and effort to “strengthening and stabilizing” the negotiation of adoption assistance, the whole enterprise will be dismissed as failure. Current levels of mistrust between parents and agencies will continue.
In thinking about ways to approach this challenge, it occurs to me that a child’s foster care payment rate should provide the foundation for arriving at a child’s adoption assistance payment.
Why?
A child's needs are identified and addressed in his or her pre-adoptive history, while the child is in foster care.
Foster care payments should reflect the child's needs, level of care and the parents’ responsibilities for providing that care.
If foster parents move toward adoption after caring for a child for two or three years, or if they are already the adoptive parents of other children, we can establish a pretty complete picture of their "family circumstances."
Having been identified, a child’s needs and the family’s circumstances do not suddenly change in the month after the child is adopted. Without a compelling reason, a significant drop in support, after the final decree of adoption is incompatible with the goal of sustaining a healthy, permanent family for the child.
How can we know what a reasonable and fair adoption assistance payment would look like if we don't look at the child's background, level of care and foster care payment rate?
It is striking that the child’s foster care payment rate has not played a significant role in the negotiation of his or her adoption assistance over the years. Federal financial participation is available for adoption assistance payments up to the child’s foster care payment rate. Nevertheless, agencies frequently tell adoptive parents that adoption assistance payments are supposed to be less than foster care because they will be fully responsible for the child’s care.
Adoption assistance proposals by county agencies are often rather arbitrary. Parents are often told negotiations must start at $0. There is no basis for this claim in law or policy.
County agencies often present the adoptive parents with forms or checklists that do not provide the opportunity for parents to discuss family circumstances that affect their capacity to incorporate their child into a healthy permanent family. There is little consistency among the forms in use.
After the family completes the form or checklists, it frequently goes to an agency committee that determines the amount of adoption assistance that it thinks is warranted.
There is little or no opportunity for the adoptive parents to negotiate with the committee. Instead of a negotiation, the agency employs an approval process, as if adoption assistance were a defined benefit program like Ohio Works First (TANF).
Connecting Foster Care Payment Rates to Adoption Assistance; Questions and Challenges Why Does the Foster Care Payment Need to Provide a Context for Determining the Adoption Assistance Payment?
There are a number of possible ways to bring adoption assistance payments closer to a child’s foster care payment rate. Wisconsin and Minnesota apply standardized instruments to establish foster care categories and corresponding foster care payment categories based on levels of care and caretaker responsibilities. The child’s foster care payment rate becomes the adoption assistance payment. See “The Role of Foster Care Payment Rates in Adoption Assistance Agreements in Four States.”
But, doesn’t federal law require adoption assistance payments to be negotiated? Yes, but the federal share of adoption assistance is only available up to a child’s foster care payment. So, if the adoption assistance agreement calls for a payment at the federal maximum, there is little to negotiate.
ODJFS has a group working on the establishment of statewide “tiered” foster care categories based on age, and level of care. I am not sure if the different foster care categories will have corresponding foster care payment levels on a statewide basis. Statewide foster care categories and definitions will probably applied in some fashion for arriving at adoption assistance payment rates.
Wisconsin and Minnesota both have state administered child welfare systems, so connecting adoption assistance payments to foster care payment rates is a less complicated endeavor than connecting adoption assistance payments to foster care payment rates in a county administered state such as Ohio.
I would imagine, that ODJFS will establish a stronger connection between a child’s pre-adoptive needs, his or her foster care “tier” or category, his or her corresponding foster care payment rate and the child’s adoption assistance payment.
Will state reforms establish a connection between the child’s foster care rate and the child’s adoption assistance at the county level? This assumes that Ohio might establish statewide foster care categories or tiers, but would not create “tiered” foster care payment rates on a statewide basis.
Will state reforms establish a connection between the child’s foster care rate and the child’s adoption assistance at the state level? This assumes that Ohio would establish statewide foster care categories or tiers and corresponding statewide foster care payment rates.
Both of these reforms would require significant increases in state funding to cover the non-federal portion of Title IV-E Adoption Assistance, Title IV-E Foster Care Maintenance or both. See “Ohio's System of Funding the IV-E Foster Care Maintenance and IV-E Adoption Assistance Programs Functions as a Disincentive for Higher Adoption Assistance Payments.” Linking adoption assistance to a child’s foster care payment rate would reduce the current stress and conflict around the negotiation of adoption assistance.
Will state reforms establish a system in which a specific category of foster care payment would generate a percentage of the child’s adoption assistance payment? The remaining amount would be negotiated based on a detailed discussion of a comprehensive list of family circumstances and how they impact the adopting family’s such as: Leaving a career, transportation needs, specialized child care needs, other children in the household and so on.
For example: a specialized foster care category entitled “therapeutic” might generate a foster care payment rate of $1,200 per month. Let us suppose the corresponding adoption assistance payment is 80% of the foster care payment or $960. The remaining $340 would be negotiated based on a discussion of various family circumstances.
County agencies would be tempted to limit the child’s adoption assistance as close to $960 as possible. A third party mediator would be needed with the authority to settle disputes.
I am presenting these scenarios as models. None of them may eventually be embraced. Each illustrates the main point of this post. When states set out to standardize and strengthen adoption assistance,
A. They standardize foster care categories and corresponding foster care payment based on an assessment of the child’s care needs and the responsibilities of the child’s caretakers, and
B. Adoption assistance cannot be strengthened and made more consistent without connecting it to a more standardized foster care payment system with categories and definitions that reflect children’s care needs and the responsibilities of caregivers.