Updates

Corrected Chart on 2023 Adoption Assistance Agreements and the Adoption Assistance Negotiation Process Workgroup

Correction of Previous Table

On July 27, I discussed “A Few Adoption Assistance Agreements Negotiated in 2023.” In my haste, I inserted a table that lopped off the county’s median adoption assistance payment in October 2022. Even though, I had very few cases to cite, I was impressed by the comparatively high payments that were negotiated. The column listing the 2022 county median was intended to illustrate that point. But I missed the bus, so to speak. The corrected table appears below.

This is encouraging, even though no conclusions can be drawn from a handful of cases. I know that in the overwhelming majority the parents took the initiative to inform themselves which gave them the confidence to play an active role in the negotiation process. Considering that 30 adoption assistance agreements were reached through mediation in 2022, along with 13 through July 2023, we have some indication that informed advocacy makes a positive difference for families and their special needs adopted children.

Ohio’s Project on “Strengthening and Standardizing” the Negotiation of Adoption Assistance Holds Its Introductory Meeting

The Adoption Assistance Negotiation Process Workgroup comprised of state officials, representatives from various child advocacy organizations and individual advocates held its first meeting on September 26, 2023. I am an invited member. Here are a few impressions and observations.

• The state recognizes the inconsistencies in the negotiation of adoption assistance across Ohio.

• The work group will make a good faith effort to standardize the process for negotiating adoption assistance. The group has the support of the administration at the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.

• Level of Care Assessment Instruments can be used to help establish a more uniform negotiation process. Integrating a child’s level of care with specific “family circumstances,” however, is not only a contentious problem today, but represents a particular challenge to establishing a more consistent procedure for negotiating adoption assistance across the state.

• The child’s level of care inevitably involves “family circumstances,” that is, the adjustments adoptive parents make to provide for their children’s care needs. Adjustments such as leaving a job, or circumstances such as retirement on a fixed income, or the need for specialized childcare in the case of single parent adoptions are all examples of family circumstances that are essential to negotiating a fair adoption assistance agreement.

• With respect to negotiating an adoption assistance payment, consistent with federal policy, a child’s care needs must be considered along with the parent’s capacity to provide for those needs. That conversation involves a thorough look at the family’s particular circumstances.

I encourage adoptive parents to tell the Adoption Assistance Negotiation Process Workgroup about family circumstances that affect your capacity to provide for your child’s ordinary and specialized care needs. Be sure to relate how your child’s needs and particular family circumstances are inextricably connected. You have a real opportunity to affect the work groups deliberations.

You can relate stories of family circumstances to Strengthening and Standardizing the Adoption Assistance Negotiation at the Office of Children and Families in the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS). Alternatively, you can send them to me at tpohanlon@gmail.com and I will pass them on.